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I have a point of order, Madam Chair.

Just so you know, Mr. Kelly has left.

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I want to point out to the committee, because it appears that perhaps they are unaware, that the status of women report on sexual misconduct in the military has, in fact, been tabled. There are 21 recommendations, all of which are incredibly important and crucial, not least of which is the one that talks about freezing all general officer promotions and salary increases until a comprehensive and independent investigation has been done to ensure that they are all beyond reproach.

The status of women committee was able to do the work, which included some valuable contributions from the Liberal members of the committee, that was set before it, and the fact that this committee cannot because of Liberal members is something we should understand more about. Perhaps the Liberal members on this committee can indicate to us why the status of women committee was able to get a report done and this committee is being filibustered to ensure that we can't. In fact, we probably have even more insight and valuable contributions to make on this report, which would be complementary, as the members of this committee have said, to the status of women report.

I recommend that all members of the committee take a look at that report, because that committee was able to do what we have yet to do.

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

The point about investigating who knew what and when in the government around the allegations against General Fortin must absolutely stay in this motion. The reason is not that we are looking to influence or interfere in any way with due process or bring this into the court of public opinion. What we are doing in this committee, as our responsibility as legislators, is hold the government to account. We are the elected representatives who Canadians have sent here to hold the government to account, and the actions of the government—what they knew, how they acted and what they did—are what's material, not allegations about General Fortin.

We can leave that investigation quite separate, but how he remained in his position, how he was appointed to that position, who knew what, and when, and how they sat on this allegation, as they sat on other allegations that have been brought forward at this committee and done nothing with, is the responsibility of this committee. It is our responsibility to Canadians to hold the government to account, to understand whether or not they acted appropriately in dealing with not only General Fortin but also with the allegations around General Vance and the allegations around Admiral McDonald, which leads us to Zita Astravas, who has been called repeatedly by the House of Commons as well as this committee to appear on this study before the committee.

The Minister of National Defence appeared in her stead, and for the moment we, as a committee, decided that was appropriate. However, since then, information has come to light that contradicts the information that the Minister of National Defence provided on Zita Astravas' behalf, and therefore the only way to know what took place is to hear from Zita herself, which is why that is a critical element that we've been trying to get to since the very beginning of this study.

I, like Ms. Vandenbeld, am also disheartened by the tone that this committee is being forced—or feels that they are being forced—to take at this juncture. That is largely because of the way that the matters are being dealt with, from arbitrary suspensions to adjournments to, yes, filibustering to ensure that we can't get to a vote.

If we really want to move forward, then we need to be able to make our points clearly and succinctly and then be able to get to a vote and allow the will of the committee to transpire, instead of simply discussing and complaining about the tone. In fact the tone could quite clearly change if there weren't a filibuster by various members, which would go a long way toward improving the situation and allowing us to do the job that we have been sent here to do.

That brings me to my third and most important point. Yes, we do agree that this may be one of the most important studies that we have done as a defence committee, and we have done it at the moment in time that this information is required. We have seen from lengthy study of witnesses' testimony that the government perhaps did not behave in the way that we expected them to behave—appropriately, efficiently or accordingly—and we need to make recommendations to ensure that it doesn't happen in the future. That's why we need to put in place a timeline to ensure that this report moves at the pace that it needs to and that various factions of this committee are not able to unduly hold up the process.

More importantly, I think we need to understand from the government why, when they had the opportunity to implement all the recommendations in the Deschamps report, they didn't, and why, with Bill C-77, a clearly important aspect of victims' rights, they didn't implement those either, so—

—we need to be moving forward rather than holding things up.

Thank you.

I am done for the moment. Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I have made my point.

Thank you very much.

Thank you to the witnesses for being here today.

General Carignan, could you tell me when you were made aware that this position was being created and that you were to fill it?

It was at the end of March.

Thank you.

Do you have a job description and performance metrics? If so, could you table those for us?

That's perfect. Would you be able to table that with this committee when you have it finalized?

Thank you very much.

We heard very discouraging testimony from Dr. West today. In her testimony she talked about the double standard, and that when she was posted outside of the country and fraternized with the U.S. military as a junior officer, she was fined, charged and repatriated. She was drummed out of the Canadian Forces essentially through a constructive dismissal.

We know that Lieutenant-General Coates was posted as the deputy commander of NORAD, which is one of the most significant positions for Canada's defence, and that he was guilty of a very similar offence. However, the media and the military have stated repeatedly that no rules were broken.

Could you help us understand which it is? Is it that no rules are broken when you're on deployment and fraternizing with another person, or they are, and a general was not charged, was not fined, was not repatriated and is still serving in the Canadian Forces?

General, we have Dr. West on the call, and she has a record for being charged for what appears and has been in the public to be exactly the same thing, probably of a significantly lower level of severity because she was a junior officer, not a three-star general.

I think, if you could, we would like you to get back to the committee and give us some clarity on whether or not, in fact, no rules were broken in the case of Dr. West or in the case of a still serving lieutenant-general.

General Carignan, we know of generals who are complicit, either through their silence or their actions. What authority do you have to hold them accountable, to ensure that their conduct is beyond reproach, if they are holding such important positions?

Thank you very much, Madam Chair, and thank you again to the witnesses.

General Trudeau, I'd like to follow that line of questioning.

The last time you were here, certainly you left me with the impression that everything is pretty much operating effectively and perfectly, with no challenges in the CFNIS and the entire military police community, and that there really wasn't much that needed to be done differently by you and your organization.

We then saw the Facebook post. We've had media articles that say testimony sometimes gets lost, that people perhaps don't get charged, or that different charges are laid in different situations.

I am having some trouble understanding how people would have trust in the system if in fact that were true.

Do you believe there are some challenges you need to address, or is everything pretty much operationally effective and nothing needs to change?

Thank you, General.

What about the actual investigation process? Are you confident that every investigation is meeting the rigorous standards that you've set? Do you have an internal audit ability to verify and double-check that the attitudes, behaviours and structural process are being met by all of your military police, regardless of what rank or authority they might be investigating?

But how do you know? What oversight mechanisms do you have in place? What internal audit? In the case of the Facebook post, how would you have found out that these were the attitudes and behaviours of your military police had there not been a newspaper article?