I apologize for that error. It was the vice-chief of the defence staff. I misspoke. The fact is that he's still in office and what we have is a statement from the minister saying it's being investigated.

I'm extremely disappointed that we didn't have a statement from the minister demanding his removal or his suspension immediately. The signal this sends to victims throughout the Canadian Armed Forces is that there is a small group of people at the top who simply do not take this seriously and who do not think that victims matter. If you can play golf with a man who is being investigated not only for an email, as one member likes to say, but for a pattern of accusations, which have been made public, of sexual misconduct before and while he was chief of the defence staff, then we have a very serious situation.

Members of the government are taking up the committee's time. They have effectively prevented us from dealing with the study of mental health in the military before Parliament rises for the summer. They have also effectively made sure that we are not dealing with the COVID recommendations before we rise for the summer. This motion is in the form it's in because of the filibuster that has been going on. Why are there suggested time limits? The time limits are there so that the Liberals can't do what they've been doing for the past few weeks, which is talk endlessly and not allow us to get to a vote. If the motions really are counterproductive, then let them come to a vote and vote against them, and then we'll see what happens. However, the Liberals aren't prepared to do that.

They're also talking about recommendations and asking us to proceed with the things we all agree on. Well, we don't all agree on the central purpose of this study. The central purpose is to get at the question of why General Vance was allowed to stay in office as chief of the defence staff for more than three years after the Minister of National Defence was presented with evidence of sexual misconduct, which he refused to look at. Another important question is why General Vance was initially appointed when there were accusations of sexual misconduct at that time. It's these failures to act by senior military and political leaders that allowed this situation to go on and allow it to continue to go on.

Again, what I would have liked to see is the removal of the vice-chief of the defence staff, on a temporary basis at least, to send the signal that this kind of behaviour—sexual misconduct—is understood and is not condoned, and that the government will act. Unfortunately, once again we see a failure to act and a statement simply saying that it's under investigation and will proceed as usual.

I remain bitterly disappointed about the fate of this committee in this Parliament, and bitterly disappointed about the failure of the government to act on sexual misconduct at the highest levels.

Randall Garrison

$586,431.00