Military Misconduct: Change Will Take Years, Lt.-Gen. Carignan says | News Today

The military leader who is leading culture reform in the Canadian Armed Forces amid ongoing investigations into sexual misconduct says her team is working on a five-year timeline to achieve concrete results.

Lt.-Gen. Jennie Carignan said on Thursday that she was more hopeful than ever that the right leaders were around the table to make things happen.

“The horizon I’m working with right now is five years for instituting effective and irreversible positive change, but we have to understand that staying vigilant about our culture never ends,” she said.

“In my 35 years of service, I have never seen such commitment and commitment to the issue of culture change as it is today.”

Carignan spoke during a military technical briefing and gave an “overview of the ministry’s approach to conduct and culture change”.

Some of the new initiatives include expanding the reach of the Sexual Misconduct Response Center’s resources by creating regional sites across the country, with a mobile app serving as a centralized online platform for support services. and a program to provide independent legal advice to victims of sexual assault. misconduct.

Carignan said his team – now a group of more than 200 – are currently analyzing how to measure success.

“Success will be like members of the defense team feeling psychologically safe showing you work every day… that’s the vision we put forward. Now we are going to design a framework to measure this progress, it will be a mix of qualitative and quantitative data, ”she said.

The Liberal government appointed Carignan chief professional conduct and culture leader in April as it launched another review of sexual misconduct in the Canadian Armed Forces aimed at providing recommendations on what an external reporting system should look like.

More details to come …