Minister asks provinces for investigative systems

OTTAWA — Federal Sport Minister Pascale St-Onge is calling on her provincial and territorial counterparts to establish independent bodies to handle harassment complaints from athletes by the end of this year.

“All governments will work together, to have every athlete and participant in Canada protected by an independent mechanism, targeting to achieve this by the end of 2023,” St-Onge told reporters Saturday.

In recent weeks, Ottawa has said that provinces and territories are making progress in offering athletes an equivalent standard for them to report abuse or harassment, as well as having those complaints independently investigated.

St-Onge said that as of Saturday, Quebec, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia have such mechanisms in place, while the rest can either start their own bodies or join the jurisdiction of the federal Sport Integrity Commissioner.

She announced Saturday a target for all provinces and territories to follow through on that pledge by the end of this year.

St-Onge argued that having a targeted timeline amounts to “tremendous progress” in having a uniform approach to the issue, and stressed it takes time to get a credible reporting body up and running.

“We understand that all jurisdictions have their own processes, their own budget agenda, their own calendar that we need to respect. But that doesn’t mean that we don’t take the safety of athletes, children, teenagers, young adults across the country seriously,” she said.

St-Onge was speaking after meeting with her provincial and territorial counterparts on the sidelines of the Canada Games in Charlottetown, where she said they compared different options for these mechanisms.

Prince Edward Island Health Minister Ernie Hudson, who hosted the meeting, told reporters the goal is “eliminating wrongdoers from sport” across Canada.