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During the past six (6) years, the Office of the CDS has acted as the Final Authority to

determine my grievance – first General Natynczyk, then General Lawson and now General Vance.

In my opinion, the exaggerated amount of time that has elapsed in the interim is absurd and inacceptable especially when one considers that the entire Second World War was only six years in length! And this was a time when carrier pigeons and radio were primary forms of communications.

There is no justifiable excuse for it to be taking such a protracted period of time to

determine my grievance, which the (then) Canadian Forces Grievance Board considered back in 2011 and found that I had been wrongfully relieved of my duties and in upholding my grievance, recommended that steps be taken to restore my reputation. Since that time, I

have been released from the Forces on medical grounds and as a result, through no fault of my own, most of the remedies recommended by the Board are no longer within the purview of the grievance process to grant.

In October 2015, the Federal Court of Canada directed the CDS to use the Findings and Recommendations of the Grievance Board to make a final determination of the said grievance. That judicial decision also remains a ‘dead letter’.

I find the Forces treatment of this matter since 2010 utterly unfair and, given both the

Grievance Board resoundingly clear and explicit findings and the Federal Court of Canada’s ruling, perhaps even impudent since this continued failure to act by the CDS is proof to many that there is no intention to determine my grievance fairly or to act in good faith. This continued failure to act is also further compounding the great injustice done to me and my family. Moreover, it lays bare the abject failure of the military justice system and the military grievance system.

I therefore request your personal intervention to ensure that the CDS honours his statutory obligation to determine my grievance ‘expeditiously’ as required under s.29.11 of the National Defence Act.

Respectfully,

Bernard Ouellette