Veterans minister under fire for ignoring winning design of Afghan war memorial

An online survey which the Liberal government used as a basis for choosing the design of Canada's national memorial to the Afghan war was not scientific, but the veterans minister says that doesn't mean it should be discounted.

Ginette Petitpas Taylor, recently appointed to the veterans portfolio, and Pascal St-Onge, the heritage minister, spent an hour Tuesday evening defending the decision to award the project design to Team Stimson, even though another group was deemed by an independent jury to have won the competition.

The decision to change course, Petitpas Taylor said, was based on the overwhelming results of the online survey, which was not part of the initial process. St-Onge told the veteranscommitteethat her department provided only support and advice.

Just over 12,000 Canadians responded, including over 3,000 who identified as having served in Afghanistan and another 3,000 who said they were associated with the mission.And they by a wide margin chose the design by Adrian Stimson, a member of the Siksika First Nation and a veteran, the minister said.

She described the results as overwhelming and significant.

"Just because it wasn't a scientific survey doesn't mean that it's not valid. We certainly still heard the opinions of 12,000 Canadians," Petitpas Taylor told the four-party committee.

"We owe these veterans a debt we can never fully repay. Therefore, choosing the design that best matches the monument that veterans and people who played a role in the Afghanistan mission want was the least we could do."

The veterans department encouraged veterans to take part by reaching out to them through their benefits account, both senior officials and the minister told the committee.

But Bloc Quebecois MP Luc Desilets described the questionnaire as a "garbage survey" at one point late in the meeting, and was frustrated as were the Conservatives and the lone New Democrat on the committee at failing to get a clear answer about why the sampling was introduced when an expert panel had already chosen the design byTeam Daoust, led by public artist Luca Fortin.

The decision by the review panel was not announced by Veterans Affairs Canada when the process ended over two years ago. Inexplicably, the department in 2021 launched public consultations to gain feedback on the proposals.

When the decision to go with Team Stimson was announced in June, the government acknowledged to Team Daoust that it had been selected by the panel and offered compensation.

"Sadly, this does seem very confusing, and I've heard again and again that this was a political decision," said Rachel Blaney, the NDP's veterans critic.

After being informed of the government's decision, Team Daoust filed a formal complaint with the Canadian International Trade Tribunal.

It has been almost a decade since the former Conservative government announced it intended to build a memorial for those who served in Afghanistan and the current debate comes in the shadow of the annual Remembrance Day ceremonies.

Veterans were not happy with the proposed location of the monument and when the Liberals came to power they moved it to a patch of land across from the Canadian War Museum in downtown Ottawa.

The committee was told construction has yet to begin but the plan is to unveil the memorial in 2027.