Monday, June 16, 2008

Union: Gender imbalance in Defense Dept.

OTTAWA (UPI) -- A Canadian union has called for more women in Defense Department emergency response units after women were stripped and washed by male responders.

The Union of National Defense Employees wants a mandate to employ more women in the hazardous materials and security units following an anthrax scare last year at a military base in Quebec, in which an all-male team took off female employees clothing and scrubbed them through the decontamination process, the Ottawa Citizen reported.

Union President John MacLennan told the newspaper there are only seven female emergency responders in the Defense Department across the country.

"You have to have a hazardous response team that represents gender, male and female," he said.

Defense Department spokeswoman Lynne Rattray told the newspaper in an e-mail the incident is being overblown by the union.

"In this particular case, all personnel present were informed of what was involved in the decontamination process, and voluntarily complied," she wrote.


Copyright 2008 by United Press International
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