Veterans Affairs Committee on April 29th, 2009

[Rob Clarke, Conservative, Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River, SK]

For the eight-week program, how many beds are in that facility? How many people can attend? How many allotments are there overall at Ste. Anne's?

[Doug Clorey]

I don't have an answer to that, but I can get it to you.

[Rob Clarke, Conservative, Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River, SK]

Okay. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thank you, Mr. Clarke.

There's one more spot right now for the Conservative Party.

Mr. Kerr, you have five minutes.

[Greg Kerr, Conservative, West Nova, NS]

Thank you very much for being here. You certainly are taking the questions away quickly.

I was interested when you talked about the national review that was done. I'm referring to the Canadian community health survey. I'd like to know a little more about that, because I'm sure that's not just for veterans. That was done for a whole number of reasons. Can you give us some detail on when it was done and when it will be updated, how we participate, I guess, overall in it, and how it's accessed when it's finished? I know it was referred to quite often, so I'm just wondering.

[Doug Clorey]

I can give you some general information. I don't have all the details with me here. Hopefully, we can do that when we have a more detailed presentation on the mental health strategy.

It was conducted in 2002, and it was a general community health survey conducted by Statistics Canada. Part of it had a Canadian Forces supplement, which was directed towards--and I don't have the exact numbers of CF members, but a significant percentage of Canadian Forces members--the mental health of Canadian Forces members in particular. It was out of that CF supplement that those four priorities that I mentioned earlier came.

[Greg Kerr, Conservative, West Nova, NS]

When do you expect that will be updated or done again?

[Doug Clorey]

I don't have any information on that at all. That's essentially pursued by Statistics Canada.

[A voice]

We can get that information.

[Greg Kerr, Conservative, West Nova, NS]

Okay.

When you started off, Mr. Clorey, you were talking about whether there was a stigma. I know Judy was raising the question. It's something that comes up and you hear about it. As a matter of fact, my friend was talking about the RCMP, and I remember being involved several years ago where all you were hearing about was stress leave for RCMP officers. There was nothing about treatment or going somewhere else, just that they were off duty.

Are we making progress on those stigma issues in terms of depression, or alcohol dependency particularly? I'm not so sure I understand as much about the social phobia that was referred to. Do you sense that, not just with Veterans Affairs but in terms of delivery, we making progress in breaking through that stigma part?

[Doug Clorey]

As I mentioned earlier, I think we're making progress in terms of the stigma associated with post-traumatic stress disorder, and that's reflected in the number of clients we have. In terms of depression, I'm not so sure, and that's reflective generally of Canadian society. There is still significant stigma around the whole notion that depression is a clinical condition that requires the same kind of assistance as any other kind of medical condition. The attitude still continues to be a “get over it” type of approach.

There's probably some movement, but it's not as significant in terms of the veteran community as it has been with post-traumatic stress disorder.

[Greg Kerr, Conservative, West Nova, NS]

Okay. And that would be typical within the society dealing with the issue, would it not?

[Doug Clorey]

Correct.

[Darragh Mogan]

The only additional comment I would make is that I think in the military there is more of a recognition that operational tempo and the nature of the deployments can bring about things, some of which are very natural responses to very unnatural circumstances, and some of which are very unnatural responses to unnatural circumstances, and they need to deal with it. Witness the fact that both organizations have made a strong commitment in the mental health area. Witness the fact that the number of individuals who come to us for disability benefits has come up from 5,000 ten years ago to 14,000 now, or 11,000 or 12,000. So I think it's kind of coming out of its shell.

The other thing that has a very strong influence, frankly, is the lack of research on things that you can't see. So all the research that all countries do tends to go to the physical injuries, and thank God that happens. But there's a whole range of research or a whole range of things that we don't know about mental well-being and mental illness that will be uncovered when the stigma leaves the research community as well. So it's still something we have to deal with. Nevertheless, these people are coming to us, and we have to respond.

[Doug Clorey]

As just a final comment on that, I find it disturbing that we're not making more movement in this area, because the World Health Organization indicates that by 2010, I believe, or in the neighbourhood of 2015, it will be the second leading cause of disability in the world next to heart disease. We just don't seem to be moving fast enough to address that.

[Greg Kerr, Conservative, West Nova, NS]

And there is a massive cost, of course, to the economy as well. We're going to get a chance another day to pursue some of this, but I really think it's something we have to talk more about, not just within a departmental context but in a public context, so I appreciate that.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thank you, Mr. Kerr.

Just to clarify, because the answers were from two individuals, you are saying that the number one issue is depression.

[A voice]

Yes.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thank you very much.

Now we'll go to Mr. Stoffer.

Maybe a maximum of three questions at once would be good, sir.

[Peter Stoffer, NDP, Sackville—Eastern Shore, NS]

I have three questions, actually. The first one is on the hospitals. What is the long-term plan for the hospitals when the vast majority of World War II and Korean veterans have passed on?

Also, in Nova Scotia, the 1-866 number for veterans shuts down at 4:30 and they are told to call back the next day. I wonder if that can all be changed and transferred over to handle calls across the country. It's frustrating. The people who answer the phones during the regular business hours are very good, but the problem is that if you call after a certain time, you're told to call back.

The other issue is that you had indicated—and we're quite aware of this, Doug—the fact that there are many people within DND collecting a DVA pension. Could you please tell us how many of them could be doing so, and are they part of this statistical information that you've given us? If you don't have the number, maybe you could send it to us later. It seems rather ironic that they're not veterans, which is understandable, but they do receive the DVA pension. So it would be interesting to know how many of them are, and are they part of your statistical information?

That should do it for now. I have many more questions, but the chair will cut me off, I'm sure.

[Darragh Mogan]

I'll answer the first two, and maybe Doug can answer the third for Mr. Stoffer.

On the long-term-care plan for our hospitals, Veterans Affairs created these hospitals in the absence of any alternative in the community. Right now there are about 250,000 to 260,000 nursing home beds in Canada that weren't there at the end of World War II. The long-term-care response at the end of World War II was a stop-gap measure--and a very important one, by the way.

Now the older veterans are sort of voting with their feet and wanting more and more to stay in the community. Our long-term plan for these facilities—even for the modern veteran, because it's so important for long-term care to be close to family and home—is to emphasize and support individuals staying close to home in existing Canadian nursing homes. Over time, our plan is to specialize the care and services offered in the contract beds we now have for the older veterans that they can't get in the community--primarily respite care, and then geriatric care.

I think we could give the committee a longer briefing on our long-term-care strategy, but in summary that's the direction in which we're proposing to go. Even the traditional veterans want to stay close to the community. For instance, they don't want to go to Sunnybrook Hospital if they live in Barrie, Ontario, because they'll never see their families again.

Adding eligibility for Canadian Forces veterans is a political decision that will have to be considered in time.

Regarding the 1-800 number, I'll have to check about the availability. It seems to me those service hours are meant to be longer, but we'll have to get back to the committee on that.

[Peter Stoffer, NDP, Sackville—Eastern Shore, NS]

On the hospital issue, you indicated they want to stay longer in their homes, but in Halifax there's quite a waiting list, and there's a three-tier process to get in. If you're absolutely correct that most of the veterans want to stay near their homes, why would we have such a massive waiting list to get into one facility and a three-tier process to get in? In reality, there simply are not enough nursing homes in areas like Atlantic Canada to facilitate that.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but you didn't say the hospitals may not have a long-term future 20 years from now, but I hope that's not what you're indicating. Ste. Anne's does a wonderful job in Quebec, as does Camp Hill and others, even though they're provincially run and federally funded. I would hate to see the demise of those institutions if we go to more community-based ones. There's nothing wrong with community-based hospitals for those who want them, but the reality is the vast majority of veterans I talk to on a regular basis love Camp Hill. They would love to be able to get into Camp Hill, but they can't because of the eligibility restrictions.

[Darragh Mogan]

That's probably true, but I can't comment on whether those eligibility criteria are going to change. I can tell you that when you give veterans in Nova Scotia a choice between staying in Eastern Passage or going into Camp Hill, they'll stay in Eastern Passage. It's the absence of choice rather than the presence of something else, so we're working on increasing the number of choices.

We will get back to you on the 1-800 number and the availability of service.

Doug, do you want to comment?

[Doug Clorey]

If I understood you correctly, you were asking how many clients of Veterans Affairs who receive disability benefits are still serving in the Canadian Forces.

I don't have the figure for all our clients, but of the 11,888 clients who have psychiatric conditions, 1,369 are still serving. They would be included in our statistics.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thank you, Mr. Clorey and Mr. Stoffer.

Now we'll go to Mr. Andrews for five minutes.