Veterans Affairs committee  I told him I would mention it to VAC. One of the reasons Mr. Duffie wrote to me is that as a prelude to coming to Ottawa, I sent an email to our membership, generally. It reaches well over a thousand people in a matter of seconds. Thank goodness for the email system.

Veterans Affairs committee  I served with the Canadian Army Provost Corps, which is now called the military police. I served in Manitoba, Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, and Cyprus.

Veterans Affairs committee  I'm under the impression that this is being addressed by the various committees in Veterans Affairs Canada. The Gerontological Advisory Council has indicated that a veteran is a veteran is a veteran. Although I appreciate the different status of veterans, whether they be World

Veterans Affairs committee  In the various committees we serve on, we have brought that to the attention of Veterans Affairs Canada. They're trying to address an operation that will advise people of what is available to them. I'm under the impression that there are still 220,000 veterans out there who may o

Veterans Affairs committee  With respect to the slowness of Veterans Affairs Canada, some applications are extremely complex, and some applications require the resubmission of documents. The resubmission of documents takes time. Sometimes they ask for medical documents. In cases that I'm aware of, the secur

Veterans Affairs committee  Yes. As part of the veterans independence program.... There's a paragraph in the booklet that is handed out by VAC that says, “transportation costs to foster independence, for activities such as shopping, banking, and visiting friends when transportation is not otherwise availab

Veterans Affairs committee  With respect to Chris Beattie, on Monday of this week I joined a committee called the client advisory committee, out of Halifax. Mrs. Beattie sat to my right, and she has a folder that is approximately four or five inches thick with respect to the difficulties that took place in

Veterans Affairs committee  The Salute! magazine is sent out by Veterans Affairs Canada and it goes to every one of their clients. In addition, they send to me about 1,000 copies and I distribute 1,000 copies to the peacekeepers. Now the peacekeepers in some cases, of course, will receive two copies, one fr

Veterans Affairs committee  Yes, but I also feel there could be regional contact. Perhaps under contract, I guess, they can't always do volunteer work on a continuing and regular basis, but perhaps they could have someone who goes out and speaks to the veterans organizations and goes out and speaks to commu

Veterans Affairs committee  Yes, I do. Regarding new veterans, I understand that the general retirement age for a new veteran is 36 years of age, or in that vicinity. Once they leave the forces, for whatever reason—their end of engagement, or some other reason—they want to move on. If they have a problem a

Veterans Affairs committee  I agree that post-traumatic stress disorder is going to be an illness of the future, although the illness is already here. It's going to be a severe illness of the future for these young men and women who are serving overseas. The difficulties they regularly encounter are reporte

Veterans Affairs committee  Our association is right across Canada. We have 27 chapters. We're part of what might be described as the “big six”, or the “three big and the three little” type of thing, and we're on the “three little” end of it. The criterion for joining our organization is that you must have

Veterans Affairs committee  Yes, there is an effort to get out more communications. It is not particularly addressed to a rural setting. I live in Nova Scotia, in the Annapolis Valley, in a rural setting, although I'm only six kilometres north of a small town called Berwick. On the same token, my neighbour

Veterans Affairs committee  It could be better operated. There's room for improvement.

Veterans Affairs committee  A more local phone number, a more local 1-800 number, perhaps, for a province or two.