Veterans Affairs committee  In the Colorado Springs area, you've captured it correctly. There are lots of discounts offered to those who serve. Remember that when you're discharged from the U.S. military, they have a different apparatus in their country from what we have. They have different medical care programs, and they have different income tax activities.

Veterans Affairs committee  I'll try to give you a short picture. My comment is not intended to demean any race or any nationality in our country. I took my wife, when I got re-married, over to Holland and showed her a cemetery outside my hometown where some 2,700 Canadians are interred, and she was quite taken by the way it was maintained.

Veterans Affairs committee  I think the short comment on that is for five years the country where I was born and where Andy's relatives come from was occupied by the oppressors and they were busy starving us to death. They wanted to annihilate us, and Canada came along and gave us back our freedom. It's a very precious gift, and that country will never forget.

Veterans Affairs committee  Thank you for your question. It's one that would be more appropriately addressed to the Legion or to Veteran Affairs Canada. I will attempt to answer your question. I was active with the Legion on the national level from about 1999. There was an amendment passed to the benefits program, wherein a serving member could start to obtain disability benefits while still serving.

Veterans Affairs committee  Yes, as I said in my testimony, most of the applicants today apply by telephone and have a dialogue with a counsellor. The counsellor can be one of ours, or the person may phone a client service agent at Veterans Affairs to ask the same question. The person would be given an explanation of what the means test is.

Veterans Affairs committee  Yes. In the dialogue they have with the counsellor, that's clearly explained to them. The counsellors are there as a service to them. They would be very inquisitive and would ask if the person understands. If the person still does not understand, we mail to them all the information relevant to the program and ask them to complete the financial analysis.

Veterans Affairs committee  I do. Mr. Arthur Hair discovered a Boer War veteran in a hospital in Montreal in 1909. This is where we started. Hair himself had been in the Boer War, and he recognized this veteran lying on a gurney. He had the same discharge paper in his pocket that Hair had. That's how he found out he was a veteran.

Veterans Affairs committee  I wouldn't say it was a dramatic increase in the amount of moneys we've collected. What happens is that it's event-based. Your chairman would remember that in Nova Scotia, about four or five years ago, a large number of unmarked graves suddenly were identified. Right away the donation money just flowed—big amounts—because that was something that caused Canadians to be angry.

Veterans Affairs committee  We in the Last Post Fund use the same definition the Government of Canada uses; that is, one who has served his country in the armed forces past the recruit training stage till he's qualified in his trade. For instance, a pilot student who joins the air force and washes out after a year and a half is not a veteran by that classification, the same as a radio repair technician, who may take four years of training to become basically qualified.

Veterans Affairs committee  Yes.

Veterans Affairs committee  I'm quite familiar with the program, since I was the one who designed the air force one. Honorary colonel, or honorary captain in the navy, is a rank that's bestowed upon individuals of Canada—they don't have to be service members—in recognition of their unique contributions to Canada and because of their dedicated involvement in the unit they represent.

Veterans Affairs committee  Sure, and thank you for your question. I was in Colorado Springs, and there's a large mountain there that was right behind our headquarters. It's called Pikes Peak. It was named after a U.S. army surveyor who came from Maine; his name was Zebulon Pike. I used to be quite brave in telling the Senate committees and the government committees who came to visit that Canada has never been invaded except once.

Veterans Affairs committee  I'm an immigrant and a Canadian. We are a special people. We live in such a free country, with all that we have, and when you project yourself out in the military somewhere where people do not have what we have, it's a natural thing to try to better their lives in some way. Our soldiers, sailors, and airmen have been on record doing just that since we went on our first deployment in the Boer War.

Veterans Affairs committee  I can't give you an exact date. It would have been somewhere in the post-World War II period under the Pension Act. I just can't tell you the precise date. I'm sorry.

Veterans Affairs committee  Just like the Pension Act, a number of changes were enacted in Parliament to the veterans burial regulations. Major changes were made at one time, but I can't recall the precise date. It had to do with the provision of services, embalming, the change of rates, and who would be eligible.