If I may, Mr. Chair, I will address the issue of mental health and the ombudsman's report.
The Canadian Forces and the department are working very closely with the ombudsman. When we speak of discrepancies, Mr. Chair, I don't know where that's focused at, because the comments made by the ombudsman did not focus on discrepancies across the country. They were targeted at a specific area, be it at Base Petawawa and Base Gagetown.
As for what we have in place across the country, if a man or woman in uniform is sick and needs help, they go to their local mental health clinic. We have those in place. They're called operational stress injury clinics, which are provided by the Department of Veterans Affairs and are integrated with our OTSSCs, which are operational stress injuries clinics that the Canadian Forces run. We have many across the country, and they're staffed with psychiatrists, psychologists, nurses, and addiction counsellors to provide that help.
In particular, we have just been recognized by the national Mental Health Commission and the senator on having a model that the rest of government, and perhaps the provinces, should follow in regard to what we have in place from a policy process and machinery point of view when it comes to mental health.
On the two issues of Petawawa and Gagetown, I'm fully aware of those two concerns. First, on the Gagetown piece, I can tell you that I spoke to my staff just last week, and the concerns in Gagetown of getting more staff there have actually improved since the ombudsman's report, which we do take very seriously and do address. With Petawawa, we actually now have a full-time major. I just recognized him last week for the great work he has done that is actually coming into play.
We know where the challenges are. We're not perfect. It's better than it was. We know what we need to do, but clearly we're going to do that hand in hand with the ombudsman.
The focus right now for me is a priority on Petawawa and Gagetown. Those are the two areas that I'm working on personally to make sure they're at that same standard. Part of the challenge with Petawawa--and I know you've heard it before--is getting people to Petawawa. At this point, we are busing mental health providers from Ottawa up to Petawawa.
A decision was made, not in the last four years but before that, not to put an operational stress injury clinic in Petawawa. In hindsight, it was probably a bad decision. What we see here today is that having an OSI clinic in Petawawa would have been the right thing to do. It was not done, but we're dealing with that issue to ensure the men and women in uniform get the support they need in Petawawa.
Thank you.