That's a tricky question, as you know, in the sense that—
Let me answer it in this way. One of the features of the new Veterans Charter that I think is very important is that the wellness programs we provided under the new charter also extended to families. This was quite a new approach for the Government of Canada.
We are now able to provide counselling to families of veterans, and can do so in a much more aggressive fashion, if I can call it that. We don't have to wait until people have received a pension entitlement in order to deal with their families. That's given us a tool in our toolbox that we didn't previously have, and it's very useful.
That said, our legislation still refers primarily to the treatment of families of veterans. People who are still serving are not the responsibility of Veterans Affairs, as you would know. Rather, they are a responsibility of the Department of National Defence. The Department of National Defence prides itself on preparing for counselling the families of people who are deployed, preparing the families for all sorts of ideas about what the members themselves are going to face.
There was a bit of attention a few weeks ago given to how much DND is doing and how much the Province of Ontario is doing in some particular areas. I was pleased to read in the media, as I'm sure many of you were, that this issue has now been resolved in the sense that Ontario and the Department of National Defence have sorted out a way to provide more proactive assistance to families.
Certainly one challenge—and this is something that you would have experienced previously, as minister—is that we don't also want to abandon military families or have them ghettoized in such a way that they can only get benefits or attention from the federal government. The provincial government has certain responsibilities for families as well. We want to make sure that this is a comprehensive approach that has everyone helping, and it's my sense that the provinces want to do that too.