Maybe, Mr. Stoffer, I'll try to give a little addition to the answer Brian gave to your first question. This is a very important one. I can't presume to make any political statements, and I wouldn't.
There are veterans who served Canada who are not eligible at the moment for the health services they need as much or perhaps even more than spouses. So it's not that one trades off against the other. We have a very complex eligibility system. After 60 years of adding patchworks, it's very difficult for people to navigate through it, even our own staff. What we don't want to do, even though there is an imperative to move quickly on this, is, in a rush, make some serious mistakes that we'll be back here having to be accountable for later on.
I don't detect any change in the commitment. I do sense that a comprehensive review of health services that will get away all the barriers to good health outcomes, including those for widows, is, in terms of veterans, at the top of the government's list of things they really want to do.
I guess all I can do, from a public service point of view, is say that it does take time. I can't account for every second of time that's lapsed between the time it was written and now. But what I can say is that I don't see a diminution in any commitment there. I do see the desire to make a comprehensive approach so that we don't add yet another patchwork eligibility issue.
Hearing loss is one of the major presenting conditions for pension eligibility. The benefit of the doubt is there. If someone doesn't have clearcut evidence that their service was a causative factor in their loss of hearing, if they're in a trade, a hard C trade or whatever, that's likely to produce hearing loss, benefit of the doubt means they will get their disability award or their disability pension.
If there are problems on an individual basis, we'll look at them for sure. I don't know that there's sort of a system-wide problem. Maybe you could provide more information and we'll respond to it.