Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you for being here today, Mr. Allard and Ms. Burdett.
You made very professional and very good presentations, and I think you're quite clear on your points. I very much appreciate hearing from the Royal Canadian Legion.
I have a lot of military retirees, as well as war veterans, with the former military bases of Cornwallis and Greenwood in my riding. So I have a lot of interaction with members of your organization through my office.
My father was very proud of his association with your organization. He was a service officer and he was president of his legion. He was a World War II vet and a member of the West Novie Regiment. I was fortunate to go to the unveiling of a cairn of the West Novie at Camp Aldershot, which I point out is the oldest regiment in the country. I believe the Annapolis Regiment and the Lunenburg Regiment were amalgamated to form the West Novies. So I had a chance to see that.
My office works with and is in contact with many service officers in many branches in western Nova Scotia. We recognize the very difficult work they do.
One of the questions I would ask is on the pension advocates and that office at Veterans Affairs. In your relationships with them, as they apply or as they launch appeals and they work with them, are you satisfied with the professionalism of the service, the access to the service, the number of people employed in that division to service your members? Is it at the level that you would like, or would you like to see some improvements?