Veterans Affairs Committee on March 6th, 2008

[Peter Stoffer, NDP, Sackville—Eastern Shore, NS]

No, this is in the War Memorial room in the Peace Tower. Do you know where the books are? There's no end date on it.

[Les Peate]

Our first peacekeeping mission in Korea—in fact, it was our first Canadian peacekeeping mission—was in 1949 when we sent somebody to supervise the elections. That's where you get the 1949. You are quite correct that an armistice was signed in 1953; a peace treaty has never been signed. Technically, North and South Korea are at war.

[Peter Stoffer, NDP, Sackville—Eastern Shore, NS]

Rather interesting. My last question—

[The Chair, Conservative, Rob Anders]

And that's why it's especially fun, as a marine, to serve in the DMZ.

Mrs. Hinton, with the Conservative Party, for seven minutes.

[Betty Hinton, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

Good afternoon, Mr. Peate. It's always a pleasure to see you and listen to you. You remind me a lot of another voice I could listen to forever, which is Morgan Freeman's. That's a compliment coming from me.

The second thing I want to start with is to bring you special greetings from my executive assistant, who happens to be the president of your fan club. We don't need to go into details as to why, but I would be remiss if I didn't bring you greetings from her.

You mentioned a couple of things in your speech today that I found really interesting and intriguing. One of them was regarding allied veterans, who received benefits until 1995, when they were cut off unceremoniously. I happen to be on the same side of that issue as you are, and I can give you my personal assurance that it's not being overlooked.

The second thing I wanted to ask you is regarding your comment about a separate department for widows. You're obviously aware of the ombudsman's position. Do you think that would suffice, or is there another rationale behind your wanting a separate department for widows?

[Les Peate]

I could be wrong...and happily, I'm not in the situation where I'm leaving a widow, but I think one of the concerns is whether or not...the entitlement for VIP for widows. This is very much an issue these days. Would a widow really get the VIP? If a veteran is on VIP--the veterans independence program--and dies, the lawn still has to be cut, the snow has to be moved, and all that sort of thing. Sometimes there seems to be some doubt as to whether the widow would be eligible for the same benefits the veteran had.

We haven't seen this new policy long enough, really, to determine how it works. As I said, right now it's a concern rather than a complaint. But we are concerned about it.

The other interesting one that came up--and this probably doesn't affect Veterans Affairs as much as DND--is if a person was killed in Korea, and now, only now, his wife is in need of assistance, does she get VIP? Right now, obviously, she probably wouldn't. And the reason she wouldn't is because of course VIP is a Veterans Affairs program. The pension she's getting from the army is the DND one.

If the guy was fortunate enough to live for a little while and get VIP, and then pass away, his wife would still get it.

But as it is, we don't know.

[Betty Hinton, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

Mr. Peate, I have some wonderful news for you. We just added 12,000 widows in the last budget, the one that just passed, and it's for that very reason. We had some of these very stoic men who did not apply for VIP even though they were eligible to do so. They died before their wives were able to get them to apply for it. These last 12,000 that we just added--we added 12,000 last year and we just added 12,000 more this year--are precisely who are covered: women whose husbands didn't apply.

So I'm very happy to be able to give you that kind of news.

[Les Peate]

One of the things we're encouraging people to do is...and a good example is PTSD. I'm about in the middle I guess. I'm 79--I'll admit it. But a lot of our veterans are in their 80s, and they're saying what's the point of applying for a pension. I say, look, even if you're only going to live six months to draw your pension, you're going to leave a widow.

This is a point we can't stress enough. This is probably one of the reasons I think we should have more emphasis on widows. When I say widows, I'm being a male chauvinistic pig, of course, and saying that the veterans are male and the survivors are female. But yes, I think definitely that is very much a concern, and I'm hoping they will address it.

It's a fairly new initiative, but I'd like to see what happens on it.

[Betty Hinton, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

Sure, well, maybe you and I can have coffee afterwards and I'll try to bring you up to speed, because it's very good news.

[Les Peate]

That's great.

[Betty Hinton, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

There are some other things.

You mentioned beds. I've been approached by a number of representatives from a number of different veterans groups with some pretty innovative ideas. We're taking all of those ideas into consideration so that we can actually improve the situation for veterans and their widows.

Perhaps you and I can have a coffee sometime when we're not limited to how much time we have to speak, and you could give me some of your ideas on what you'd like to see happen.

[Les Peate]

I think so.

I might add, incidentally, as you know, that your executive assistant knows whereof she speaks, because her father was a Korean veteran.

[Betty Hinton, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

Yes, he was.

I know you're aware that this year is the 55th anniversary of the ceasefire in Korea, and I wanted to assure you that Veterans Affairs is organizing events. I brought a list with me today, but as per the rules, we need to do something in French and English for both sides. I will be happy to put that forward at a later date.

I look forward to seeing you at those events.

[Les Peate]

Are you going?

[Betty Hinton, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

We'll hope so.

[Les Peate]

It's quite an experience. I really strongly recommend it.

If any of the members here are approached to go to Korea, it's well worth it. I hate to put in a plug for our allies, but I think possibly there are two nations that really appreciate what Canada has done for them during war. One of course is the Netherlands--that's fantastic--and the other is Korea. The greetings we get are almost embarrassing. You drive on a bus to our old battlegrounds and all the little kids are waving to you. They have a Canadian flag and everything else. It will do your heart good to go down there.

I'm sorry to digress from the subject, but--

[Betty Hinton, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

Any time you want to talk about the good deeds Canadian veterans have done, I'd be more than happy to let you have the time.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rob Anders]

Thank you.

Now we'll go over to Mr. Russell for five minutes. We've said Mr. Valley wasn't finished, but that doesn't preclude Mr. Russell, with the Liberal Party.

[Todd Russell, Liberal, Labrador, NL]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Good afternoon, sir. It's a pleasure to listen to you this afternoon.

I'm new on the committee and I'm learning as we go through some of the issues that are of importance to you and your colleagues.

You wrote a book, The War That Wasn't: Canadians in Korea, according to my notes. I have not read it, but I'm definitely going to have to read it because--

[A voice]

He could sell you one now.

[Todd Russell, Liberal, Labrador, NL]

He could probably sell me one now. I'll have to go down to Chapters and get one.

There are also notes here that say it is a forgotten war. I'm reflecting on that a little bit, because I believe it's absolutely true, even with my own experience. We hear so much about other conflicts we've been involved in. With some of my colleagues around the table and many other Canadians, I've had the opportunity to celebrate some of our victories in Europe during World War I. There was the 90th anniversary at Beaumont-Hamel, which was a very moving experience, and I can relate when you talk about some of your own remembrance experiences as well.

This may not be directly related, but I think it is: why is it that you entitled your book The War That Wasn't, and why is it that we call it the forgotten war? It's important in your struggle to achieve equality of benefits for people who served in the Korean War.

[Les Peate]

Well, the title was based on the fact that it wasn't until I think something like 1998 that the Canadian government accepted the fact that the Korean War was a war. It was a police action; it was a United Nations operation. We felt that when you're shooting somebody and they're shooting you, it's a war. It took us about 45 years from the end of the war to get the war recognized as an actual war.

There are a number of reasons for that. I think one of the things was the timing. The Korean War broke out in 1950. People were war-weary. They'd had a world war that ended five years before, and now they had another one. And really, in comparison with the scope of the Second World War, obviously Korea was, as far as Canada was concerned, at least, a sideshow.

Then on top of that came the next major war or the next major operation--we like to call it--when the Americans moved into Vietnam. This was a massive operation again, and it was covered. Every day you saw the war on TV. It was fresh in everybody's memory. It got lots and lots of news and all that sort of thing. So we were more or less sandwiched in between the two major events.

As an example, one of the papers--I think it was the Vancouver Province--just to see what happened, printed the same communiqué from Canadian headquarters three days in a row to see if anybody noticed it. Nobody did.

Today, as an example, a soldier gets killed in Afghanistan. God knows we don't want to lose anybody in Afghanistan or anywhere. He gets a full page of the paper. You get TV showing him going on the plane in Kabul. You get more TV showing the ceremony at Trenton. You probably get something in the national press. Fine, he deserved it. As far as I'm concerned, any soldier who gives his or her life for the country—and I say “her” because we have a lady right now in our cemetery, as you know, at Beechwood--deserves everything they get. In our day, the most you would get in the national press would be a list of casualties. You might get a couple of paragraphs in the local paper, perhaps a photograph, if they had one, and that was it.

So people did feel forgotten. And this is why it's unfortunate. I don't think it's deliberate; I think it's just the way events happen. As I said, we called it “the war that wasn't” because it took 40 years to get it recognized as a war.

[Todd Russell, Liberal, Labrador, NL]

I thank you for sharing that history with me. It's certainly something I'll remember.

On a more technical question, you mentioned that if you served in World War II with one of the allied countries, and now you've come to Canada and you live here for 10 years, you can apply as a veteran.

[Les Peate]

You're a veteran. If you served as one of Canada's allies in the Second World War, yes, you're a veteran, but if you served as one of Canada's allies in the Korean War, you're not.

I'm getting a pension from Veterans Affairs on the basis of my peacetime service in the Canadian army.

[Todd Russell, Liberal, Labrador, NL]

Am I finished?