Veterans Affairs Committee on March 6th, 2008

[Gilles-A. Perron, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Good afternoon, Mr. Peate. How are you? It's a long time since we saw each other. A year and a half has passed since our last meeting. I have pretty much the same questions to ask you as I did then.

You know that I have a particular interest in post-traumatic stress disorder, which I call an operational psychological injury. I am not too fond of the word “stress“, because it frightens people.

You talked about veterans as “old guys”. When I see Thierry sitting beside me, I say to myself that I am an old guy. We are talking about progress being made, but you are afraid that a lot of people are bluffing, that they are pretending to suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder. But all the specialists have told us that a half-hour interview is all they need to tell whether a person is putting it on. So people shouldn't be afraid, they should go for a consultation. Yes, Second World War veterans treat post-traumatic stress disorder with a large gin. They start at 8:00 a.m. at the Legion. Those are my comments on post-traumatic stress: people have to go for consultation.

I would like to talk to you about another problem and I would like to know your views on it. It seems to be popular, both in Quebec and in the rest of the country, to want to keep seniors at home as long as possible. The wives, the spouses or husbands of these seniors are virtually the same age. So they may not have the strength they need to give home care.

Are we equipped to help these people in their homes? If not, what should we be doing?

[Les Peate]

Because I speak French somewhat like a Spanish cow, I am going to answer in English, if you don't mind.

[Gilles-A. Perron, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

That is the answer you gave me a year and a half ago. Put your Spanish cow in the paddock and talk to me in English.

[Les Peate]

First of all, I quite agree about the wives. I think the wives have been very, very underrated. I think the part they play is very important.

The other thing I'm glad you brought up is that one of our concerns, not so much in the KVA, because we have a comparatively small group of veterans, but in the National Council of Veterans Associations, is not only with the placement of veterans in homes—which is obviously much better for everyone concerned, if they can get finance or support to stay at home, rather than keeping them in places like Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue or at the Perley, or some place like that—but also with finding places for them. For the person who lives in, let's say, North Bay or Sudbury, where there is no veterans hospital, we're suggesting that DVA should purchase a number of beds—not necessarily purchase them, but at least reserve them. So if a veteran needed to be placed in care, there would be some place for him.

This is one of the things that Cliff Chadderton and Brian Forbes of the NCVA have been pushing for, for a long time. I feel they would be far more qualified to answer that than me, and should they come before this committee, I would suggest you raise that point with them.

[Gilles-A. Perron, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

I understand your perspective and I have a lot of sympathy, but we have the same problem with so-called normal civilians and people who are not veterans. In every hospital in Canada there are beds that are full and unbelievably long waiting lists. Your solution will create another more severe problem: we will have to say that there are three or 10 or 20 beds in a hospital that can't be touched in case a veteran comes in. The idea is perfect, but how can it be applied? That's the problem.

[Les Peate]

That is true. It's why I would strongly suggest that you discuss this with Mr. Chadderton and Brian Forbes.

Incidentally, I would like to know where the people got their gin at 8 o'clock in the morning.

[Gilles-A. Perron, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

La Légion canadienne. We could go to the Légion canadienne at 8 o'clock in the morning and have some there. I've been there and I had some!

[Les Peate]

Very interesting!

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Les Peate]

I might add, and I don't want to take your time, that I did attend the convention that was held in your province, as you know. I found there was no shortage of gin or anything else, but there's a drink they have there that I believe is called Caribou, which comes out during the winter carnival.

[Gilles-A. Perron, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Because I have only one minute left, I am going to ask my question now, and you can answer it next time around the table.

I am still astounded to see that there are 57 veterans associations and no effort is being made to bring them together under a single roof. Regardless of what it were called, you would have more power if you got together, instead of having 57 separate associations.

[Les Peate]

The answer to that one is, we are together. I didn't bring my letterhead from the National Council of Veterans Associations, but the 57 associations are the member associations of that body, and we do work together. We feel unity is strength, and the more the better. Cliff Chadderton is our president and he represents all of us. So we have in fact got together.

[Gilles-A. Perron, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rob Anders]

Monsieur Perron, that was uncanny. You were bang-on, within a second of your time.

[Gilles-A. Perron, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

As usual.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Chair, Conservative, Rob Anders]

Sir, that's to be commended.

Now we're on to the New Democratic Party and Mr. Stoffer for five minutes.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thanks again, Mr. Peate, not only for your service to our country but also to your fellow veterans.

One of our concerns, sir, of course, is that being a veterans committee, we interlope a lot on defence issues when it comes to soldiers returning to their families and on some issues facing veterans and their spouses, issues that really are under the auspices of DND. For example, there's the marriage after 60 clause, which you're aware of. We've spoken about it before. It's actually a DND technicality. The amount of money a veteran leaves his spouse when he passes on is 50%. Many groups have been asking for that to be increased a bit, because a lot of the time their wives will be pushed into—or, at least, in some cases—pretty dire poverty. So those are some of the hurdles we need to look at.

In your experience—because you were in the reserves as well, if I'm not mistaken—of going from DND to DVA for your hearing aids, and everything else, how did you find that transfer? Were there delays in some of your processes, or was it fairly smooth, in your opinion, when you transferred?

[Les Peate]

Actually, there wasn't really much of a comparison. We're really talking of apples and oranges here. The only part that DND really played in my hearing pension was that they provided medical evidence from the sick reports.

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

Was that a fairly quick process?

[Les Peate]

It should be. The only thing is, of course, they lost mine. Usually, as you probably know—I'm probably telling everybody something they know well—in the service, if anybody is injured, a board of inquiry is convened, an incident report is created, and that sort of thing. These are the things our veterans go back to.

I had one case, for instance, where this was lost. The guy injured his back on a parachute jump. But being a macho guy, he never reported sick, because he had done four jumps and had two more to do to qualify. We had a heck of a job proving this guy's back injury, which deteriorated as he got out of the service and he was unable to do the job he wanted. We had no record of it. This was when our association really got in touch with his buddies. If you read Legion Magazine, for instance, you'll often see in the lost trails, “Did anybody know Private Jones who fell off a truck in Germany? Evidence is needed to support a pension claim.” This is really the connection. In other words, let's say DND provides the evidence, Veterans Affairs provides the assessment, and presumably the pension is triggered.

A few years ago we came up with a group called the Centre. Some of you may know it. This was a joint DND and Veterans Affairs operation. It was just around the corner from here, as a matter of fact. This is when they were staffed by both, and this enabled things to move faster. One of the things they did that never really happened is they set up four centres to test people for the effects of DDT. We thought this was great because this was our biggest problem. Could we use it? Certainly it was open to all veterans. Well, apparently the Centre either shut, moved, or didn't open. We never really did get much out of it.

To this extent, we do cooperate with Veterans Affairs and DND, but they have a distinct role to play. DND provides the evidence and Veterans Affairs then assesses it and determines what pension or treatment the person could have. This may be changing, of course, in light of the Afghan situation.

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

Mr. Chairman, you may recall that on most cenotaphs in the country the Korean War is listed from 1950 to 1953, but in the War Memorial room in the Peace Tower it says 1949, with no end date, because the Korean War is not over.

[Les Peate]

Can I explain that?

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

Yes, go right ahead.

[Les Peate]

We're talking about the peacekeeping monument?