Veterans Affairs Committee on March 11th, 2008

[Colleen Calvert]

It's a complete catch-22.

[Brent St. Denis, Liberal, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rob Anders]

Mrs. Hinton.

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

In response to one of my colleagues earlier, you said you don't know when there's been an accident, so you're not able to contact the family, and the family is left not knowing. DND contacts families of soldiers who are harmed, do they not? That's the first question.

The second question is about the budget for your wonderful organization. You said it was something over $3 million per year. Could you give me an idea of how much of that $3 million or so goes to salaries? From listening to what you've been saying, some of your positions are voluntary and some are paid. I'd like to get a handle on the percentage.

[Colleen Calvert]

I would say about 85% is salary, and it's because of my day cares. I have 175-space day cares. This is something we're not mandated to provide, but because of the needs of the community, we've been forced to put it in place. So it's almost all towards salaries.

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

So 85% is salaries.

[Colleen Calvert]

At least, yes.

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

And you have 175-space day cares.

[Colleen Calvert]

Yes.

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

For that day care, do you get provincial funding?

[Colleen Calvert]

Absolutely, we get some support.

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

What was the answer to the first question? Doesn't DND contact family members?

[Colleen Calvert]

Of the injured? Yes, they do.

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

Okay.

[Colleen Calvert]

But what happens is that after the event is over, the family may not have been told about all the resources that are available to them, and then the assisting officer goes away after a number of months and the family is sitting there. The ombudsman's report clearly suggested that the information should be passed on to the family, and that the MFRC should get all the information as well.

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

You and I are in agreement. My only concern was that I understood you to say that no one contacts the families.

[Colleen Calvert]

Gosh, no! They do a great job there.

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

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rob Anders]

Yes, sir.

[David Sweet, Conservative, Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON]

You said your budget was $3.5 million and that you got $1.25 million from DND?

[Colleen Calvert]

We get $1.18 million from the Director of Military Family Services, and I get about another $179,000 from the Maritime Forces Atlantic.

[David Sweet, Conservative, Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON]

You're underselling yourself, then. You mentioned that you got 55% of your budget funded. But that sounds more like only one-third.

[Colleen Calvert]

I'm going on last year's numbers. I'm mixing up last year's numbers with this year's, because I just got my new funding. At the end of the audit last year, 55% of my funding came from the Director of Military Family Services.

[David Sweet, Conservative, Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON]

Okay.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rob Anders]

I see our list of questioners is extinguished. Thank you, witnesses, for your appearance.

I'm going to talk about some other issues since we're here. I want to inform the committee members that we were scheduled to go to Petawawa and Valcartier under the last budget. We're coming up to a wrap of the budget at the end of March, and these trips will take place in April. Those budget requests came up again at the Liaison Committee and were approved, so we're still a go, which is a good thing.

I have some handouts with regard to Korea and whatnot.