Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, gentlemen, for being here. It's extremely helpful. We're trying to get our heads around not only the issues facing veterans generally but also--and I think this is of some concern, at least to me--the fact that our veterans are spread out among so many different organizations. I know there's some sort of association of associations, but in the long term, the more they can work together, the better it will be, I think.
I'd like to focus a little bit on the issue of health services in terms of quality of life for our veterans. You mentioned literacy as an issue for aboriginal veterans.
My friend Roger Valley was explaining that a lot of veterans--I hope I have this right, Roger--who entered the service learned English. They were away from their homes for a period of time, went back into their communities, on the reserve or otherwise, and in many cases they lost contact with their traditional language. Maybe they could communicate in some way, but then, when it came to English, they lost the ability to speak it. They could understand English but they couldn't speak it, because there was nobody around who spoke English in some of those communities.
Do you have a sense, even anecdotally, of what percentage of aboriginal veterans--status, non-status, Métis, Inuit--just aren't accessing programs, VIP included, because of the language barrier?