Again, it's something veterans have for a number of years been asking for. I do know the committee has paid some attention to both of those issues. In terms of the bill of rights, there was a lot of input on what was in that bill of rights. I hope I thanked the committee for their work on that, Mr. Chairman. The members of your committee did a lot of work on that.
The bill of rights is basically enforced by the ombudsman. I really believe that at Veterans Affairs we have men and women who are committed to doing the best thing for our veterans. Obviously, it's a pretty good-sized department.
The bill of rights, in my opinion, just provides a level of comfort to the veteran. It's a little wallet-sized thing they can carry with them. Many of you have asked for the original document or the ones that we've sent out. I think now they're in just about every legion, and all the veterans organizations across the country have a copy of it. I think all of us here collectively can take some pride in it. It's something they were asking for, and we just did it. We went down to Kitchener about a year ago with the Prime Minister, and we announced it.
It has such basic rights as service in the language of your choice, being treated respectfully, and so on. I think more than anything it provides a level of comfort for veterans so they know what they can expect from the departmental officials. That goes along with the ombudsman, because at the end of the day, you have to have something to enforce it, something outside of the minister of the day. I'm the minister today, but you could argue that I may not be here tomorrow. Who knows? That's the nature of politics.
No matter who the minister is, I think the stuff in terms of the ombudsman is the right way to go. It will be that one more check on the government of the day. Again, I'm a big believer in the power of Parliament, and the power of individual members of Parliament to bring these issues to the floor of the House of Commons when they've been outlined by the ombudsman, when he can identify systemic problems within the department or a case where veterans aren't being handled properly by the department, or whatever. Basically, regardless of whether it's legislative or otherwise, it's going to hold the government and the minister's feet to the fire to do better. And that's what we're there for--to do better.
I think the model we have set up and adopted is a very powerful model, and in those jurisdictions that have that model it's proven to be very successful. Again, at the end of the day the strength in that ombudsman is going to be the men and women surrounding this table who will never hesitate to either cross the floor on a temporary basis to talk to the minister, to give the minister the devil, or stand up in the House of Commons and just tear a strip off him. Because when that ombudsman's report is tabled in the House of Commons, you're the people--whether it's the Conservative Party, Liberal Party, NDP, or the Bloc--who are going to be there demanding some answers.
I'm very confident that it will work, and I'm pleased that we were the government that brought it in. I think at the end of the day it's going to pay huge dividends to our veterans community.