In some cases, yes. In some cases, the veterans were not ready.
I think again it's very important for us to understand that the people living on the street live in a very different world and a very different life from us, who generally have jobs and go to work every day. In some cases, we have made contact with veterans through our outreach. In some cases, we've been able to get them into a program. And in some cases, they've skipped, given their very transient nature.
I had a homeless veteran last week who presented at the Vancouver district office. He actually came to the office and we were able to work with him. Now, he told us that he was in Calgary the week before, and the week before that he was somewhere else. So that's the transient nature. Sometimes when you make that connection, they move. Now we're working with that veteran in Vancouver. We've also been working with the Royal Canadian Legion poppy fund. We've been looking at issues of housing for the individual. So this person may stay in Vancouver, or he may vanish and show up in maybe Halifax in a month's time. That is the transient nature of the population. But certainly we have been able to make some contact.
I would suggest to you that one of the most effective ways is really through the peer support program. You know the military family is a very tight-knit family. If you talk to some of them, you talk to somebody who may have been with the Van Doos or with the Princess Patricias, they have organizations beyond that of the military. It stays with them, I would say, for the rest of their lives. They want to take care of each other.
So we talk to these organizations. For example, if it's somebody from Halifax who's a former naval officer who is having difficulty, they can persuade that person to come forward to the department, or not necessarily go to the department.... That's why you need to understand the peer support. It's not about coming to a Veterans Affairs office. It may be about going to a Tim Hortons and having a cup of coffee. It may be about going for a walk along the street, just to try to get the connection to say, “I understand your suffering. I understand your suffering because I went through it myself. But the reality is that there are people who can help you.” But like many addictions, the person has to want to be helped, and that's part of building that trust and that connection.