Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Buenos días, Carolina. It's good to see you.
I'm always amazed. The chairman and I were at a meeting about four years ago. We had some disabled veterans and their spouses at a table in an in camera meeting. It went on for almost four hours and it was one of the most tremendous meetings I'll ever remember.
Everyone was going through concerns similar to those you yourself are, Sean; through PTSD and through various things they couldn't understand. They were once healthy, vibrant military personnel, and a lot of them were broken. If it hadn't been for their spouses, many of them couldn't have been there.
So kudos to you, Carolina, for your steadfastness with Sean and for representing all those wives, husbands, and partners out there who care for their disabled veterans in this regard.
Sean, this chronology of key events is really quite disturbing. I don't know what more to say about it. I think it needs further review. We'll talk about it at another time.
One thing I'd like to have you comment on is the 16 recommendations from the gerontological advisory group, which I believe you aren't part of. Have you had a chance to look at those 16 recommendations, and would you more or less agree with their theme? I notice that some of them more or less mirror yours, so I'd like your comment on them.
Second, Carolina, on the aspect of the family members not receiving the information from DVA, I know from talking to DVA and to DND that an awful lot of information that is there is sent home by the military members, the veterans themselves. I could only assume that in a lot of cases that information doesn't get transferred over to the spouse either because of embarrassment, pride, or whatever the answers are, because there is a tremendous amount of information at DND and DVA.
You're indicating that people aren't contacting you directly. I think it's a great recommendation to make, that DND and DVA people contact you directly. But I can foresee a possible problem there, because the military person may feel a bit offended by the fact that they've gone past them directly to the family. There may be things there, maybe privacy issues, that I'm unaware of. That is something we need to key on.
Sean, I'd like your comment on that as well. You have worked with a lot of disabled veterans. Do they willingly pass the information they receive on to their spouse, or is there some holding back because of some concerns they have?
By the way, I lost my keys once. I didn't cry; I swore up and down big time. It's a pain in the ass to lose your keys, I'll tell you, especially if you're 200 miles away from home and there's nobody there to pick you up.