Mr. Chairman, I would like to reflect the optimism that the member had regarding the new Veterans Charter and the Office of the Veterans Ombudsman. In my early days, I praised the collaborative approach that parliamentarians took to getting the new Veterans Charter through.
What has been painful for me is that the reports of the special needs advisory group, as well as those of a special committee on the new Veterans Charter that was convened by the department, were lying dormant within the department. I can say categorically—first person singular once again, point-blank range—that there were no initiatives within the department to fix the new Veterans Charter. That is the fundamental error with this.
We will see by 2011 if some of these quick fixes ever come into fruition, if the very people who have sacrificed their lives, and I don't mean by dying, because I consider dying to be the penultimate sacrifice.... The ultimate sacrifice is having to come home, start a new life, and burden your family with your disability. Those people are not being covered by it.
Quite frankly, I've lost my optimism about the mandate as it was written in an order in council. I've seen the paperwork that led up to the Office of the Veterans Ombudsman, and I can only suggest that it was watered down and hijacked by bureaucrats who did not want to be checked into.
The office should be of deputy minister status. To me, it's an insult to veterans that their ombudsman would be at the level I am at right now, which was lower than a colonel when I came into this job. I took the job because I'm an optimist and I took it for the veterans. But in the future, this office deserves much more status for the sake of the veterans.