Veterans Affairs Committee on April 1st, 2010

[Colin Mayes, Conservative, Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Has that been expanded to include the family? It's okay to deal with things in the detachment, but the officer goes home and has to deal with the issues at home, and he has some of the baggage that he's bringing from his job to his home. Has that program been expanded?

Because I think it's very important. In our veterans charter, we're not just looking at the veteran. We're looking at their families. A vital part of any type of recovery is to have a strong family unit and understanding, so does the program you're talking about also include the family?

[C/Supt Alain Tousignant]

Not necessarily, and I don't know the exact details. As far as I know, it doesn't necessarily address the family component, even though I think that through our M/EAP, our employee assistance program, we recognize more and more now that unless we involve the families, we're not going to solve the issues, or we're not going to be able to move forward on some of the issues that are outlined.

Again, we're just starting to grasp that, the family component at home. How do we address that issue?

Rich can provide more comments.

[Supt Rich Boughen]

Just very quickly, one of the things we've done in renewing our health benefits table of what members are allowed is that we've made a change, as of January 1, to allow the first six visits to a psychologist or a family counsellor for...and the spouse can go without the member. That's a bit of a change. I'm not sure that it's addressing exactly what you're talking about on an at-home basis, but it's a bit of a benefit for people who are experiencing difficulties. They can go and have these discussions.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thank you very much, Superintendent.

Thank you, Mr. Mayes.

Now we'll move on to Monsieur Vincent, pour cinq minutes.

[Robert Vincent, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I read your document carefully. There are a number of things that seem vague to me. You talk about independent living, but that also involves greater support for snow removal, and yard and general household work, in order to help them remain independent. If you want them to remain independent in their own homes as long as possible, why are they not required do these tasks?

Then you talk about those who are more severely disabled. I would like more information on that.

You also talk about RCMP members who are medically released for non-service related reasons and those who demonstrate a service related need, post-retirement. I would like you to explain what a non-service related reason is.

There is another thing that bothers me even more. The average age of the 8,087 members receiving a disability pension is 58 years old, while the average age of those still serving is 48. I understand that we are talking about pensions, but what are you doing in terms of prevention?

A bit further on in your document, you talk about pension amendments:

In summary, this alternative would provide modern standards of care and support to future affected members and their families [...] It is also the most cost effective, yielding significant savings to the Government of Canada over time. This may allow the RCMP to reinvest some savings into the improvement of program and service delivery for serving and retired members, e.g. job placement assistance, as well as improving upon aspects of the organizational culture that are impediments to affected members’ full recovery and re-integration into the workplace.

If I understand correctly, pensions will be improved using the money that was saved. Before things get to that point, what are you doing in terms of prevention to keep these things from happening?

Did you check with ambulance attendants and emergency medical personnel to see how they manage post-injury traumas? How they manage PTSD? How could you bring the network in line with emergency medical personnel and ambulance attendants so as not to minimize your members' PTSD but to better manage it, in terms of prevention measures?

I would like to hear your thoughts on that.

[C/Supt Alain Tousignant]

Forgive me, but what page is it? I just need to find my place.

[Robert Vincent, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

In this document, on page 8. I hope my time is not still going.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

I've already stopped the clock, sir.

[Robert Vincent, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Thank you.

[C/Supt Alain Tousignant]

I think it kind of comes back to what Superintendent Boughen was saying. We are talking about recognizing the symptoms of PTSD, and I think the pilot project we are currently working on with the Canadian Forces....

[Robert Vincent, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

I would like to hear more about your situation at the RCMP. It says that 8,087 people are receiving a disability pension. They were not all hit by a bullet.

[C/Supt Alain Tousignant]

No.

[Robert Vincent, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

So there are a lot of people suffering from PTSD. The problem is not new to the RCMP. What prevention measures have you taken since then so that people do not have to suffer from this illness?

[Supt Rich Boughen]

I hope I'm going to be able to answer your question. There was a lot of information in your buildup to that. Are you talking specifically about physical injury or post-traumatic stress disorder?

[Robert Vincent, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

When someone suffers a physical injury, it is clear. You know what that involves. But I am talking about preventing post-traumatic stress syndrome. Ambulance attendants and emergency medical personnel deal with the same thing as police officers, when individuals are injured in an accident and arrive at the hospital. What coordination have you arranged with these groups? What do you plan to do to protect these people?

[Supt Rich Boughen]

I would preface this by saying that I'm not 100% sure that ambulance attendants, emergency medical personnel, and doctors.... They may arrive at the same symptoms of compassion fatigue or post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms. The way we get there is different, and therefore, I would think, the way you would prevent it is different as well.

Again, there's not a lot of information that is police-specific, so one of the things we're looking at is building resilience. It's the idea of somebody who is resilient, who can bounce back from a traumatic event. We don't know what that encompasses. We think it encompasses things like a healthy social network, where you can sit down and talk about things, and also the supervisory stuff that the other member of Parliament was talking about. It also encompasses the ability to maintain a physical fitness level so that your body can deal with--

[Robert Vincent, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

I know you work in workplace health and safety at the RCMP. There are plans that you have to establish every year. In terms of workplace health and safety, what kind of prevention plan do you intend to put in place? You have identified a problem, and a solution needs to be found.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Superintendent, just one moment, please.

Mr. Vincent, that will have to be your last intervention. You're well over time--

[Robert Vincent, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Okay.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

--but I understand that you wanted to clarify, so go ahead.

[Supt Rich Boughen]

Thank you very much for clarifying that. One of the things we have done, as the chief has talked about, is to make sure that people going into high-stress areas are assessed prior to going in, during the time they're there, and upon leaving. Does that prevent...? I think what it does is point out to us that there might be issues, so we don't put people at a higher risk of having an operational stress injury into those positions to begin with.

There's another thing that we've done, and again, I need to preface this by saying that this is fairly new to us, so the amount of research that we've done on it isn't extensive. What we have done is the resilience education and development program that I've talked about. The program allows people to gain some information and some psycho-education around the issues they go through and the reactions they have, so that they know these reactions are absolutely normal reactions to abnormal situations.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thank you, Superintendent.

Now we'll go on to Mr. Storseth for five minutes.

[Brian Storseth, Conservative, Westlock—St. Paul, AB]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

First I have to apologize; I don't have an RCMP tartan tie, so I couldn't wear it today, but Peter has promised he'll get me one.

I want to thank you gentlemen for coming forward today to testify. It is always an honour and a pleasure to have people of your calibre who have served our country. I want to preface my comments by saying that first and foremost, we need more research when it comes to these issues regarding policing. It has to be very difficult for you and very worrisome for the rest of us to try to build a program around a lot of things that you're trying to adapt from other things that you've seen and witnessed.

I have a good friend in K Division in Alberta who also served in the Canadian armed forces, and he says the work he does for the RCMP is every bit as stressful on a daily basis, if not more so, as the work he did in the Canadian Forces. The work that K Division and the RCMP do in Alberta is very important, and it's also very stressful, so I think we need to take it upon ourselves to make sure that any needed resources are there to do research and to help identify some of these problems.

I have some questions for you in regard to PTSD, and then I will have one comment afterwards that's totally not relevant to our topic.

My first question is on access to operational stress clinics. Obviously our government has created new operational stress clinics. We have one in Edmonton. Does the RCMP have access to those operational stress clinics?

[Supt Rich Boughen]

Yes.

[Brian Storseth, Conservative, Westlock—St. Paul, AB]

Do your members also have access to those clinics after they've retired from the forces?