Veterans Affairs Committee on Dec. 1st, 2011

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

We have a quorum. I think we'll get under way.

We'll hear from all of our witnesses and then do the rounds of questions. We're allowing an hour and a half to cover the bases. We do have some business at the end to deal with once again.

I'd like to start by welcoming all of you. We've heard some of you before. Certainly Brad is no stranger to being here. I want to say welcome to all of you and thank you for taking the time. We really appreciate it. We're into the study and we're pretty serious about trying to get some results.

We'll start with Brad and Andrea, then Tim Laidler, then Janice and Maureen from the department. It will be in that order. You each have ten minutes to present. Welcome.

I think, Brad, you wanted to start with mentioning something.

[Brad White, Dominion Secretary, Dominion Command, Royal Canadian Legion]

Thank you, honourable chair and members of the committee. It's a pleasure to once again appear in front of you.

You have before you a copy of our presentation in both official languages. Today we are going to speak in English, but we can answer your questions in French also.

To begin,

we have given each of you a pin produced by the Royal Canadian Legion. The pin is to commemorate seventy years of service of women in the Canadian Forces.

We started with 1941. Of course you know that before 1941--in World War I and other wars, and other actions--there were nursing sisters and women involved in military service, but we picked 1941 as a good position to start from. On the back of the card you can actually see some of the commemorative dates we have down there for you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Thank you very much for that; it's a very nice gesture.

[Brad White]

It is a great pleasure to appear in front of the committee again, on behalf of Patricia Varga, our Dominion President, and our 342,000 members of the Royal Canadian Legion. We offer our support to your continuing advocacy on behalf of all veterans, including still-serving Canadian Forces members, members of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, and of course their families. Sometimes we forget about the families as we go along this road.

The Legion has been asked to discuss the front-line health and well-being services and programs that we in the Royal Canadian Legion offer veterans and their families.

Needless to say, the Department of National Defence, the RCMP, and Veterans Affairs Canada are responsible for the provision of health and well-being services for all veterans, including still-serving members of the Canadian Forces, both regular and reserve, members of the RCMP, and their families. The circumstances and requirements for each organization are different, and the circumstances are different for the veterans as well.

Some are young, some are single, some need employment, and some are married with families. Some are still serving, and of course others have left the service. Some are healthy and others suffered significant injuries attributable or not to their service. Therefore, we believe it's very important that the Department of National Defence, Veterans Affairs Canada, and the RCMP put in place complementary policies, practices, and programs supported by a sustainable research program—something we don't currently have—with the goal of providing health and well-being programs and services based on need, regardless of when and where served, and not through a myriad of eligibility hoops.

Notwithstanding that, the Royal Canadian Legion has been delivering our programs to all veterans and their families since 1926. The Legion is an iconic cornerstone of Canadian communities, at the forefront of support for military and RCMP members and their families. Today a new generation of veterans is coming home, and veterans and their families will continue to turn to the Legion in support of affordable housing, representation, benevolent assistance, career transition counselling, trauma relief, and recognition.

As the only national veterans service organization, the Legion, through its extensive infrastructure, with 1,500 branches across the country, offers a range of programs to all veterans, including still-serving members, both regular and reserve, RCMP, and their families. First and foremost, we offer camaraderie in our branches. This past summer, to celebrate the completion of the combat mission in Afghanistan, the Legion, in branches across the country, honoured over 7,000 members of the Canadian Forces who served in Afghanistan and their families with dinners, receptions, gifts, and parades. This program continues today.

To ensure that the camaraderie of military life continues after service, the Legion offers a free one-year membership to all veterans as part of the release process. This is a new program, and nearly 1,000 have signed on to it already. Membership offers veterans and their families the opportunity to volunteer to help other veterans as part of community-building, which of course is an important part of the military culture. Some veterans simply want to support a veterans service organization through their membership contribution. However, many programs are offered by Legion branches and supported by thousands of volunteers. These are core programs to the Legion, and of course membership is not a requirement.

[Andrea Siew, Director, Service Bureau, Royal Canadian Legion]

The Legion's advocacy program is core to our mission. The Legion provides representation to assist veterans and their families with obtaining their disability benefits from Veterans Affairs Canada. Disability entitlement is key to accessing the various programs and health benefits, as well as to receiving financial compensation.

The Legion's service bureau network, with over 1,500 branch service officers and 25 command professional service officers, provides representation from first application to Veterans Affairs Canada through appeals to, and reconsideration from, the Veterans Review and Appeal Board. Through legislation, the Legion has access to all of the veterans' service health records and the departmental files, as well as the client service delivery network, which is their IT system. These resources enable the Legion to provide comprehensive, independent representation to veterans at no cost. And there's no requirement to be a Legion member.

We are also an active participant in the Veterans Affairs transformation agenda in the transition to electronic data transfer, as well as the transformation of all their business processes.

Our benevolent assistance program provides financial grants to meet the essential needs of veterans and their families who have limited financial means. The program is available at all levels of the Legion and is accessible to all veterans, including still-serving CF members and their families.

We also assist allied veterans living in North America with obtaining benevolent assistance from a variety of resources. Our network of service officers at all levels of the Legion coordinate grants with other agencies, such as the Canadian Forces military families fund, to ensure that the veterans' needs are met.

The poppy fund is available at all branches across the country to assist veterans in need. For example, in Calgary, the poppy fund supports a food bank for veterans. We also contribute to non-government-funded programs provided by military family resource centres. At the Edmonton Garrison Military Family Resource Centre, the poppy fund supports a program for children with parents who have experienced trauma. This is a group-based program for children whose parents have suffered from operational stress injuries, and it teaches them how to develop skills to deal with the stresses in their homes, in a peer environment with children who also have families with the same difficulties.

The Legion has an extensive outreach program to inform all veterans and their families about health promotion, independent living, community resources, and healthy lifestyles. This includes information about the needs of both men and women. The Legion has a presence in most of the Canadian Forces' integrated personnel support centres on each base, and we assist veterans and their families as part of their transition process. We offer information on our programs, representation, and financial assistance, as well as other government programs and activities. We also provide information on how to access all of those programs and activities.

We have been engaged in assisting homeless veterans for many years now. Through our poppy funds, we provide emergency housing, food, clothing, bus tickets, etc. Across Canada, Legion provincial commands work closely with Veterans Affairs, various shelters, and community organizations to help get veterans off the street and into transition programs.

In Victoria, Cockrell House, which is sponsored by the Legion, is a transition house for approximately 12 veterans. The success of this program is overwhelming. Veterans receive addiction counselling, education, and skills training, which enables them to transition back to our community.

In Ontario, through the Operation Leave The Streets Behind program, Ontario command works with Veterans Affairs and various shelters in downtown Toronto to provide transition assistance to homeless veterans. We will continue to build on these various programs as a framework for the Legion's planned national program for homeless veterans.

The Legion also has a national affordable housing program for seniors and veterans. With a growing inventory of over 7,000 units across the country, we continue to provide an affordable option to veterans and their families.

In Vancouver the Legion has been a partner in the development of Honour House Society, which provides free interim accommodation for the families of Canadian Forces members, as well as ambulance, fire, and law enforcement services, while these members are receiving care in Vancouver. Honour House is a place of refuge, where families may enjoy a degree of normal family life despite the stress of their circumstances.

The impact that military service has on our sailors, soldiers, and airmen and airwomen often makes the transition to civilian life challenging. In Alberta, the Legion has partnered with Outward Bound Canada to offer a specialized program to bridge the gap for veterans. This program involves one-week wilderness courses designed to help participants build a supportive community with other veterans and facilitate discussions on readjustment and transition challenges.

The veterans transition program, the only program of its kind in Canada, assists former members of the Canadian Forces in their transition back to civilian life. It was developed to address the invisible wounds of our soldiers so that they can function and have healthy relationships with their families and friends, at work and with themselves. It was established in 1999 with funding from the B.C. and Yukon command of the Legion. It is a group-based program from UBC's faculty of medicine, and is offered free of charge to former members of the Canadian Forces. The program is expanding nationally and is planning to offer sessions uniquely for women. Tim Laidler will talk about that in his presentation in detail.

The Legion in British Columbia has also partnered with the British Columbia Institute of Technology to deliver a Legion military skills conversion program to help accelerate and advance the civilian careers of former and current reserve and regular force Canadian Forces members. This program offers fast-track education, with accreditation through BCIT for credits for military experience, assistance with developing your own business, and finding a job.

Last year, to better understand the experiences and issues of service women, the Legion hosted a seminar with Senator Lucie Pépin, which included women who had served in the Second World War through to today, from all three environments—married, single, with children, without, different ranks, those who had served, those who have served. This was an eye-opening experience. Women have unique issues, and there needs to be more quantitative research to determine the life-long effects of military service on women.

The Legion delivers many programs to veterans and their families to ensure a quality of life after release and to ease the transition from service. More research is required to determine the effects of service unique to the Canadian military service, to the demographics and to the operational environment. There is a lack of dedicated, independent research in Canada on military and veterans health. The Legion is engaged with the evolving Canadian Institute for Military and Veteran Health Research to ensure that this capability is implemented.

[Brad White]

Our plans for the future include expanding programs to ensure their sustainability and accessibility across the country. We are going to develop a formal partnership with the Canadian Institute of Military and Veteran Health Research to ensure that Canada has a credible and independent military and veterans health research institute. We will expand our outreach to our traditional veterans, who are often isolated at home due to limited mobility, and to our modern veterans, including those members of the regular and reserve forces, and of course their families. We are also embarking on a modernization of our service bureau network to ensure that we have a continued effective service to all veterans and their families.

This is a brief snapshot of some of the services and programs that the Legion provides to veterans and their families. The Legion has been delivering programs to our veterans and their families since 1926. The Legion is very proud of the work that has been done to assist all of those individuals. Our programs continue to evolve to meet the changing demographics while supporting our traditional veteran community. Notwithstanding the capacity of the Royal Canadian Legion, however, we firmly believe that the Canadian Forces, the RCMP, and Veterans Affairs Canada have a definite obligation to ensure that policies, practices, and programs, supported through sustainable research, are accessible and meet the unique needs of all veterans, with the goal of providing health and well-being based on need and not a myriad of eligibility hoops.

Programs and services need to be delivered from cradle to grave in an integrated and seamless manner by all responsible government departments who share responsibility.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Thank you very much, Brad and Andrea.

I should have pointed out that we thanked Pierre Allard last week for his service. I should introduce Andrea as his replacement. I understand she's just as affable and determined as he was.

We look forward to good things from you. Thank you for that.

We'll move on now to Mr. Laidler. Welcome. We look forward to your ten minutes.

[Tim Laidler, Operations Coordinator, Veterans Transition Program, University of British Columbia]

Thank you.

I sit before you today representing the veterans transition program on behalf of Dr. Marv Westwood, a professor of psychology at the University of British Columbia, and Dr. David Kuhl, a professor of medicine at the University of British Columbia. They founded the veterans transition program 14 years ago. They started it in a church basement, serving soldiers who had been on peacekeeping missions such as the Medak Pocket, and after that in Cyprus. It was developed at UBC.

Because of their cutting-edge research capabilities they were able to study and learn from these veterans coming home what was actually needed. This program has been going on for quite a number of years. It has finally developed into a ten-day program that's delivered over three months. I want to speak about it in detail.

I am here as both a student in psychology at UBC and a serving member of the Canadian Forces. I was deployed to Afghanistan in 2008 as a corporal and I am still a corporal today. I worked on the front lines in Afghanistan. I know first-hand what it can cost someone to go over there and come back home.

I worked on the front lines there, and I continue to work on the front lines here as the coordinator of the veterans transition program. My job is to get into the communities and recruit veterans who have been living in their basements and struggling, or those who have been surviving just fine working in jobs and careers yet are living lives that are emotionally empty. We talked about the families and wives of military personnel, and this affects not only veterans coming home, but their communities at large.

That is partly why I am excited that this program is funded by communities and the Legion. It's not just military personnel who benefit, but whole communities, when the men and women come home healthy. It's a great opportunity here to take advantage of the resource of Canadian Forces coming home. It's not the case that we have to wait until they are hurting from PTSD so badly that the symptoms require medical intervention. This program offers a proactive approach.

I want to use my own personal example to explain how this proactive approach can be implemented. I came home at 23 and went back to UBC to finish my undergraduate degree. I completed it just fine. It was easy transitioning from working 18-hour days over in Kandahar to coming back to a student life of a couple of classes here and there. I finished my degree on time, and it was great. The problem was that not everything was quite the same inside.

When I went to get my PTSD assessment from the psychiatrist, he said, “You seem to be functioning quite healthily. Sure you have some dreams. You get a little bit angry. Those are things that seem pretty normal for transitioning home. You don't have PTSD. Congratulations.” I shook his hand and thought that was pretty good. I thought I was okay. I walked away from there, and because I didn't have the PTSD diagnosis I was not eligible for any services. On top of it, I didn't want to access any services because I didn't want to admit I was weak. In my eyes, that's what it was. I didn't want to go in front of all of my colleagues and friends and say I wasn't okay, even though they were. I went on for about two years living an emotionally empty life, being high-functioning in society and struggling back at home.

The Legion program came in for me when a friend of mine who works on the program and is a member of my regiment said that I should come to help other people. I said “I could do that. I'm okay. I don't have PTSD. The psychiatrist himself told me, so I'll come into the program.”

Once you come into the community with other military personnel who have been home and gone through that same transition progress, you realize that you can be affected by this. It doesn't make you weak. You can actually go through this program and come out stronger than when you went in.

That's what I really want to highlight about our program. It's different from the other ones out there. It brings people into the community once again. This is work that has been heavily researched by Judith Herman at Harvard University in trauma and recovery. The big component there is that once they address whatever issues may have happened, if they come back into the community the transformation process is long-lasting. When we divvy them up individually to go into one-on-one therapies across all the boards, they start to get the idea, “It's just me. I'm by myself. Maybe it's just me who's crazy.” If you can bring them into a group and everyone can validate their experiences, it truly has a long-lasting effect.

I want to get into the breakdown of our ten-day program, and a little about our national expansion. The program is delivered with a ten-day residential component over three months. They come in together for four days, learn some of the skills, get familiar with what we're trying to teach them, and draw up some of their issues.

They go back into their communities, back into their homes, and they practise new communication skills. They have a chance to tell their stories to their families, often for the first time. It's all very much guided. We do a lot of behavioural rehearsals on the front end.

They come back for another four-day residential component where they get to then debrief how that went for them. On that second four-day component, they get into the trauma work itself and go back and revisit an incident that may have been plaguing them from their service or pre-service.

The last component of the program, after they've dropped the stress injury, is really focused on career. It's focused on the psychological component of career.

To lighten the mood for a moment, there is one of those de-motivational pictures you sometimes see with a caption below it. It has a picture of an operator in Afghanistan, a Canadian member, firing downrange, all in his battle-rattle, looking pretty high-speed. The caption says: “PTSD: coming home and realizing you'll never be this awesome ever again”.

I'm hesitant to use humour with this sort of thing, but that's a huge component. How could you ever diagnose that with a medical diagnostic and statistical manual? It's that trick you play on yourself where you realize, yes, I'm coming back, and the one program they have is from helmets to hard hats. Okay, so I went from being in charge of millions of dollars worth of equipment and numerous people's lives, and I guess I can start on construction, back at the bottom of the seniority list, the bottom of the experience list. How am I ever going to be this fulfilled again?

That's where our program can start to look inwards and find what the core values are, what motivated them to join the Canadian Forces and become such high-functioning members of society, and how they can transition that into the civilian workforce. Not only is there, I believe, a moral obligation to help men and women in this position, but think of the benefit to Canada as a whole society. Perhaps we could actually re-brand Canadian soldiers--not as what was happening down in the States with the Vietnam veterans, where they were labeled as crazy or as needing to be taken care of--and start to see them more as how the World War II veterans were seen, as coming back and being leaders in society, running for political office, holding the leadership positions, and transferring all the valuable skills they had coming back to Canada.

Thank you for your time.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

That's very efficient, Corporal. You're actually well under time. Do you have anything else you would like to add?

[Tim Laidler]

I'll yield my time for the questions and answers.

Actually, I will add something about the national rollout. Because it's a UBC program--it's been researched for 14 years--we have our data and we presented it at the military research conference. We are now looking to move it into the program delivery phase. It's been run as a research laboratory, which means they run it twice a year only, helping just 12 soldiers as they do it, and evaluating the program. That is now complete.

UBC is going to partner with us on the continual program development and research. But we are going to be starting a national organization that will be delivering this across Canada. We're excited to move forward with a public-private partnership with the military, with the government—VAC, DND—and with the Legion and other community funders. This will help us keep a certain air of independence while also getting anyone who needs the program into it.

We'll be working closely with OSISS and other groups that are already in the communities, already established, and have those contacts to get groups of soldiers together—about six or eight at a time. We have leading teams ready to go in B.C. Last year we were given $1.4 million by the B.C. and Yukon Command of the Legion. That helped us grow our capacity. We're ready to move across the country with this now. We're just going to look at how to get the funding for the local communities.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Thank you very much for that.

We'll now go to our representatives from the department. We have directors Janice Burke and Maureen Sinnott.

Thank you for being here. Please proceed with your ten minutes.

[Maureen Sinnott, Director, Strategic and Enabling Initiatives, Department of Veterans Affairs]

Thank you, and good morning. Thanks for the opportunity to be part of the discussion. It's most interesting to follow after the discussion of Mr. Laidler from the veterans transition program.

As we all know, the Department of Veterans Affairs has had a long history of providing quality support to Canadian Forces members, veterans, and their families during the transition from military to civilian life. As you would have heard earlier this week from Charlotte Stewart, we know that leaving the military and returning to civilian life is a major life-changing event. Not only are they leaving behind their chosen career, but they are also leaving a lifestyle and culture that is unique to the Canadian Forces. We also know that transition impacts not only the member, it impacts the entire family. That's why we encourage family members to take an active role in the transition process, and we've developed programs with their needs in mind.

Obviously, modern-day veterans are much younger than our traditional veterans, and often continue working full-time after their release. They have many years ahead of them to be active and full participants at home and in the workforce and their communities. Modern disability management principles emphasize wellness and promote early integration into the workforce. These principles, along with other research and consultations with key stakeholders, are what formed the basis of the programs and services we've developed to support transition.

Veterans Affairs Canada implemented our new suite of programs designed specifically to meet the needs of modern-day veterans and their families. Eligible Canadian Forces members, veterans, and their families can access a comprehensive package of programs and services designed to promote wellness, including rehabilitation services, health benefits, career transition services, financial benefits, disability awards, and case management services—all supported by mental health programs.

From the moment a CF member prepares to leave the service, our staff is there working closely with the Department of National Defence to support a seamless transition. We now have more than 100 staff working side-by-side with DND staff in 24 integrated personnel support centres across the country to provide care and support to ill and injured military personnel and their families.

Transition interviews are available to every releasing Canadian Forces member, and, as I mentioned earlier, family members are encouraged to attend and participate. During meetings with a VAC staff member, the transition needs of the entire family are discussed and information is provided on the programs and services we have available to meet those needs.

For those with more complex needs, comprehensive case management services are available. A VAC staff member will work with the veteran and family members to assess needs, set achievable goals, and to establish a plan to reach those goals. Veterans Affairs case managers are members of interdisciplinary teams that have access to various professionals who may become engaged in the process. These would include doctors, nurses, physiotherapists, occupational therapists, mental health specialists, and rehabilitation specialists.

Earlier this year, in an effort to enhance service, case managers were given more authority to make timely decisions that are critical to the veteran’s recovery, rehabilitation, and transition to civilian life. Case managers have been allocated to areas with the greatest need, such as the integrated personnel support centres I mentioned earlier, and to key locations across the country with large numbers of Canadian Forces deployments. These include Canadian Forces bases in such places as Edmonton, Shilo, Gagetown, Petawawa, and Valcartier.

For those without a disability, our career transition services program provides eligible Canadian Forces members, veterans, and certain surviving spouses or common-law partners, help with finding suitable civilian employment. The career transition services program provides workshops on how to complete résumés, interview basics on identifying transferable skills from the military to the civilian world, and on exploring self-employment. It also provides individual career counselling to practise interview techniques, evaluate skills and experience, and develop a plan to enter the civilian workforce. As well, it provides job-finding assistance to help market the participant to potential employers and to prepare for job interviews.

For CF members and veterans with a service-related disability, there is vocational assistance available through our rehabilitation program. It includes a range of medical, psycho-social, and vocational rehabilitation services and financial benefits to meet the recovery and rehabilitation needs of a veteran and his or her family. Vocational assistance helps the veteran, or family member in some cases, identify and acquire the skills needed to transfer to a civilian life.

Together, our staff work with the veterans to transfer skills gained in the military to jobs in the civilian workplace. When necessary, training is available to support this move. Many of the costs of training or schooling are covered under this program, including child care, so that individuals can participate in retraining programs.

If a veteran is unable to participate in the rehabilitation program due to illness, the veteran's spouse or partner--or if there was a service-related death, a survivor--can have access to the program.

The results speak for themselves. Based on a recent survey, compared with those entering the program, our rehabilitation program clients at program completion are more often employed. Seventy-nine percent of those who want to and can return to work find employment. They feel better prepared to find and keep civilian employment. And they're more knowledgeable about job-finding activities.

A quality job, post-release, is what Canadian Forces veterans themselves told us was one of the most important things they needed to transition to civilian life. Veterans Affairs listened, and we delivered. We continue to listen to our veterans and to deliver the services required to best address those expressed needs.

As you would have heard earlier this week from Bernard Butler, we recently made changes to enhance the new Veterans Charter. We have increased case management support for severely injured veterans and their families. We are making progress.

I'd like to now turn to my colleague, Janice Burke, who will speak in more detail on research and any mental health supports we have that would support veterans in transitioning.

Thank you.

[Janice Burke, Director, Mental Health, Department of Veterans Affairs]

Thank you, Maureen.

Good morning, everyone.

I'm very pleased to be here today, particularly with the Legion and with Tim, with respect to the important subject of the transitioning of our veterans to the workplace, which is a critical subject for veterans, as you can see from the Legion and from community organizations and universities, as Tim has outlined.

As Maureen indicated, the transition from military to civilian life is a critical passage for Canadian Forces members. Yet as Brad has indicated, the research in this area is evolving to the extent that we know we need to know more, we need to learn more about that experience, what the needs are in transition, and how we can best develop programs and services to meet those needs.

There has been recent research, such as the “Life After Service” studies. I'm not sure if you're aware of those studies. It looked at veterans who released between 1998 and 2007, and this kind of research is helping us to better understand the needs of transitioning veterans. The total released population from 1998 to 2007 was approximately 42,000, so it provides very rich data to help us better understand the experiences and the needs of the transitioning veteran.

This research has told us that most veterans who transition out of the military—that's 65%—felt they had an easy adjustment to civilian life, but a very important group, about 25% of the releasing members, have found the adjustment to civilian life very difficult. As a whole, the research indicated that released CF members were less likely to experience low income compared to other Canadians. A full 89% of the survey participants worked as civilians post-release. About 8% experienced unemployment, which is similar to the Canadian population, and very few—1%—accessed social assistance. Those with a difficult adjustment tended to have less than 20 years of service in the military, released at lower ranks, and had multiple health conditions and poor social support.

So this research is telling us we need to target supportive programs more precisely to those 25% who are having difficulty with their transition. I think you're hearing it here this morning, from the Legion and from Tim in terms of the program through UBC, how critical these kinds of initiatives and programs are to better support our veterans who transition.

This is also why the new Veterans Charter, which Maureen has described, is so important to the transition of modern-day veterans. It's based on the principles of modern disability management, but also based on the fact that those with the greatest need require the greatest support. These programs—whether it's medical, psycho-social, vocational, or financial support—work together to support the successful re-establishment of the veteran and his or her family into civilian life. That can be defined in various ways. I think there's a misunderstanding that a rehabilitation program is all about employment. Employment is not necessarily the goal. There's also independence, reintegration into the community, and recovery, which is defined very individually by veterans.

For those who don't require immediate or intensive supports, we have the career transition services program, which provides assistance in finding a satisfying second career. It's interesting to note that in that research, we did see that 72% of the participants in the “Life After Service” study indicated that military experience helped them obtain a civilian job.

So available research and VAC experience indicate that re-establishment in communities and the civilian workplace is particularly complex for veterans living with mental health conditions, particularly if there are co-existing physical disabilities. To better support the transition of these veterans and their families, a number of mental health supports are available, in addition to the new Veterans Charter programs and the case management programs that Maureen described, many of which were not in place ten years ago.

Mental health diagnosis, assessment, and treatment is available through a joint network between the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Department of National Defence. We have 17 operational stress injury mental health clinics, and veterans also have access to more than 4,000 registered health professionals across the country who specialize in mental health.

Tele-mental-health services are also available through our operational stress injury clinic to help ensure that veterans are provided with easier access to support when they need it, particularly those veterans in rural or isolated areas.

VAC and DND also have in place a network of trained peer support coordinators for veterans and their families through the internationally recognized operational stress injury social support program, which Tim referred to in terms of the folks working with him and helping to get veterans in touch with the program offered through UBC. These folks have first-hand experience dealing with the impact of operational stress injuries. They coordinate vital support, often leading fellow CF members, veterans, and families to seek treatment and access re-establishment programs, as Tim indicated.

The department has also significantly added to our front-line health services by providing more than 200 clinical care managers across the country who provide intensive support and monitoring of veterans with particularly complex mental health conditions. There's also a VAC assistance line, where veterans and their families can access short-term professional counselling 24/7. We also have a pastoral outreach service, with a network of more than 200 chaplains to provide spiritual guidance to those veterans and their families in need.

We have a strong focus on partnerships to expand our knowledge of and support for veterans with mental health problems, and their families, including outreach to community organizations to build awareness of veterans issues.

I was very happy to hear that you will be visiting Conception Bay during your tour in Newfoundland and Labrador, to see first-hand the community covenant that has been established there to support veterans. It is surely a model for other communities across the country, and a mechanism to enhance the veterans' sense of belonging in the community, which is so critical. Through our research, we found that only 39% of our veterans actually felt a belonging in the community. So it's critical, as Tim and the Legion have indicated, that programs and initiatives developed at a community level continue to grow so that the veterans feel more integrated and have a sense of belonging in the communities.

Recognizing the re-establishment difficulties for those with mental health conditions, we are working on a program of research on workplace reintegration for veterans with mental health conditions. In addition, given the link to transition success, health, and employment, the Canadian Institute for Military and Veteran Health Research, which Brad had indicated, was established in September 2011. It includes a network of about 20 universities. Through their work, we hope to further increase the body of evidence in veteran health.

That concludes my comments. I would be happy to have my colleagues in research, if there's ever any interest in the recent research on veterans issues, appear before you, as well.

We'd be pleased to respond to any questions you might have.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Thank you very much.

We'll go to that right away. Five minutes to Mr. Stoffer of the NDP.

[Peter Stoffer, NDP, Sackville—Eastern Shore, NS]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

To all five of you, thank you very much for being here today and for your service, Tim and Brad of course. And to Andrea, good luck filling Pierre Allard's shoes.

I have several questions for you. I'll ask the questions, three of them, and then you can just answer when you get the opportunity.

Tim, when you were diagnosed, you were diagnosed by a mental health professional. And do you believe that individual, while they may have been enthusiastic that you didn't have PTSD, may have missed something? And were you offered the option to come back in six months to a year for a reassessment ? That's the first question.

Andrea and Brad, as you know, one of the saddest things to hear is when a veteran calls you and says, “It's bad enough I've got PTSD, and it's bad enough my wife tells me that I'm not the same man I was when I left, but it's when my kids tell me that I'm sick in the head that I can't handle.” So I'd ask the Legion to elaborate a little on what you do in terms of the family services for the spouses and children. I know in Sackville they're starting to look at it a bit more in that regard of allowing family members access to the service officers as well. Can you elaborate a little more on what you do for families in that regard?

To Janice, I just want to read this line to you, because it came from the Legion. I'm not blaming anyone for this. Just listen to this: “For example, in Calgary, the poppy fund supports a food bank for veterans.” It's the richest city we have in Canada, and we have to use a poppy fund to help feed the heroes of our country. If that's not an embarrassment to all parliamentarians, I don't know what is. I just say that as a statement. Coming from Holland, when I tell my relatives that we actually have food banks for veterans in Canada, they cannot believe that. They simply do not believe that actually is true. But it's true.

The question I have for you, Janice, is I noticed in a lot of the cases when we talk about post-traumatic stress disorder, it's more or less male-oriented. We see a lot of men talking about their PTSD. But as you know, we had that--and I forget her name--major in Afghanistan who unfortunately took her own life. A lot of women also suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, and like Tim, they don't like to be known as sick bay rangers. They want to suck it up, buttercup, and move on. Can you tell me what special concerns you're doing for women who are suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder in terms of their transition? Also, can you elaborate on the transition between 3(b) release and those who voluntarily release? Because there is a big difference. When you're 3(b)-released, in a lot of cases you don't want to go but you're told to go, as opposed to a voluntary release in that regard.

I know those are a lot of questions. If you can't have time to answer them all, if you could send us back the answers in writing it would be greatly appreciated.

I thank each and every one of you for your work for veterans.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Before you start, I'm going to say that most of the time has already been used up. I'm going to ask you if you would very briefly respond and perhaps send in writing more detail, if you wouldn't mind. Thank you.

[Tim Laidler]

To the first question, I went to an OSI clinic; those are the provincially operated federally funded clinics. It was the psychiatrist there who said “quick assessment”--and it wasn't quick, an hour and a half--and then that was it. There were no other additional treatments offered. I am exceptional in deception; I've been trained in it with the military. I went into that assessment saying I don't want to have PTSD, and insisted that I was okay just for my own benefit. That's why in terms of further diagnosis and getting people into these programs it is so essential to go through the community model, through the peer-to-peer model, because many military members will say “I don't have any issues, but I can name five of my buddies who are totally messed up and they need to get into these programs right away.” So I say we use that to get them in.

I also just want to mention something about the women. We are excited to start the first women's program in January. Professor Tim Black, of the University of Victoria, is going to be operating that and training two female psychologists on how to deliver it. I just want to say from personal experience that it is both the men and the women who fall victim to the hyper-masculine culture of organizations like the military. It's not gender-specific but it is culture-specific. It's a hyper-masculine culture--suck it up.

[Brad White]

I'll respond very briefly, and I'm not usually very brief, you know that.

From a funding perspective, what we do for families is we've opened up our poppy fund. It's always been there, but we've opened up the poppy fund very recently, within the last two years, to service members and their families. We've always had former service people as part of that, and their families. So we do have the funding available to assist them through the poppy fund.

[Andrea Siew]

Very quickly, we're working very closely with the director of military family services in the Canadian Forces, who has responsibility for all of the military family resource centres across the country.

We're working to establish an understanding of the resources that are available either through the Canadian Forces or in the community, so that when we have these calls from family members about spouses and children we can refer them to the community resources, to DND resources, or to Veterans Affairs resources, depending on their need. And we're educating our service officers to be more aware of what programs are available and to have the tools to access them.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Thank you.

Go ahead, very briefly.

[Janice Burke]

Very briefly, regarding special concerns about women with PTSD, this is a very important area for Veterans Affairs. In fact, I believe about 10% of our clients in receipt of disability benefits for PTSD are women; so of 14,000 that we have, about 1,443 are women.

We very much consider this in our analysis of policies. We have a gender-based framework so that when we look at policies we do so from the perspective of gender. We're also sensitive to this issue in our operational stress injury clinics, and within our operational stress injury social support program. So yes, it is an important focus.

We're very hopeful that in the future we will have more research on how to best meet the needs of women with mental health conditions.

The second question--

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Sorry, we're well over time. You can give all the credit to Mr. Stoffer for that. I do apologize, but we have to move on.

Mr. Storseth.

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

First of all, I'd like to thank all the witnesses for coming today. Thank you for your assistance and your dedication to veterans and our country.

Mr. Laidler, thank you for the service you have given our country and continue to give to our country moving forward.

You hit on something that I think is very important. You talked about the recognition factor and Canadian society embracing the work that military men and women have done, not just through the great wars and Korea and peacekeeping, but also in Afghanistan.

I think society recognizes that. As I was saying to Mr. White earlier, our Remembrance Day ceremonies are larger than they've ever been. They are embraced by Canadian society at large.

But I think it starts with the government. The recognition last week of the Libyan mission was an excellent step, and I think the opposition could help out by embracing that and talking about the positives in that kind of thing, rather than focusing on the negatives. Because it's important that we recognize the great work and celebrate the great work our men and women have done in Libya and Afghanistan and throughout our Canadian Forces.

I've read the review I was given on the veterans transition program. It looks very interesting. It looks as though you guys have had some very good success in more localized situations. Is the program ready to be disseminated across the country quickly? Is it just funding that you're lacking right now?

[Tim Laidler]

Yes, we have five leading teams--that's two psychologists. They are trained and they're ready to go. They're asking me all the time when the next program is going to run. I just have to say “That's based on funding”.

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

What percentage of new veterans do you have the capacity to help out? Can you help out all the guys who are coming back, or 50% of the guys? Do you know?