Veterans Affairs Committee on Dec. 1st, 2011

[Janice Burke]

I'm sorry, I don't know the answer to that.

[Eve Adams, Conservative, Mississauga—Brampton South, ON]

Paying for the education of the orphans of our soldiers, you don't know whether or not that was supported by the NDP? I do know that the Conservatives supported that. I checked the record. It turns out the NDP did not support that. That's kind of odd, isn't it?

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

Point of order.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Before you say it, I have to point out that I don't think staff should actually answer that political question.

Perhaps we can move on, please.

[Eve Adams, Conservative, Mississauga—Brampton South, ON]

Not to worry.

Corporal Laidler, thank you very much for being here and for your great service to our country. I know Dr. Westwood's work out in UBC is really extraordinary. He has really created just a wonderful program and taken a real leadership position on this. You mentioned that your program is ten days. There are two sets of four days, mostly focused on communication. The last two are focused on career transition. Can you expand upon the career transition?

[Tim Laidler]

Sure. Absolutely.

When we talk about the first two sets of four days, it's not just on communication. It is really in-depth psychological treatment for people with severe PTSD, or people with mild PTSD, or whatever varying operational stress injury. The career transition program is different from what VAC offers. I'll just be really clear here that it is intended to be very much complementary to the service model that's there. We do not offer a stand-alone program. It's required to have individual counselling on the front and back end, and many of the people who come through the program are clients of VAC or DND.

The career transition component that's different is that it looks to get to the deeper cause, whereas the current career transition modules that they hold and are funded by the government will be typically that you fill out the assessment tests and find out what your skills are and you look to make an across-the-board transition. So if you were a truck driver in the military—for example, I drove convoys overseas, so I'm qualified to be a truck driver in the civilian workforce. It helps translate the language across like that.

Our career component tries to move it further up. When I came out, I was going right into the police force; that's where I saw my competencies were; I did all the assessment tests; I said to myself that I'm qualified to be a police officer. After going through that transition program, realizing that I had a bit more energy or passion to move up and beyond, I'm now doing a master's in counselling and psychology at UBC, and I'm set to be the executive director of this national non-profit organization rolling out the program.

There are a number of cases like me. We have people coming through it and going on and saying, “You know what; I am going to get my MBA. I'm not just going to stay here and take this other vocation that I did for ten years in the military.”

[Eve Adams, Conservative, Mississauga—Brampton South, ON]

That's wonderful.

I would like to direct this to VAC. Could you give us some more information on the transition program and how unique Corporal Laidler's program is, in that is allows for these leadership experiences for veterans?

[Janice Burke]

We have the two programs, as you know. The career transition services program is for the people who are released involuntarily. It provides résumé writing, education, aptitude testing, and help with finding employment locally. The vocational rehabilitation program is very similar, in that there is an assessment that is carried out.

[Eve Adams, Conservative, Mississauga—Brampton South, ON]

I guess what I'm getting at is if people have gone through that and they still haven't found a job, what's then available for them?

[Janice Burke]

If they have not found a job, we also have the Canadian Forces income support, which is available as a soft landing for people who have been though the program and have still not found a satisfying career. However, we continue to work with the members. They can come back into our programs as many times as needed. We have vocational rehabilitation experts working with them in terms of getting them training and access to jobs in their communities.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Thank you very much, Ms. Burke.

That ends round one. We certainly spent a lot of time on that first round, so I'm going to make the second round three minutes, so we can make sure everybody gets a chance for a question.

I understand we are starting the three-minute round with Ms. Papillon.

[Annick Papillon, NDP, Québec, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

First of all, I'd like to thank you for coming here today.

I'd like to correct something my colleague said. The NDP did indeed support the New Veterans Charter. However, we did not approve of the Conservatives' budget, which we deemed to be incorrect and unfair to all Canadians.

This being said, I'd like to talk about the fact that you, like nearly all the people who have appeared before this committee, moreover, have emphasized the importance of ensuring better medical follow-up of veterans to help them make a better transition. Such medical follow-up should be improved.

It has also been pointed out that there's a lack of independent specialized research in Canada on the health of members of the military and veterans. What do you plan to do to improve this situation? Also, what do you think of the idea of considering for the time being, while all this research takes place, the studies that have been conducted in various allied countries? Different studies have been done, for example, on exposure to chemical agents and other questions concerning the health of our military. Are you prepared to take them into consideration in order to improve what we know about this subject?

[Brad White]

I guess I can start this one off, and maybe other people can jump in.

Excuse me. I'm going to answer in English. If I can't think of the words in English, I'll come back to French.

I'll start with research. We don't have any really dedicated research in the country that allows us to go ahead and move forward with some of the issues that we need to be tackling, issues like depleted uranium. All those other issues of chemical access, environmental factors, and chemical factors, we don't have that research.

We didn't have research on things like ALS. Two years ago we went to the American Legion convention, and we found that Veterans Affairs in the United States had accepted ALS as a benefit symptom for moving down the road because they'd found out that they had research demonstrating that people who'd served in the military, due to environmental reasons and stressors that they experienced while in the military, had a higher preponderance of ALS symptoms than those of the general population. The Legion took that to VAC and VAC said they didn't have the research for it. So we went, back door, to the ALS Society of Canada with Pierre, brought it back again, and, lo and behold, ALS is now a benefit symptom. This is how we get our work done.

Do we use outside research? You bet we do. Do we have people looking at it? Andrea has people in her office who are becoming subject-matter experts, who look at that research on the outside, to be able to say that we need to look at these types of things.

We also have our own research that we're doing, through just talking with the individuals as we're doing first applications. We're finding out what the commonalities are, and hopefully we're going to be able to identify where we need to direct that research in the future.

As for access to medical care on the transition process, when in you're in the military you have good medical care. When you receive an injury, you have three more years in the military before you're assessed as to whether or not you're going to stay in the military or you're going to be transitioned out of the military. That's a really heavy transition period for the individual who really needs constant case management and care. What happens is, when you're doing that process, you're also involved in the SISIP process, service income security insurance plan, as well as going through all of this. Then, of course, at the end of the three years you're transitioned over from being a member of the Canadian Forces to being a client of Veterans Affairs. There are differences—mentality differences—between being a member of an organization and being a client of an organization.

When you leave the military, as we did, you have to go and find a doctor. I had to apply for an OHIP card. I've never done that in my life. So there I was, just like everybody else, down on Albert Street, looking for my OHIP card, and then I had to go and find a doctor. In the last 13 years I've been through five different doctors, because people move, and people pass. We have a serious shortage of health care professionals in the country, and there are Canadians who are not receiving health care.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Mr. White, I'm going to ask you to wrap it up.

[Brad White]

When you transition out of the military you have that problem of trying to find yourself a doctor.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Okay, thank you very much.

Mr. Lizon, for three minutes.

[Wladyslaw Lizon, Conservative, Mississauga East—Cooksville, ON]

Good morning. Thank you for coming here today.

I was just thinking of all the services that are provided for veterans. Generally speaking, are we maybe missing a target in some areas?

My reason for this question is the history of veterans, not only in this country but in many other countries. We've had veterans of many other wars. There was a huge number of Second World War veterans, some of whom are still alive. My grandfather was a First World War veteran. I remember he was missing his right arm. I had family who experienced terrible things in the Second World War, and I knew veterans from the Second World War, people who worked as forced labourers in Germany.

If you look at their history, a great majority of these people were able to return to normal life, sometimes, or probably in the majority of cases, without counselling or special programs. My question is--and I would ask Mr. Laidler--are we different now from what these people were before? For example, if someone is diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, is the diagnosis important? I think what is more important is the treatment.

Maybe what the majority of people need is what the Legion can provide, where they can get together with friends and have a drink, maybe have a meal once a week or a dance. This would bring them to normal life.

Therefore what I am asking is, are there services that should be shifted? Maybe financial means should be shifted for programs of this kind of experience for people who served in our armed forces and have come back.

[Tim Laidler]

I'd be happy to answer the first part, and this would be directly on behalf of Dr. David Kuhl, the co-founder of our program. He worked in palliative care at St. Paul's Hospital in Vancouver for a number of years, so he'll often say that he's seen thousands of people die.

What encouraged him to get involved in this project was that he saw many men and women dying alone at the end of their lives. They had served in the military. They were coming out of the downtown eastside in Vancouver, drug-addicted, and they died horrible deaths. He said that some of them had managed to function right to the end. They had managed to get by, but the way they died was in pain, it was alone, and it was outside of their communities.

That's when he came to the younger generation of veterans, because he saw the impact of putting out the face of everything being okay, and of having a few drinks or a beer and carrying on. But he will say that underneath, in the inside world, it was not okay and that's what comes out at the end of life.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Thank you very much.

We are way over time. I know everybody would like to talk right through until noon, but we do have to move on because we have a set time and another committee comes in here. So I thank you very much for that.

I have Mr. Genest, and then we're suspending and then we're going in camera.

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

I have a point of order.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

You want a point of order now?

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

Just before we wrap up for today, I just want to advise the parliamentary secretary--and I'll be gentle to her, because she's new here--that a cheap shot like that is completely unacceptable here. There is one person here who worked--

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Mr. Chair--

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

No, I'm already going to rule that's not a point of order. I know there's a disagreement. I know the PS backed off and got the question, understanding staff can't talk about political things.

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

Understandable.