Veterans Affairs Committee on Sept. 29th, 2011

[Bernard Butler]

That is one I'm certainly unable to respond to.

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

If you could just respond--

[Bernard Butler]

We could certainly commit to making that available to the committee.

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

Do you know about any changes to the Veterans Review and Appeal Board that you can discuss at this point?

[Bernard Butler]

Certainly none I am privy to. Again, the chairman of the Veterans Review and Appeal Board would be the better one to speak to issues about the board itself. As you know, it's been set up as of this past April as an independent entity under the Financial Administration Act, reporting to Parliament and to the minister. It might be prudent to consider having the chairman before the committee, where you could get a lot more detailed information.

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

How much time do I have left, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Thirty seconds.

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

All right. Thank you very much, Mr. Butler.

For anybody who hasn't had the opportunity to go to Charlottetown to visit, the headquarters for DVA does excellent work there. I think everybody should take the opportunity to go down there.

[Bernard Butler]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Thank you, Mr. Storseth.

Now it's to Mr. Lizon for five minutes.

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

What, if anything, has Veterans Affairs done to engage youth in the commemoration of veterans affairs in Canada? Is there a specific program? Is there an outreach program for school kids, high school students or university students? Can you elaborate on this?

[Bernard Butler]

Thank you for that question, Mr. Lizon.

Absolutely. The Canada Remembers program and the Department of Veterans Affairs are very well aware of the importance of engaging Canadian youth in commemorative activities. Obviously our youth are the future, and we need to reach out to them. The department has been very successful in an educational program that provides educational materials on remembrance activities and remembrance programming. All that material is made available to schools all across Canada. That's one example of their outreach to youth.

Another good example of outreach to youth is the success the department has had with social media. We've learned that with the age cohort around this table, a lot of us would not be as familiar with things like Facebook, Twitter, and so on. That's where the young people are today. Veterans Affairs has been exceedingly successful with the Canada Remembers group in reaching out to youth through Facebook. Right now, Veterans Affairs has one of the largest corporate Facebook accounts in Canada in membership. A lot of those would be young people.

Those are two examples of how we reach out to and engage youth in commemoration and remembrance activities in Canada.

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

One of the groups that always comes to mind are Scouts. They are the ones that are maybe the most knowledgeable through their own programs.

As we know, the lack of knowledge and some kind of insensitivity causes terrible things, like defacing our monuments, for example. Cases like this have happened in the past, and I think will happen in the future. I think it's due to a lack of knowledge in that regard. Could you say a few words on this topic? Is anything specific being done so the level of knowledge is higher? These things should not happen.

[Charlotte Stewart]

No, it's very important. The youth of Canada today, unlike people of my generation, whose fathers or grandfathers may have been directly involved in the military, have less of a direct relationship at times. As Bernard mentioned, there are a lot of things happening at the school level. I think our educators are very important and very well informed on our commitment to commemoration. If you go across the school systems, they are working very hard to use the learning materials that are given at a young age in the school system, and to have those children grow up with knowledge that they learn there.

Also, as children become teens, we've engaged them directly in some of our overseas pilgrimages, as we call them, on which we take veterans and young people to key sites, for instance Vimy and others, where they can see first-hand where Canada fought, and they can spend time with those veterans while they're there. When those young people come back, they become ambassadors for Canada Remembers, not for our organization but to remember our veterans. So we're hoping to build in those youth the sense that they are leaders in helping to spread the message and send a positive message of how important it is.

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

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Okay, I want to thank you for the first round.

I'm going to take direction from the committee. I know Mr. Storseth is being helpful in pointing out that we should try to tighten, but normally right now we'd be finished with the witnesses. We've used up the hour, but we started ten minutes late. We don't have time for a second round of four minutes each. We could go to two, if that's the wish of the committee. It is at the committee's direction, because we're just going to the business section, but we do definitely have to wrap up at 10:45 because we have to get to the business. If you're comfortable, we can go to a second round of two minutes each. Is that agreed to?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Okay, then we will go to the NDP for two minutes.

Ms. Mathyssen.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Butler and Ms. Stewart. I very much appreciate your being here.

You touched a bit on what I'm about to ask when you talked about mental illness, addiction, and substance abuse. One of the things that's come to my attention through a local professor in London, Ontario, is the issue of homelessness among veterans and the fact that we were very much unaware of that for quite a long time. Now we're hearing some quite disturbing information about the number of veterans who aren't coping and they're ending up on the street or in some cases they're taking themselves into very rough lifestyles in the woods, in the bush.

I wonder if you have taken a close look at the studies, what your plans are to respond to them, and whether additional studies are needed. I'm thinking about aboriginal veterans because so very often they're overlooked.

[Charlotte Stewart]

We're certainly taking a look at the study, and it will help inform us. I want to tell you, though, a bit about what we're doing. We will always look to be informed by any new information that comes forward. We understand homelessness is a very difficult issue. It's very difficult to address, because those who are homeless are very isolated, by choice often, and we have to find new means to reach them. They lack trust in organizations—the federal government and others—so we have to develop relationships with those they have relationships with.

On the ground, for instance, when we look at our district offices, they are actively working with organizations that are in support of the homeless, so they will do outreach. They've done a lot of this in the last little while, because this issue is getting much more attention.

We've gone to hundreds of agencies and groups across the country to spread the word about Veterans Affairs Canada. We've gone to advocates of veterans. We've gone to organizations. We're trying to reach the homeless in new ways. We have found and we have served homeless veterans. We have clients now who were homeless and we're working with them. We've had some great success stories, but they're modest in terms of the potential number. We know there is lots more to be done.

With respect to homelessness, we're working closely with other federal departments, most notably HRSDC—it is key to their mandate to support this—and the Canadian Mental Health Association, so that we all tie together and we're not doing anything independently.

We've run pilots--

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

We're at the three-minute mark actually. It's very important, but I know we do have to move on.

Now we go to Mr. Daniel.

[Joe Daniel, Conservative, Don Valley East, ON]

Thank you.

Obviously, mental health is a big issue with a lot of veterans and it isn't just a one-point fix-all type of situation. What is the VAC doing for veterans with mental health conditions? What programs exist for them?

[Charlotte Stewart]

The first thing is to understand when a veteran has an issue. So our case managers, who are the front line in many cases and the first point of contact, are being trained to recognize the indicators of mental health issues, and it's a sensitive area. It's very unlikely that people will come in and ask for mental health support. So the case managers are trained to find a way to work with them to get the information. They get the families involved, because to support people with mental health issues requires good support around them as well.

That's one thing, and then they work with mental health professionals. As a case manager on the ground, you have access to and you can support the veteran to receive benefit from mental health, whether it's a psychologist or an addictions counsellor. There's a range of professionals who are available. They also refer those clients to the operational stress injury clinic. They'll make a direct referral, and that's where, in those 17 sites across the country, a veteran can get direct support.

We're building capacity through those centres as well. It's an area, as you know, where we need to have as many health professionals as possible who are trained in this. If you're not close to an operational stress injury clinic, we can use telecommunications to do mental health. All of the clinics have the capacity for mental health services through telecommunications. That might sound like an approach that may not work as well, but in fact it can, at least to engage at the front. So we're having good success with that as well.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

We are past time, so I am going to thank you very much.

I understand the NDP is going to pass on its last time slot. Did I get that right or not?

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

I thought we were done.