Veterans Affairs Committee on Oct. 4th, 2011

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Mr. Genest?

[Réjean Genest, NDP, Shefford, QC]

Very well. That is all.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Okay.

Ms. Papillon.

[Annick Papillon, NDP, Québec, QC]

First of all, thank you for coming today and thank you for the work you do.

I would like to know how you involve the private sector in activities. I would like to have some information on that.

[Derek Sullivan]

Our work with the private sector does not include providing any contributions to them. Our funding programs are exclusively directed to the not-for-profit sector and community groups. However, we encourage the private sector to use their own resources to take on a leadership role in remembrance.

A number of companies are quite interested in doing that. This is a more recent area that we've begun working in. They're interested in looking at their existing activities, and perhaps even advertising campaigns, to see how they can achieve their objectives while also honouring those who serve Canada.

Our role in this is to make them aware that there's an opportunity for them to do this, and encourage them to take on that leadership role themselves. Sometimes you only need to make them aware of an opportunity, and if they see that it's the right thing to do they'll take advantage of it themselves.

[Annick Papillon, NDP, Québec, QC]

Do you have any examples to give us?

[Derek Sullivan]

Yes, and some of it goes back a number of years.

There was a spectacular television ad from Bell Canada some years ago, where a young man was walking on the beach in Dieppe talking on his cellphone. He called his grandfather, who had been a veteran of the Dieppe raid, to say thank you. The ad didn't talk about cellphones or any of the company's services, but it was very powerful. They did not overly commercialize it, but they sent a powerful remembrance message to viewers, while making them aware of Bell Canada at the same time.

[Annick Papillon, NDP, Québec, QC]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Thank you very much, Mr. Sullivan.

We'll now go to the Conservatives. Mr. Anders.

[Rob Anders, Conservative, Calgary West, AB]

Thank you very much.

I think the only person who has been on the committee long enough to remember this discussion would be Mr. Stoffer.

I am still bothered by the idea that Beechwood Cemetery and many other cemeteries across the country have what I would term to be unmarked graves. If I go to Beechwood today, I can find patches of grass where a veteran has been buried. I appreciate the fact that the Government of Canada or our funeral and burial program has provided a space for people to inter their loved ones who have served us so well, but not all of them have gravestones, markers, or even plaques to indicate who is buried there. The only way to actually know who is buried would be to ask the people who tend the graves. They have paper copies in their records of all the grave sites, and they therefore know that private so-and-so is buried there, but there's no indication whether in stone or in bronze in the earth for somebody visiting the cemetery to even know a body is there.

We go to great lengths on many levels with regard to newspapers, videos, slide presentations, and this, that, and the other damn thing, but for me, in terms of the “we will remember them” part of the ceremonies that we have every November 11, $1 million would make sense. I remember when Brent St. Denis was a Liberal member here and we actually calculated what it would cost for the couple of hundred dollars per thousands of them. We calculated that we could actually mark all of those graves for about $1 million.

I leave it as something for the committee to consider. We spend lots of money in this place on all types of other things. I think it would be a worthwhile project.

[Derek Sullivan]

We actually have a program that provides for the marking of unmarked veterans graves. As part of our funeral and burial program, we work with the Last Post Fund corporation, which delivers the program for us. They have an unmarked graves program as part of their activities.

If anyone is aware of any unmarked veteran grave that has remained unmarked for five years, the Last Post Fund would be very pleased to provide a marker for that grave. The vast majority of the funding for the program comes from Veterans Affairs. We have the means and the mechanism to do it now. Anyone who is aware of any unmarked veterans graves should contact the Last Post Fund or us, and we'll make sure that it's done.

[Rob Anders, Conservative, Calgary West, AB]

I appreciate that.

On the visits I've made to Beechwood, I'm quite certain those graves have been left unmarked for more than five years. Is it merely because nobody has filled out the paperwork or made an application, or approached this body or entity with regard to those graves?

[Derek Sullivan]

Yes, I would say that's the case. We can't fix what we don't know.

[Rob Anders, Conservative, Calgary West, AB]

All right.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

We will go to Mr. Lizon, for five minutes.

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

Thank you.

Thank you very much, Mr. Sullivan and Mr. Mills.

What significant anniversaries are coming up that Canadians will celebrate or recognize?

[Derek Sullivan]

There are a number of them coming up over the next few years.

There are significant anniversaries that we recognize every year. A couple were mentioned earlier, which are the Battle of Britain, D-Day, Merchant Navy Day, and National Peacekeepers' Day on August 9 every year, or in many places on the closest Sunday to that date.

In terms of major cyclical anniversaries, we have the 95th anniversary of the Battle of Vimy Ridge on April 9, 2012. On August 19, 2012, we have the 70th anniversary of the Dieppe Raid, which is a truly Canadian commemoration. In 2013, in late July, we have the 60th anniversary of the Korean War armistice. The big one that is coming up is quite a series of anniversaries during the entire 100th anniversary of the World War I period, beginning in August 2014 and going right through to November 11, 2018.

Those are some of the key anniversaries that are coming up.

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

I have a question with regard to the social media. Of course it's very popular and it is very good that social media are used, but I still believe the participation of people in commemorative ceremonies is very important, and that goes for people of all ages.

Do you gather any information on how social media helps or if they have any impact on participation of people in commemorative ceremonies?

[Derek Sullivan]

That's a really good question. I haven't thought about it in exactly those terms.

It is very difficult to draw a connection between an online activity with people in one area and a commemorative activity in another. I don't have any evidence or analysis that I can draw on for this, but on the Facebook posts I have seen people talking about how they are planning to go out to ceremonies for key anniversaries in the lead-up to November 11. Having them talking about it online, seeing it, making it visible to them every time they go on Facebook helps them remember.

We do know from estimates that have been done by the CBC as well as veterans organizations that participation at Remembrance Day ceremonies across the country has increased dramatically from the early nineties to today. This predates the work we have on Facebook and other social media. The CBC tracks this because they want to know both the in-person attendance here in Ottawa as well as the television viewership. They found that between 1993 and 2003-04, both the in-person attendance and television audience had tripled. I think many factors contribute to that, but one of the key ones, of course, would be that remembrance is not just about things that happened long ago. People recognize more and more that it is what Canadians are doing today in places such as Afghanistan.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Okay, we are just about out of time on your side. Do you have a very quick one?

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

This is a technical question. Maybe in other constituencies people have the same questions. Sometimes one I hear in my constituency is what a veteran should do when he loses his medals.

[Peter Mills]

If a veteran loses his medals, he should contact the Department of Veterans Affairs. The staff that work for me will process the inquiry and can provide replacement medals to him, regardless of whether they are lost or stolen.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Thank you very much.

That ends round one. We are going to do round two, move into four-minute rounds, and we start with the NDP, Mr. Stoffer.

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

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

On Mr. Anders' comments on Beechwood Cemetery, consider yourself asked, Derek and Peter. I do believe that a request was made at a previous committee to look into that, and with Mr. Anders' submission here it is obvious it hasn't moved forward yet. So if it is possible to look into that, that would be great.

The other point I have is that you talk about commemoration, but—and that is just me--as I go around the country I don't see very much commemoration of the Boer War. One of the concerns I have is that this is truly the forgotten one. That was the first time we organized battalions to go to Halifax and take a ship to South Africa. Over 250 lost their lives in that particular battle. I would like to know what commemorations are going to take place next year for South Africa, for the 110th anniversary.

As you know, next Christmas will be the 70th anniversary of Hong Kong, and you have a lot on your plate in this regard. You have indicated truthfully that as the veterans get older they can't travel any more. My fear is that no one will go to visit these sites on very special commemorative days.

Will there be opportunities for people such as you and others to travel to these sites on behalf of all Canadians to pay tribute and our respects to those who went before us so many years ago? That is not just Vimy Ridge and Beaumont Hamel, what I would call the more popular sites that most people know about, but very few people know about the Battle of Hong Kong, about where our first VC winner was. He's buried in Ethiopia. A lot of people don't know that, and there are these kinds of things to go forward.

As my last question, I understand there is a push on to recognize women in the military in the commemorative events, what women have done in our armed forces. What they have done is tremendous history as well.

[Derek Sullivan]

Okay, there are some good ones there.

The Boer War, the South African War, is something that we in fact commemorate. I think if you look at the Canada Remembers Times this year and last year and the year before, you will see we have material on the South African War. We think it's important that Canadians, particularly young Canadians in this instance, are made aware of what happened, because for most Canadians it is entirely forgotten.

We're trying to correct that in terms of a special commemoration for next year, which, as you say, is the 110th anniversary of the end of the South African War. We don't have a particular event planned, but I am going to look into something we might be able to do here at the National War Memorial that would raise awareness further on that.

In terms of overseas commemoration, I do agree that it's important. We have 110,000 Canadians, or thereabouts, who are buried all around the world. It is important, I think, that Canadians pay tribute to them where they lie.

One very, very encouraging part of what we've seen over the last number of years is that increasingly large numbers of Canadian high school students, through the support of their teachers, are raising their own funds and travelling overseas to pay tribute to Canadians where they lie. While these tend to be on the major anniversaries, they don't just go to the major sites, such as the Canadian National Vimy Memorial or the Beaumont Hamel Newfoundland Memorial, they go to many other Canadian war cemeteries and Canadian memorials overseas.

Next year, for example, for the 95th anniversary of Vimy, there are already 4,000 to 5,000 Canadian high school students who will be participating in the ceremonies we will organize at Vimy next April. Last year we had over 2,000—2,200, I think it was—in the Netherlands for the 65th anniversary of the liberation of the Netherlands.

That's a very, very encouraging trend, to see young Canadians travelling overseas to pay tribute to Canadians where they lie. In fact the groups organizing for Vimy have many other events they're working on as well. Most notably, for the 100th anniversary of Vimy in 2017, we are expecting between 20,000 and 25,000 Canadian high school students. Some schools and organizations have already started planning for the 100th anniversary.