Evidence of meeting #42 for Veterans Affairs in the 41st Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was work.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Laurie Hawn Conservative Edmonton Centre, AB
Probably the last thing I'd want is for government to run it all. I think that would be awful, frankly. I think you probably agree.
Your counterpart organizations in countries like the U.S. and the U.K., where there are similar organizations doing similar things, are you in contact with them on best practices and things?
President, True Patriot Love Foundation
We are. Actually, we are hosting our fourth international symposium this fall. We're doing it in San Francisco. This will be the fourth year that we're doing it. Every year we bring together organizations like True Patriot Love, governments, academia, the medical community, and the corporate sector, and we focus on a specific topic. The first year we did it at the Canadian embassy in D.C., and the focus was on PTSD. The second one we did at Canada House in the U.K., and we focused specifically on veteran transition. We just did one last year in Ottawa at the War Museum, and the focus there was the modern military family. The one we're doing in San Francisco, the focus of that is going to be on veteran identity, and how the media perceives veterans and how that in turn impacts the way they feel about themselves, but also the potential for employment and kind of dealing with some of the stereotypes that are out there.
Conservative
Laurie Hawn Conservative Edmonton Centre, AB
Is there follow-up between meetings, and so on? Obviously, there are some great things said and done and talked about at those meetings.
President, True Patriot Love Foundation
Yes. We issued a report from our last one recently. I think most importantly what comes out of that is less about all sitting down together and saying that we need to solve a problem together. It's more about the network that you create and the interaction that you have with organizations that you would never have met before. I know that within our own Department of National Defence, I've heard so many times that, as a result of our symposium, they're now talking to people in Australia about what they're dealing with or how they're addressing a specific issue. It's more those kinds of relationships that come out of it.
Conservative
Pierre Lemieux Conservative Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON
That's all I need, Chair.
Thank you very much. I was reflecting on some of your comments about post-service employment. I'm wondering if there's any work that's been done on identifying, for example, a target population among those who leave the military.
Here's what I'm thinking. I myself was in the military and I know many military members who might have been in for 25 years, for example. They leave with a 50% pension and their thinking is not that they want to find a job that pays exactly what they were earning or more than in the military. They're thinking that they might want less stressful employment, something that's a little less demanding. They'll take less salary because it's supplemented by their 50% pension. If that's not taken into consideration, it can skew the numbers on a broader study that would say, “Oh, he or she has found employment, but look, the salary is less than what they were earning in the military.” It's by choice.
I would say the same, in general, regarding people who leave on a voluntary release later in their career. Let's just say someone voluntarily releases at five years. After five years of service they're much younger and yes, they might face very different challenges than someone who voluntarily releases at 20 years whose thinking is, “Well, I've been in the military for so long and I'm freely choosing to leave the military.”
I'm wondering if those kinds of considerations were made, as far as you know, in terms of some of the statistics you've provided.
President, True Patriot Love Foundation
They were. I would say less so with respect to the ill and injured. When we did the work at the Veterans Transition Advisory Council, we recognized that that could be the case in many situations. If you look at somebody who's releasing, who has been in the military for quite a while, you see that their post-military career income drops. You think, oh no, but quickly realize, well—
Conservative
Pierre Lemieux Conservative Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON
It's supplemented by the pension, for example.
President, True Patriot Love Foundation
Yes, so that's fine, and it's probably a bit of a personal choice.
I think the area where we were most concerned was with the younger veterans who were releasing, where you couldn't make that same argument necessarily. That was more where we were focusing our concern rather than on the....
Conservative
Pierre Lemieux Conservative Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON
Right. I think that is the case with ill and injured veterans as well. Although it would be interesting to know the window. For example, through SISIP and through Veterans Affairs, there is medical rehabilitation that goes on, and then there's vocational training. It is quite possible, for example, for an injured veteran to leave the forces and undertake three years of vocational training. During that time, they're getting the earnings loss benefit, but from an employment perspective, they are not employed in a job earning a salary. They're moving in that direction. It would be interesting to know what the window was in terms of employment when the numbers were put together, perhaps through a study, whether it was within a year of having left the forces, within five years of having left the forces, particularly for ill and injured veterans.
Conservative
Conservative
Pierre Lemieux Conservative Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON
Of course, Chair. I just had to explain the question.
President, True Patriot Love Foundation
I agree with you. This is very anecdotal because we've had veteran interns come and work at True Patriot Love. We try to do that on a regular basis, and we tend to focus on the ill and injured population because we know it's most challenging for them to find employment.
With one person in particular, I was interviewing him, and his dream job was to go into security, and I wondered how I was going to fit him into a job with True Patriot Love. He looked at me at one point and he said, “I just want to work. I just want somewhere to go every day. Just give me whatever and I will come and do it.” We hired him. We brought him in and he stayed with us until he found a security job. We couldn't pay him because he was still getting an income from the Canadian Armed Forces at that point, but there was a sense of wanting to contribute and being unable to sit around at home doing nothing. That's the part that's—
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Royal Galipeau
Thank you very much for your presentation today and for your interaction with members of the committee. It was enlightening. I'll bet you that the evidence that you presented will be reflected in the work that we're going to do.
Next Tuesday, we're going to have Major-General Rohmer. Next Thursday, of course, we've already spoken about SISIP; they will be with us.
Meanwhile, earlier today we distributed a request for a project budget. This is basically to reimburse witnesses whom we've had coming to this committee for this study. They've come from across the country. You've seen the various amounts. The total is $10,850.
Could I have a motion?
Mr. Lizon is moving the motion.
I see there is opposition from Mr. Lemieux.
Conservative
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Royal Galipeau
Should I call a vote?
Everyone is in favour, even Mr. Lemieux.