Veterans Affairs Committee on May 26th, 2015

[John Rafferty, NDP, Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON]

Mr. Forbes.

[Brian Forbes]

Actually, I can go back to 2009. The New Veterans Charter Advisory Group was set up by this government in 2007. One of the more fundamental priorities that we identified was eliminating the SISIP program as part of VAC's income replacement culture.

Just quickly, Mr. Chair, when this act was passed in 2006, there were restraints placed on what VAC could do because of the SISIP program. We were touching on that. But the 75% of income, the age 65 termination date, the 2% cap on inflation, and no probable career earnings were all part of the insurance program. It had to be borrowed at that time in order to get the charter through, but we're still living with it almost 10 years later.

It has to go, to be very blunt.

[John Rafferty, NDP, Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Royal Galipeau]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Opitz.

[Ted Opitz, Conservative, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and through you, thank you all for being here.

Clearly, we're all seized with veterans around this table. There's nobody who gets up in the morning and asks, “How do we do it worse?” We all want to strive to do it better. That's something that we're all trying to do and, as my colleague said earlier, a lot do change. Back in the days when he was flying a Sopwith Camel in the First World War....

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Ted Opitz, Conservative, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

I had to get that in.

But you know a lot did change then as it did in 1938. There's no possible way we could have anticipated the level of issues and Korea after that. For example, we went through shell shock and combat fatigue. PTSD was only diagnosed in the 1970s as an actual term. So there's a lot of flexibility here and latitude for discovering new things because as we progress, the war injuries are different and they're caused differently. They're caused through different weapon systems and other things. How do you treat that?

We have new treatments for PTSD every day that they're working on. DRDC, as the ombudsman well knows, and CIMVHR and others are working to address these things. They are trying to get ahead of the curve and identify people through genetic markers who might be susceptible to this and be able to treat that earlier or to be able to address it. There's a lot going on.

By the way, when we bring even a half-smile to the ombudsman facing me, it makes my day, so I'm happy about that.

As Mr. Hawn said, the minister is absolutely seized with it. He is absolutely committed to it. Sir, you had a veterans summit. That's commitment for this minister to be able to address that with stakeholders and to be able to talk about that. He has a deputy minister who, I think everybody here will agree, is top drawer: my old boss General Walt Natynczyk, who was just absolutely the right man for the job, is doing brilliantly.

There are a lot of vets on this side of the table, three veterans. Many of the minister's staff are veterans, one currently serving as the CEO of a medical unit still. So, I mean, if that doesn't say commitment, I absolutely don't know what does.

I know that this government and the minister are absolutely seized with moving the yardsticks forward on this and this committee, folks, will never be out of work. We will never be out of work. We will always have something to address year after year on this committee about veterans, because this is an ever-changing, ever-evolving issue with veterans. New things will happen. Things will change. New treatments will reveal themselves or new problems will reveal themselves, and we will have to address those. That's why this committee will always be here, I think, in perpetuity. We do have things to address. There is a gap. It's narrowing all the time but it may never completely close, and that's why I think we have to deal with that.

Our previous witnesses—to address some of the comments you made right now about what some of the problems are—addressed in their testimony that the language is going to change and how they're talking to veterans so it's much more understandable and doesn't sound like it's right out of the legislation. I mean, I have trouble with it; I have to read it two or three times sometimes to understand it, and I work in this environment. It needs to be made clear. They're going to do that. The new case workers who are coming on line will be educated and trained to work with this and to address it, so better communications are en route and getting done. Are they going to happen by tomorrow? No.

But there's going to be an option to, as this evolves, as the deputy minister said.... As they start to implement this plan with the changes, which I think we have agreement on that you all counsel this committee to vote for. It will be implemented and delivered as a service delivery, to use a term that you used earlier, to the veterans.

Given some of my comments and given the fact that previous witnesses already addressed what some of the changes are coming: being able to be more understandable, more flexible, making sure that the application process is simpler and quicker and that there is guidance given to veterans as well, as you all know, the initiative now is to blend. You know as soon as a recruit is taken on that they will learn throughout their career about VAC so once they retire, there won't be any mysteries. They will know how to access it. They will know how to deal with it much better. I think as we move forward over the next few years that will start to manifest itself.

Mr. Parent, would you have any comment?

[The Chair, Conservative, Royal Galipeau]

Mr. Parent, that five-minute preamble is leaving you one minute.

[Guy Parent]

I think the best way to answer that is, when you have a chance afterwards, look at the blog report we produced yesterday. That is a report card on the recommendations you made and the recommendations we made. There are some x's there, things that didn't happen, but the majority of the changes meet the intent of the recommendations. I think that's important. I think if you read this report you'll see we've come a long way in the right direction. However, there are still some gaps, and for those gaps, as Brian has indicated, and as the whole community of veterans has indicated, we need to keep the momentum going. That's important.

The work you've done in the last few years to move that forward is laudable. Thank you very much for that, but we need to keep it moving.

[Brian Forbes]

Could I speak to that for a second, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Conservative, Royal Galipeau]

I think considering the preamble, I'll give you a minute too.

[Brian Forbes]

Thank you very much.

First of all, I want to compliment Guy on the chart he's produced. We saw it for the first time last evening, and I certainly encourage the committee to take a look at that.

Mr. Opitz, I think one of your comments, which I am quite attracted to, is that the administration now under the control of Walt Natynczyk is a much improved administration that is getting TS faster, which I particularly like. The veteran-centric attitude he brings to the entire assignment is laudatory.

The one thing I would suggest to you is that access to benefits is one thing, and the improved language is important, but the entitlements have to be there at the end of the day. That's why I've suggested this morning, in a bit of a critical way, that the other half of the loaf is yet to be completed. Walt Natynczyk can't give us that half loaf unless the government provides the legislative entitlement.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Royal Galipeau]

Thank you very much, Mr. Forbes. You stayed on time.

[Brian Forbes]

I'm doing better, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Royal Galipeau]

You're getting good brownie points with the chair.

Mr. Lemieux.

[Pierre Lemieux, Conservative, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Just as the meeting is winding down, I'd like to make a proposal to the committee. I think we all agree this is important legislation. A few days ago, I had offered to the committee that we have extra meetings. I was suggesting two extra meetings to make sure we hear from the most number of witnesses as possible. The opposition gratefully accepted one extra meeting, which is the meeting we're going to have tonight.

Mr. Chair, what I'd like to do is propose the second meeting for Wednesday evening, for just one hour. I say that because I believe there are four witnesses we haven't been able to schedule into the two meetings we're having, and this will give them an opportunity to talk about the legislation and what's in front of us. As I mentioned, certainly from our perspective on this side, it's important that we hear from as many witnesses as we possibly can.

I'd like to put that out to the committee, that we host one more meeting—a one-hour meeting, not a two-hour meeting—on Wednesday night.

[The Chair, Conservative, Royal Galipeau]

We don't have a lot of time to discuss this.

Mr. Valeriote.

[Frank Valeriote, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Of course, a number of people have made commitments. We have votes at 6:00 p.m. The Speaker is hosting a dinner for retiring members of Parliament, and one day, if you're talking about tomorrow night.... Are you talking about tomorrow night or the following Wednesday?

[Pierre Lemieux, Conservative, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

This Wednesday.

[Frank Valeriote, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

That's tomorrow evening. I don't know what witnesses you're suggesting we bring here on 24-hours' notice, but they're likely witnesses you're going to propose—

[Pierre Lemieux, Conservative, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

No.

[Frank Valeriote, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

I don't know how the NDP feel, but I'm happy to do it early next week, or Thursday morning. It's short notice.

[Pierre Lemieux, Conservative, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

It is short notice. It's meant to be accommodating to witnesses. They're not our witnesses.

[Frank Valeriote, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

What time are you proposing?

[Pierre Lemieux, Conservative, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

It would be after votes. I believe up until votes we're all jammed up with other meetings, question period, and votes.