Evidence of meeting #34 for Veterans Affairs in the 42nd Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was thing.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
Doug Eyolfson Liberal Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
Okay, thank you.
Mr. McKenna—and I have it written here—you talked about how they need something that they can do because, as you said, people are released and they want an identity, they want something to do that's going to keep them in the loop, serving in some way.
Is the principle of universality of service contributing to this?
As an Individual
I think it's a crutch. I think the army takes a good shot at you, but not a great one. Then, once it's given that shot, off you go.
There's a term they have that we call “being on category” and people will cringe when they hear it. Essentially, you get an injury and they give you a temporary category or a temporary suspension of duties while you're getting fixed. There's only so many of those you can go through until it becomes a permanent one and then the permanent one gets assessed. Is he in or is he out?
At the height of military engagement in Canada, during World War I and World War II, we still had over 30% of our force here. This idea that World War III is going to take every single one of the 30,000 reservists and 68,000 regular force and put them in a country tomorrow, it's just not believable. If it were believable, are there really 1,300 every year?
I would buy it, if that number was 40. If we had done a head-to-toe on that person and said there's just no way. I'm telling you that there is a way because one of the jobs I was put into while I was going through that category, once they released me, they then had to transfer a guy in to fill it. There's another family relocation that didn't need to happen. I did the job for two years while injured, proving that I could do it. Then I get released and another family gets uprooted from eastern Canada and sent to western Canada to fill a gap that wasn't there.
The gap that was there is the policy of universality of service. I don't deny that the CDS needs the authority to be able to make sure he's got a fighting force up to a certain percentage and that certain people can't do it, but it's being used way too much, sir.
Liberal
Doug Eyolfson Liberal Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
All right.
Are there roles or positions where you could have dedicated positions that would sometimes be held by civilians in the military or give these to.... Do these exist in Canada's military today?
Liberal
Doug Eyolfson Liberal Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
Are they being utilized enough or are they being underutilized?
As an Individual
We fill them with civilians now. There are unionized civilian positions now. These should be going to veterans that still have an opportunity to serve in some capacity, but we toss out the soldiers....
The other side of the coin too is that it costs hundreds of thousands of dollars to train a soldier. He has an issue and instead of keeping him in a training capacity or in some other capacity, we throw him out in place of a new off-the-street recruit. You're paying all that money now to retrain this guy to get him to that level. We keep throwing this experience out and this money. If you want to talk about cost savings, hold on to these people and keep them around. Take some of these civilian jobs and maybe switch them out for veterans that can't serve as a service member, but are still capable of serving in some capacity.
As an Individual
If I could just add to that, the military has a shadow organization called National Defence headquarters. It's civilian. That would be the logical place to re-employ individuals.
I know a lot of guys in NDHQ who are ex-military. They step from one job into the next. Some don't even leave the same desk, but it's a perfect opportunity. Paul Franklin, for example, lost both his legs in Afghanistan. The military doesn't know what to do with broken people. They had him pushing a broom instead of putting him in a classroom teaching people emergency first aid because he was a medic.
As a culture, we've come a long way. In 1995, when I deployed, family services was considered a third-line duty behind collecting mess dues. It's not like that now. There's been a steep learning curve and we're trying to do the best that we can. The problem is that we need to educate you along the process. You don't understand what you're dealing with. We're a finely tuned, aggressive animal here that needs to have an understanding of what it is you're sending us into, and how you'll respond to us once we're broken. The truth is that we're not dealing with a great number. Generally speaking, it's about 5,000 people, when you crunch all the numbers.
NDP
Irene Mathyssen NDP London—Fanshawe, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you all for being here. Thank you for your service, and thank you for supporting and loving those who served. I appreciate what you've done and what you bring to this committee.
I wanted to have a chance to talk to all of you, mostly because I want some clarification.
Mr. Grant, you said that post-deployment should be broken down into components. You mentioned education, so that the individual could understand what had happened to him or her in regard to post-traumatic stress. I wondered what the other components were. I wasn't sure I caught them.
As an Individual
Once the battalion comes back there needs to be a time to recuperate, an opportunity for people to sit down and talk about their experiences as a group, PT, medical appointments, talking to a psychologist if that's necessary, an opportunity to reconnect with their families rather than stepping right into ramp-up training for the next or continued battalion training.
An opportunity to rest and recuperate is a big thing. More importantly, I think...and this is just a contractual issue, I mentioned the NDA and the fact that it was written in the 1800s. The simple fact that we send our reservists home does not allow them the family environment. What I mean by family is that if Brian is my platoon warrant officer, being able to talk to him for nine months on tour is one thing, but then suddenly going away from that and not being able to talk to him again, that's difficult because he knows what I've been through. It's important that I be in that environment and have the opportunity to rest and recuperate before I launch back into civilian society.
NDP
Irene Mathyssen NDP London—Fanshawe, ON
Thank you.
Mr. Westholm, when you were here at the committee before you mentioned the poor condition of the CAF's only transitional support unit. You talked about it again today. At that time you recommended that the military extend an offer of extension should a military family not be prepared to transition because of the situation that they were in. Has there been any movement on this extension? Have you heard about the JPSU situation improving at all?
As an Individual
No. It's been a year now since I first suggested that be done to the transitional oversight committee that's looking at the JPSU and they said nothing about it. But it does segue into something that's been mentioned other places here. When a person is posted to the JPSU they fall out of the Canadian Armed Forces order of battle. That means to say that when they are transferred to the JPSU they transfer with all their experiences. They might have a bad knee, but that doesn't mean they lose that 35 years of experience to do a job. At the same time, the JPSU is understaffed, and it's never been fully staffed, and they're still letting those people go who could fill the staffing positions.
NDP
NDP
Irene Mathyssen NDP London—Fanshawe, ON
It sounds so appropriate and intelligent to take those skills and utilize them further, yet there's resistance. Why is there the resistance?
As an Individual
The universality of service is archaic. It's based probably in World War I, where you had to go out there and walk around with a cannon. Some of the skill sets that are available through these people.... Again, I look at what's going on with our aboriginal communities. There are engineers, combat engineers, water purification specialists. They have all sorts of people who could be up there and volunteer happily to go, and use them in a non-combat means with all those skills and experience to help Canadians.
As an Individual
I also think, Madam, in regard to what you're asking, it just shows us that on the surface the military is too small. When you take away the extra people, those were actually our contingency plans to be able to do stuff like this. When you have just the bare minimum all the time you can't afford for there to be broken people in your organization. When you break a couple you have to punt them so you can refill that spot with an able body. That will be the military's approach so far as it only has three of three that it needs, four of four that it needs. If you need four of something in this country you need to get six because you're going break two. Until that's the reality, the military will continue to shove people out the door because it doesn't have the ability to handle that many folks who are broken.
It's easy to look at them and point our fingers, which we do rightfully, but you need contingency plans to be able to execute once you lose stuff.
I'll put it this way, when we sent 3,000 guys to Afghanistan, that meant 9,000. Three thousand came back, 3,000 there, and 3,000 getting ready to go. That's the cycle that Kurt was just speaking of here about how when you get back, you don't have time off. You might actually be in mortar platoon for the next mission because they don't have a mortar platoon because they lent it out to the RCR, who leant it out to the Van Doos, and that's how this goes. If you want what Barry is speaking of—and I want it—and if you want that break that Kurt is speaking of, this is a dollars and cents thing at the beginning, making sure your military has enough size for contingencies. Until it does, it's going to punt every broken guy because they don't have room for them.
Liberal
Alaina Lockhart Liberal Fundy Royal, NB
Thank you.
This is a really good panel with all the experience you bring and your comments. As you know, or may know, we've just finished a review of service delivery, and we did that to take a look at some of the thousand cuts that you mentioned, death by a thousand cuts, of that delivery process, and what we can do to make that process better.
One of the things that came out in a few of your comments today was a sense of purpose, and not having that sense of purpose. We also talked about the transition phase. Is there something in place now that you feel is sufficient—I think I know the answer to this—to help to redefine your purpose, your identity, whatever, when releasing?
As an Individual
There are some good things out there. I've seen lives changed by the Soldier On program. That thing is fantastic. I don't know much more about its structure or how it's funded, but whoever is pulling that lever, keep pulling it, because it is doing very good things.
Aside from that, especially for men, that's a point in life where it's easy to flail. You just don't know what you are anymore. I struggled with that more than I struggled with what was going on in my head, and going on in my guts. Who am I now? For a while, there isn't that much.
Another little secret is, a lot of us do this to find that purpose a little bit again. I have a platoon that I used to have that I don't have anymore, but I still get to help them. If I can help you guys steer some benefits in the right direction, this can also be part of that.
As an Individual
Actually, I can expand on that. The key thing that we're looking for is a network. We're unique in many ways because we're broken. There's a humility that exists in this panel. We've been through more shit than you can shake a stick at, more than the average guy, and we don't judge each other. When Brian talks about his pain and whatnot, I understand. He doesn't have to explain it because we understand the subtext.
The root of all of this comes down to two things. One is money, as it always is, and the other is accepting the fact that the government of this country has an obligation to us. This is probably the biggest slap in the face that any of us faces, that we are constantly fighting.
We feel like we've been abandoned. We feel like the government.... Pat Stogran said to me the other day, “I never developed PTSD when I was being bombed in Yugoslavia. I developed it when I was dealing with the bureaucrats in the government”. That should tell you a whole lot.
All we're looking for is a little support, a nod, and a little help along the way.
As an Individual
We're driven. We're fit people when we serve. There isn't anything that we wouldn't do for this nation, including giving our lives. I've often said, having suffered PTSD after serving in Somalia and Rwanda, it would have been easier for me to have lost a leg or two, or to lose two arms. People understand that.
When you come back, they do not understand when you tell them “Well, I have nightmares every day. I can't cope with day-to-day living. I don't like being in crowds.” For me, being a medic in those trades, everything I did at that moment was life and death. People die on the decisions you make, and you sometimes can't do anything.
I deal with that every day, and there are things that still stay with me today that are as clear as they were 20 years ago. That will never go away for me. Then, on top of that, because I served in Somalia and Rwanda, I spent over a year on mefloquine.
I'm getting older now. PTSD should be mellowing for me. I should be getting better, but I'm not getting better. I'm getting worse. I also have a terminal illness. I don't know how much longer I have, but every day I wake up and make a decision, do I live today or do I kill myself today?
That is everyday existence for me. I've been fighting a long time with this, and so far I'm still here. I don't know what tomorrow will bring. I go one day at a time, and hope that tomorrow is going to be a good day, but it's not always. Some days are hard. This morning was tough.
