Evidence of meeting #69 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 soldiers.
A recording is available from Parliament.
9:30 a.m.
BGen Bernd Mattiesen
We have 106 soldiers who are now career soldiers because of being injured.
9:30 a.m.
BGen Bernd Mattiesen
We had 3,000 in all who were injured, psychologically or physically—
9:30 a.m.
BGen Bernd Mattiesen
—but these 106 have now become career soldiers, not because they were at the maximum age but because they were injured in a mission.
9:30 a.m.
Liberal
Doug Eyolfson Liberal Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
Sure.
I bring that point up because the proponents of universality of military service say that you couldn't handle the large numbers of people who couldn't fully serve, but you have 106 out of 180,000, which is less than 0.05% of your forces.
9:30 a.m.
BGen Bernd Mattiesen
Yes, absolutely.
9:30 a.m.
Liberal
9:30 a.m.
BGen Bernd Mattiesen
That's correct.
Thank you.
9:30 a.m.
Conservative
Phil McColeman Conservative Brantford—Brant, ON
Are the pensions and benefits taxable that are provided by your organization?
9:30 a.m.
BGen Bernd Mattiesen
Yes.
9:30 a.m.
BGen Bernd Mattiesen
The pension is taxable. The lump sum of 150,000 euros is not taxable. This is free.
9:30 a.m.
Conservative
Phil McColeman Conservative Brantford—Brant, ON
Okay, so some of the benefits are non-taxable, whereas pensions are taxable?
9:30 a.m.
BGen Bernd Mattiesen
Yes.
9:30 a.m.
Conservative
Phil McColeman Conservative Brantford—Brant, ON
What are the differences between what former military members receive as a result of service-related disability and what public servants receive for the same disability if injured in the course of their employment? In other words, do military members with a service-related injury receive more than public servants injured in the course of their employment?
9:35 a.m.
BGen Bernd Mattiesen
The public servants, of course, also get a pension if they are career public service, and normally they are, but they will never get those 150,000 euros, which is only reserved for military missions outside of Germany. All these laws that I explained to you are only applicable for soldiers who have been deployed outside the borders of Germany.
The reason behind that policy is quite simple. Our Ministry of the Interior fears having to pay a lot more money if it also applied within the borders of Germany.
That brings up a very interesting situation. If a soldier loses both legs because of a severe accident while doing pre-mission training in the training area, for example—and we had that—he will not get the same pay as if he got the same injury within a mission.
9:35 a.m.
Conservative
Phil McColeman Conservative Brantford—Brant, ON
That presents a whole new area of problems for that eventuality.
It's very arbitrary, then, and you have to be out of country to qualify. How do people deal with it when they're denied because it happened within the borders of Germany? How are your members dealing with that?
9:35 a.m.
BGen Bernd Mattiesen
Yes, this is part of the discussion. It is a part of the political discussion. The members of parliament, of course, are involved in that discussion. There are some private organizations involved in it, and this is indeed a discussion. However, these people injured in Germany get all the medical treatment, of course. They get the same support from the social service, but they do not get the same sum of money. It's a law that is discussed, but for the time being, I can't change it.
9:35 a.m.
Conservative
Phil McColeman Conservative Brantford—Brant, ON
Okay.
I'm sorry, but I wasn't able to take notes as quickly as I would like to have done regarding another area that you said in your opening comments briefly became very political. Can you refresh us on what that was and on what the political fallout or discussion was that you were referring to?
9:35 a.m.
BGen Bernd Mattiesen
I'm not just on the right track, I think.
9:35 a.m.
Conservative
Phil McColeman Conservative Brantford—Brant, ON
It was when you were referring to one of the charts. You said that this became very political. Do you recall saying that?
9:35 a.m.
BGen Bernd Mattiesen
Yes. It might well be the creation of the special laws for mission in the years 2004, 2007, 2011, 2013, and 2015, when Germany for the first time realized that they also had mission-related or war-related injured, traumatized, and killed people. Maybe this was it.
9:35 a.m.
Conservative
