Evidence of meeting #74 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 military.
A recording is available from Parliament.
12:55 p.m.
Conservative
Robert Gordon Kitchen Conservative Souris—Moose Mountain, SK
Would this be a pairing that would be done automatically, similar to that being in place, or would it be something that the member would ask for?
12:55 p.m.
Chair and Co-founder, VETS Canada
I think that it could be a voluntary thing, something that the member could ask for. Having said that, it could also be something that would be suggested by their chain of command.
12:55 p.m.
Conservative
12:55 p.m.
Conservative
Robert Gordon Kitchen Conservative Souris—Moose Mountain, SK
As they're transitioning out, they don't recognize it in the first place.
12:55 p.m.
Liberal
12:55 p.m.
Liberal
Doug Eyolfson Liberal Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you both for coming.
I've made reference to this before, about how upsetting some of the testimony can be about the challenges people have had. I practised emergency medicine for 20 years in the inner city of the murder capital of Canada, Winnipeg, if you're not familiar with Canadian news. I had to give much bad news to people, which had an emotional toll and really it was comparable to the emotional toll of hearing what I'm hearing in this committee. It's very upsetting to hear such struggles coming from people and the challenges they have.
Colonel Lipana, one of the things that we've talked about, and I'm sure again with your work in Canada...our military has the concept of universality of service. I'm not sure if you're familiar with that, but it means that if you can't perform any and every duty to deploy, then you must be out of the military. We've heard reports that there are people who will not report symptoms; the paratrooper who notices they're getting back pain, the person who's starting to get symptoms of PTSD. They don't want to report it because if they don't meet universality of service, they are thrown out, and things get worse.
In the American military, are there provisions for a career in modified service for someone who has an injury that prevents certain kinds of duty but could still very adequately perform other kinds of duty?
12:55 p.m.
Former Lieutenant-Colonel, United States Air Force, As an Individual
Absolutely.
12:55 p.m.
Liberal
Doug Eyolfson Liberal Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
Is there a provision in the U.S. military?
12:55 p.m.
Former Lieutenant-Colonel, United States Air Force, As an Individual
Yes, there is. You can find several examples where we have amputees, people who have lost sight, limbs, they have other disabilities, even up to certain ratings for PTSD, within the service. If they're not part of the active component we have National Guard, Reserve, and active components within the U.S. If you're not suited for one of those components, there are provisions to put you in another and you don't have to be deployable in order to stay in.
12:55 p.m.
Liberal
Doug Eyolfson Liberal Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
Okay, thank you.
One of the things I thought about—and again, I'm thinking intuitively and intuition isn't always correct—is if someone, say, is an amputee but has aptitudes that might make them suitable as an air traffic controller. Now, yes, theoretically everyone should be deployed. I've never actually heard of a long-term air traffic controller actually being handed a rifle and told to carry this back out into the battlefield. Do you think that if there were modifications to the Canadian policy of universality of service, if that was somehow modified, whereby people could in fact still serve where it wasn't universal, that would perhaps help in people coming forward with their symptoms and preventing people from being retired who wanted to stay?
12:55 p.m.
Former Lieutenant-Colonel, United States Air Force, As an Individual
I hesitate to speak for your Canadian Forces, but for the Americans I think it would make the member more willing to, as long as they trusted that the system wasn't going to harm them on the back end.
12:55 p.m.
Liberal
Doug Eyolfson Liberal Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
Thank you very much.
Ms. Lowther, this is my last question.
We talk about—and I've heard much about this too in regard to transitioning—how in the military you're told when to get your hair cut, someone takes care of all your bills and everything like that. You transition out and you have to take care of insurance for your apartment, your rent, handling bank accounts. Would there be a role for just some ongoing education throughout a military career just so that people at every stage...you say, one day you're going to be out and you're going to need to know these things? So have them, at every stage, at least having an idea of the things they're going to have to know and be able to do once they're civilians.
1 p.m.
Chair and Co-founder, VETS Canada
I agree with that entirely. I've actually spoken about this before. I come from a background of managing people where I've had to do performance evaluations, and those are opportunities in the military when they're doing their PERs to converse with the member and do that education at that point in time. Maybe talk to them about what their plan B might be and ask, “what are your plans when you get out” kind of thing, and educate them on the fact that life after service is going to be a little bit different. I absolutely think that would be wonderful.
1 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Neil Ellis
Thank you.
That ends our time today.
I just have one question for you, Ms. Lowther, and we'll have the clerk send it to you. I'll just read it here from the floor.
With recent increase of housing prices across Canada and notably on the west coast and Toronto, and in most of our ridings, are you seeing a spike in homeless vets and is this creating additional pressure on your organization? We'll get the clerk to email that, and if you could email it, she'll get it to the committee.
On behalf of the committee, I'd like to thank both of you for taking time out today to testify and help us on our journey to make things easiest for our veterans who have served. Thank you for all your help with that.
The meeting is adjourned.