The best way to analyze the success of a recommendation and to see your recommendations followed through and met.... That is why we are pushing distinct issues among ourselves, first nations, and Inuit. There's a very clear reason we pushed that as indigenous governments. We can analyze and measure the success or investment of any of those three identities I just shared with you.
I can give you the names of the 5,000 veterans over there. I can establish, in partnership with the Department of Veterans Affairs, how many of them were World War II veterans out of the 5,000. That could easily be done. Then you could measure what's happening to those who are still living today, and see if there are any services and if they face challenges.
Since there's a handful, it should be quite simple to establish where they are and understand what has happened to them. Then maybe we could learn a lesson so that it will never happen to the new veterans who are coming out of the different wars that are taking place in the eastern part of the world.
In retrospect, we need to do measurables. That's why we fought vigorously on this distinct-based issue, because when most Canadians heard that indigenous veterans got a settlement, they thought we got something. They think our veterans got treated that way. They think our veterans got their due in this country. They didn't, but the word “indigenous” implies that all of us got it. We didn't. The Métis nation has never received the proper promise that was given to them, so if we want to do it, let's do it right and let's measure it right. It's easy to measure if somebody takes the energy to do it. If you have a distinct base, you could measure it just like that, very quickly, but you have to make the department do that.