Evidence of meeting #97 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 community.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Cathay Wagantall Conservative Yorkton—Melville, SK
Yes. You had mentioned that the policies that exist in Ottawa don't exactly apply north of 60. Can you elaborate on that?
Ombudsman, National Defence and Canadian Forces Ombudsman
I'll expand a little on the two examples I gave.
Say we want to do a straight bank deposit. My cheque goes in the bank every two weeks. I don't see it, but it goes in the bank every two weeks. That's easy for me. It's not so easy in a community where there is no bank or no ATM machine, things like that. A lot of the things we're doing now we're pushing it to websites and autofill applications and so on and so forth. This is where the world is going, but the infrastructure is just not there for that.
Those are just two basic ideas that come to bear. There are other policies that work well downtown, how you should be dressed and what you do, but it's not going to work at -40, -45. There are differences and we need to be very cognizant of those differences. When we make a policy for the north, we should have the north in mind as we do that.
Liberal
Doug Eyolfson Liberal Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you again for coming. It's always a pleasure to see you, all of you.
We talked a lot in a previous study on barriers to transition about universality of service. As you know, we identified some problems that it was causing for veterans in their transition and delay in reporting injuries when they served and this sort of thing. I find it interesting, as I say, that it's not a principle in the rangers. Can you offer an opinion as to why they made this differentiation for the rangers?
Ombudsman, National Defence and Canadian Forces Ombudsman
I wasn't there at the beginning when they decided how they were going to do this, but if you look at some of the maladies that are in that community, diabetes is very high, and heart disease starts early. Those were some of the things that were taken into consideration, I'm sure, the health of that community. Just simply getting access to medical health care is also I'm sure one of the considerations that was given.
They do a preliminary review to see if the individual is physically fit and seems to be psychologically balanced enough to become a ranger. I would assume those were some of the influences. I'm not sure if those were the only ones.
Liberal
Doug Eyolfson Liberal Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
Good. Thank you.
Has there been any pressure at any time either from National Defence or anyone else to start establishing such a policy in the rangers?
Ombudsman, National Defence and Canadian Forces Ombudsman
Do you mean in regard to universality of service?
Ombudsman, National Defence and Canadian Forces Ombudsman
I have not seen that, no.
Liberal
Doug Eyolfson Liberal Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
You might have touched on this. If a ranger can't work because of an illness or injury that is attributable to service, is that ranger eligible for financial benefits from Veterans Affairs?
Liberal
Doug Eyolfson Liberal Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
You mentioned that it's sometimes difficult to tell whether they're in service. Did you say it's the training officer who is the one who will say that the person is in service? If a ranger or a ranger veteran is making a claim, who determines that they are in service or not?
Ombudsman, National Defence and Canadian Forces Ombudsman
It will depend on the type of contract they're under. Under the reserves, it's class A, class B or class C, which has an impact on types of benefits and services they have access to. If they have a malady that's attributable to service, it's a Canadian ranger instructor who is the person who is left holding the bag to make sure that the rangers are aware of what they're entitled to and help them to get to that point.
Liberal
Doug Eyolfson Liberal Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
Okay.
Is the ranger instructor the one who will be responsible for determining whether they were in service at the time?
Ombudsman, National Defence and Canadian Forces Ombudsman
Most likely, yes.
Liberal
Doug Eyolfson Liberal Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
What might you recommend to make sure that people serving in the rangers are informed of the benefits they would get under Veterans Affairs and how they can best access them?
Ombudsman, National Defence and Canadian Forces Ombudsman
I think the first thing we have to do is go to where they are. We need to be in front of these people. We need to educate and train them. We have to make sure, when we're publishing documents that are policy, that they're in language that can be understood by the intended target audience.
Those are some of the things I would recommend we start to look at.
Liberal
Doug Eyolfson Liberal Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
This is great. You're answering the questions very quickly, so I'm getting to ask a lot of them, so thank you. I'm getting a lot of information out here.
We talked about some of the distinctions between the rangers and the regular military. I understand that they cannot participate in military operations. Is that correct? If there's a military operation going on somewhere in their range or where they're serving, can they participate with the military in a formal military operation?
Ombudsman, National Defence and Canadian Forces Ombudsman
Yes, search and rescue is a great example in the north. I mean, if there's a mission for search and rescue, probably the first line of attack is going to be the ranger group. If there is suspicious behaviour on the land, it's probably going to be the ranger group who is there first. So they do participate in military missions.
Liberal
Doug Eyolfson Liberal Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
All right. I was misinformed on that. Thank you for clearing that up.
Do you have any idea the number of rangers or former rangers who are currently clients of Veterans Affairs?
Ombudsman, National Defence and Canadian Forces Ombudsman
No, I don't have visibility on that number.
Liberal
Doug Eyolfson Liberal Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB
All right.
I'm going to go back to my original question about universality of service. Again, we found that it did tend that, as applied in the Department of National Defence, there were people who were not reporting minor injuries because they were afraid that they would get basically tossed because of that. Then the injuries would get worse and worse and they'd be much sicker because they hadn't reported.
With the lack of this in the rangers, do they find that there is any hesitancy among rangers to report illness or injuries? I know it's very difficult to compare rates between them and the military, but did you get any sense talking to the people that there was a hesitancy or anything in the culture that discouraged the reporting of illness or injury?
