Thank you, honourable member, I appreciate it.
My caregiver is taking care of me even while I'm talking to you. There you go.
For the care and support given by the primary caregiver, which is my wife, if you added all of your salaries together and started paying her that much, it might be half of what she earns.
Just putting up with us, you're a mental health administrator. My wife has retired from 30 years of taking care of troubled children, so God picked the perfect caregiver for me.
Our UN and NATO veterans group here is supposed to help out where VAC cannot deliver the goods. We end up being the primary support organization for our veterans here. There are 800 of us here in Nova Scotia. There are 400 in metro and we are the midnight phone calls and the interventions.
Fortunately I managed to get through life without pills or alcohol or whatever. We are the intervention team—an assembly of veterans from all backgrounds and all histories. If we can, we get VAC to help out.
I'd love to have a caseworker. I've been trying for years. My last one was 10 years ago—a fine gentleman who retired.
Our group here is taking care of our veterans. Then if we can bang down enough doors—if we can get the MacKinnons, the Ottomans and the Dr. Daniel Rasics to push the right buttons—then we will get what we need from Veterans Affairs.
I'm not here to slag. I have been very well taken care of by VAC. I really have. I have no complaints whatsoever with the care I get, but it has taken a lot of door pounding. Sean will tell you that retired military officers don't do really well at negotiating. We like to negotiate at the end of a carbine.
That's it. Thank you for your time.