Veterans Affairs Committee on April 14th, 2021

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

Thank you.

Just for everybody's benefit, let me say that we have enough time here to get at least part of round three completed. I'm going to be a little bit more strict about cutting people off. I apologize in advance for interrupting, if I have to.

Up next we have MP Brassard for five minutes.

[John Brassard, Conservative, Barrie—Innisfil, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

First I have a question of clarification for Mr. Bruyea.

Sean, you've submitted a document—to the committee, I presume. Every member of the committee has that document. Is that correct?

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

The committee does not have that document, I'm being told. It has not been translated.

[John Brassard, Conservative, Barrie—Innisfil, ON]

Okay. I'm sorry about that. I'm going to suggest that Mr. Bruyea table that document and that we have it translated, Mr. Chair. I don't know what the process is for this, whether he just submits it or....

There are several recommendations he's made that may benefit the committee in its deliberation. It may in fact benefit Veterans Affairs Canada; I suspect that's the case.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

Yes, that would be the right course of action. If he submits it to the clerk, he can have it translated and submitted.

[Sean Bruyea]

I did submit it to the committee and the clerk.

[John Brassard, Conservative, Barrie—Innisfil, ON]

Okay. Thank you.

Mr. Hunter, what a burden you bear. I know why you do it and I appreciate the fact that you do it.

One thing that frustrates me as a member of Parliament is that often, as is the case with Tina, it gets elevated to a member of Parliament's office. I can recall one situation, just after Chris Garnier received his benefits, in which I had a veteran come into my office threatening to commit suicide. I sent an expletive-filled email to Minister O'Regan at the time and within 15 minutes got a phone call and an email back from his chief of staff.

How often do you see a situation in which people are so frustrated in dealing with the process that they have to reach out?

I happen to think that no one should ever have to reach out to a member of Parliament to get benefits that they've earned in representing their country. I'm curious to know why Mr. Bruyea would have to reach out to you, given his high-profile status as an advocate for veterans in this country.

[Allan Hunter]

There are a couple of things to say.

Does it happen often? I can tell you right now that female veterans across this country reached out as recently as 15 minutes before this began. They reached out to me and said please.

I'm reaching out right now to every one of you members of Parliament, regardless of party, to stand up and say it is not tolerable that we've rejected the women in the military and their request to be heard. It needs to be “me too”, not the “not you”.

Why did Mr. Bruyea have to reach out to me? I can tell you why. It's because in spite of all of our efforts of going through policy and saying the decisions made by the department were not supported in policy, were not supported by any of the evidence before them.... They'll deny this, but the day after Mr. Bruyea filed his lawsuit, the funding was cut for a six-year-old boy. You alluded to Mr. Garnier, who was a criminal, in his thirties, and who was given funding from the very same fund. How can you have a system that says no to a six-year-old boy and yes to a cop killer?

If we can't fix those things, this is all for naught. It's a disgrace that we would put a little boy who fears for his dad's life, let alone his own safety, in that position, and we say yes to a cop killer. It's absolutely absurd that we would do that.

[John Brassard, Conservative, Barrie—Innisfil, ON]

All right.

Tina, one thing that really struck me about your testimony is the seeming disconnect between family members and veterans. Oftentimes, we hear that Veterans Affairs will want to deal with the veteran directly. Oftentimes, that's not possible.

You've spent an inordinate amount of time reaching out not just to Veterans Affairs but to your member of Parliament as well. In your opinion, how do we help family members deal with the situations that are going on within their households?

[Tina Fitzpatrick]

Honestly, in 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, when my husband was really sick, I had to get MHA services involved. Every time he went to a hospital, I had to get an MHA person involved. When the doctor tried to take him off some kind of medication and put him on medical marijuana, I had to get the MHA involved.

I really don't have any answers for that, because the truth of it is that I had to use them for everything.

[John Brassard, Conservative, Barrie—Innisfil, ON]

I guess...a dedicated family line to deal specifically with your situation or others as well, not necessarily reaching out to the veteran's case manager. However, if there isn't something already, maybe something needs to be done to have a dedicated family unit, so that family members can feel comfortable.

I see my time's up, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

Thank you very much.

Up next we have MP Fillmore, please.

[Andy Fillmore, Liberal, Halifax, NS]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I offer tremendous thanks to the witnesses today for coming and giving your time the way you have and for all of your advocacy before today. I know it's gone on for a very long time. I'm very grateful for it.

Mr. Hunter, you brought the important voice of women into our committee today. They had contacted you with regard to the study of women experiencing sexual assault in the military. It's really important that we all understand, and that the women you've been in contact with understand, that the government has not shut down that study. It's moved it to a much more appropriate venue—the status of women committee—where these women are sure, in that venue, to have a safe and effective hearing of the trouble they've encountered, which they never should have encountered. The last thing we want to be doing is taking hope away from people who need hope, when it's not necessary that this hope be taken away. This study is going to continue, but at the right committee. I just wanted to make sure we all understood that.

There was one other point about the wait times. I'm not sure who raised it. Of course, this committee doesn't study successes. It studies what we need to do better. That's why we're all here and that's why you're here. However, it's important to understand that from 2020 to 2021, VAC took 390,000 calls and 84% of those calls met the two-minute service standard. We're not here studying the 84% that were met. We're studying the 16% that weren't met. Thank you, then, for raising those points.

In fact, there was a 93% approval rate of people making those calls. We're here to study the 7% who were not satisfied. Again, thank you for that.

It's important, though, that it does show a record of improvement year over year.

That's not what I really wanted to ask you about, though. Mr. Hunter, I want to shift gears. You are involved with the Veterans Association Food Bank in Alberta. Obviously, access to nutritious food has a clear impact on our physical and mental health. When any of us aren't sure where our next meal is coming or what its quality will be, it's a very difficult situation.

I was just wondering if you would be able to share a little bit about your experience of how the food bank has made a difference to the physical, mental and emotional well-being of veterans in your community.

[Allan Hunter]

Absolutely.

As a point of clarification, sir, the status of women committee that it got moved to doesn't apply to the military women. If you're still serving, you are not allowed to speak outside of the military. That venue might work for women, but it's not going to work for women who are still serving.

In my experience with the Veterans Association Food Bank, the most fundamental thing that Canadians take for granted is the fact that they have the ability to feed themselves at least once a day, and maybe more times. For some people, it's more than three times a day.

Again, when a person does not have the ability to feed themselves on a daily basis, that begets another problem: How did you get there? What are we going to do to make sure you don't end up back there?

Typically, the homelessness and the food part comes because of mental health challenges that were not being addressed in the societal realm that they live in. Veterans are the last to reach out for help, the last to say, “I need help,” because they've been trained their whole lives to go out and help others, to put their lives on the line for others. It's very difficult for a veteran not only to say that they need help but also to actually recognize that as their life is spiralling out of control and starts to fall down those steps of life that most of us take for granted. By the time they hit that bottom step, a lot of them aren't even aware of their journey to get to the bottom of that pile. When they get there, we're typically dealing with substance abuse.

I'm dealing with a number of veterans who were injured in combat in Afghanistan who have permanent brain injuries. They're dealing with brain injuries. They're dealing with not being able to be employed because their brain is not functioning in the fashion that it could. Their families couldn't deal with it anymore, so families have split up. They no longer have family support. They can go into fits of rage or seclusion, where nobody sees them. For a lot of our guys and gals, we don't know if they're alive or dead until they reach out to us.

The fact that we have a Veterans Association Food Bank is a detriment and a disgrace to the nation. I've never heard of a politicians food bank. I've never heard of a bureaucrats food bank. When you put a food bank out there for veterans and first responders, because we do represent first responders, police....

We lost a veteran and a police officer in Calgary—Andy Harnett. God rest his soul. His life was taken by some criminals. Again, now we have a family left behind. His wife was pregnant at the time. Now we have a veteran's wife with a brand new baby who wasn't even born then and who has now been added to the mix.

We are trying to make sure that we're the ones who are catching the people who fall out of the safety net that VAC is supposed to provide—and they do. They do a lot of good work, but there are many out there. We wouldn't exist....

It's in the Calgary region, but we're reaching from coast to coast. We have members from coast to coast who want to see our organization.... We have one in Edmonton. They've asked us to do one in Saskatoon, and on and on.

Hopefully, I've answered some of that. I'm happy to talk with you later about it.

[Andy Fillmore, Liberal, Halifax, NS]

Thank you very much, Mr. Hunter. I appreciate it.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

Thank you very much.

Up next, for two and a half minutes, is MP Desilets.

[Luc Desilets, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Since the meeting is drawing to its end, I want to thank all the witnesses for the nice constructive meeting we have had. They have all been asked a lot of questions.

Mr. Bruyea, we are hearing in the media and in the meetings of a few committees, especially the Standing Committee on National Defence, about many sexual misconduct cases. They are resurfacing and getting attention in the news. Many women are leaving the Canadian Armed Forces after having experienced sexual harassment or assault.

The Office of Women and LGBTQ2 Veterans was created in 2019. Do you think that initiative is sufficient? Are there any improvements to be made? I would like to get a brief answer, as I have other questions to ask.

[Sean Bruyea]

Yes, super.

Just to clarify, Monsieur Desilets—and thank you for the question—are you talking about parliamentary committees?

[Luc Desilets, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

The interpretation is not working in French.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

I'm not getting the interpretation either at this point. Can the clerk check to see if there's a...?

Is it back? Okay.

Sean, perhaps you can start your answer again.

[Luc Desilets, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

I hope that the clock was stopped.

[Sean Bruyea]

I apologize, Mr. Desilets.

I'm just wondering if you're talking about the parliamentary committees or the advisory groups.

[Luc Desilets, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

No. I am talking about the Office of Women and LGBTQ2 Veterans, which was created in 2019. If you are not familiar with it, that's okay.

Do you think that initiative is sufficient and relevant?

[Sean Bruyea]

It's an excellent question, Monsieur Desilets. Thank you.

I think what happens is that we have a lot of committees, studies and voluntary organizations being established that are set up to try to address the problems. I think those are all reflections that the system is not working. If we're dealing with, for instance, the neglect and abuse of serving members, as Ms. Blaney talked about, we have to also start talking about those who are males and those who are females. We have to talk about the discrimination.

Military culture itself, which I have written about—my thesis was about this—is inherently abusive if it's not kept in check. With senior leadership we've seen that. Once you get promoted, you become untouchable. We see the same behaviour in our bureaucracy. Unfortunately, a lot of these decisions and recommendations will go back to this very same bureaucracy and these very same institutions. The ones who are being abusive or not acting responsibly will then, of course, not act meaningfully on those recommendations—

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

Thank you.