Veterans Affairs Committee on May 5th, 2021

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

Give a brief answer, please.

[Jean-Guy Soulière]

It depends on who you want to reach.

I haven't heard of social media being used to educate the youth. That is critical. If we could use social media to educate, that would be a start. For other generations, there are other methods.

We've found that we are reaching our membership through social media more and more, and we're talking about the older population. The younger population can't live without it, so maybe that's the way to start.

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

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

Thank you, sir.

Now we go to MP Amos for five minutes.

[William Amos, Liberal, Pontiac, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to our committed witnesses. We all thank you for your incredible public service, and for just giving of your time and living out that passion that Canadians feel through you.

I have a few questions.

I want to start with Mr. Harris, given his history and his keen awareness of so many years and going through so many governments on this question of commemoration.

I wonder what lessons, Mr. Harris, we can learn from your four decades in public service and your awareness of the commemoration challenge. What are your take-aways after, literally, a lifetime of service in this area?

[Dr. Steve Harris]

It's funny; the real experience has nothing to do with where I work or my role as a co-chair of the Veterans Affairs commemoration group.

For 32 years I was a reserve army musician. When you are a reserve army musician, you end up playing at a lot of commemorative events and a lot of November 11 ceremonies. I was in Halton with the Lorne Scots, in Toronto and finally in Ottawa with the Governor General's Foot Guards.

I was shocked in June 1994, on the anniversary of D-Day. There was a large event planned for Ottawa. We knew that CBC and CTV were going to broadcast live from Normandy. Whether or not I was just cynical, I'm not sure, but I figured that when the band marched out of Cartier Square Drill Hall and turned down Elgin Street, there would be kind of a dutiful crowd.

That's not what we found. When we marched out and got onto Elgin Street, the crowd was 10 people deep, and enthusiastic. We turned left onto Wellington Street, and the crowd was 10 people deep, and enthusiastic. We were all kind of shocked, because none of us in the band—heck, I'd been the director of history at that point for 20 years—anticipated that response to that anniversary of D-Day.

The next year when CBC and CTV televised the VE day celebrations in Apeldoorn, it was the same thing, and it hasn't stopped since: the attention paid to the 90th anniversary of Vimy, the attention paid to the death of the last World War I veteran and the last veteran from Vimy Ridge, and more importantly, the folks who went onto the bridges over Highway 401 following the friendly fire incident of April, 2002. That was absolutely spontaneous.

I don't know why this happened. I've spoken to Tim Cook about this, because he's interested in this same question. We don't know why. Whether or not there was a sudden surge of collective guilt for having ignored veterans for a long time, I don't know, but going forward, my sense is that the appetite to commemorate is there.

Unlike for the First World War and Second World War veterans who died before they could see this happen—I'm not trying to defend that or speak to it—the idea is that we have to commemorate now, before the veterans of the post-Korea era are dead and don't see the enthusiasm for it.

[William Amos, Liberal, Pontiac, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Harris. That's tremendous testimony.

I'm going to pivot, given the limited time here, and ask an open question, a short one.

Mention has been made of the power of social media and the importance of connecting with youth. What do you think of the idea of connecting to younger Canadians through video game producers?

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

There is time for a very brief answer from somebody.

[Capt(N) (Ret'd) William Woodburn]

Mr. Amos, we've already been investigating, not necessarily video games, but actually getting active video into our ships. Someone could put their phone up to the ship, and the next thing they'd know, they'd be looking through their phone back into a battle of the Second World War. Things like that, which may be more specific to different items, I think would be tremendous in attracting youth to come and see what's out there. That's one idea.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

Thank you. I'm afraid I have to interrupt you there.

I see your hand up, Mr. Gregory. Maybe somebody will come back to you on that point.

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

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

My question goes to Mr. Sampson.

You are saying that commemoration should come after fair and respectful treatment for veterans, both men and women. Could I ask you to provide more specifics on that for a few moments and talk about the example of Australia and New Zealand?

What could we take from the experience of those countries? What do they do better than us?

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

You're on mute, sir.

[Kevin Sammy Sampson]

And I was practising my French.

I am sorry, Mr. Desilets, I would really like to answer in French, but I do not have the vocabulary I need to do so.

To begin with, your question regarding male and female, I believe that question is for Mr. Soulière. He was discussing men and women. I believe they are treated equally on active service operations. I'm not familiar with any inconsistencies there with regard to men and women.

With regard to your question on Australia and New Zealand, I'm very happy to explain that. First I'd like to mention that November 11 is Remembrance Day, and it's for remembering our dead. Unfortunately, what happens is on November 11 we tend to make it somewhat about veterans as well. This more or less takes away from what November 11 is really about, Remembrance Day.

My suggestion is that we could probably look to our partners in New Zealand and Australia. Annually they have a veterans day. Of course, they have Remembrance Day on November 11, but they recently had Anzac Day. Anzac Day saw veterans from across the countries come together to commemorate their veterans' service at a dawn parade in major cities throughout Australia and New Zealand. Everybody goes to this event. It's a camaraderie event. Everybody comes together. They march together. Then, of course, civilians who recognize what's happening also come out to witness the parade.

To some of the comments earlier about how Canadians are responding, Dr. Harris, Canadians really love their veterans and they want to hear more about the things we're doing. The challenge is we don't always have the mechanism or the means to communicate effectively with Canadians.

These events, like an event of camaraderie or a commemorative event like Anzac Day, would probably work very well in Canada, because we have similar cultures. Also, I mentioned that if you're going to get me to respond to a commemorative event and come out to represent veterans, it's going to definitely have to be something where some camaraderie is involved, where I get to see other veterans.

Thank you, sir.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

Thank you, Mr. Sampson.

For two and a half minutes we have MP Blaney, please.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Thank you.

Dr. Harris, one thing that has been talked about in this process is how important it is to capture the stories of the folks who served us before they're gone. What you just talked about is so important, that we need to recognize all these people's histories. The War Museum, of course, is doing incredible work in gathering those stories and creating a way to present those stories so people can hear them, understand and move forward.

I'm wondering if you could talk about the work you do around that gathering of the stories before they're gone.

[Dr. Steve Harris]

When it comes to what the directorate does, its main historical responsibility is to write the official histories of Canadian deployments. To that extent we will conduct interviews to support the writing of the official histories, which means in the long run those stories will be told.

I know that within Veterans Affairs the virtual memorial, which is self-generating because people are being asked to contribute material to it, is also important. This is not so much commemoration, but during the process of our casualty identification program at National Defence—when we are able to identify a First World War or Second World War individual who had been missing until we were able to identify the remains—we've found that pushing that story out garners a lot of attention. From what I've heard, it leads local schools or other organizations to ask their students to look for soldiers and to try to tell their stories.

There is no central repository of interviewers, if you will, where there's a central collection of interviews. I think the combination of what the War Museum does, what Veterans Affairs is doing, what we are doing at the directorate of history and heritage, and what some universities like UNB are doing is gradually making a catalogue, if you will.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

Excellent. Thank you very much.

Up next, for five minutes, we have MP Davidson, please.

[Scot Davidson, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Good afternoon, everyone. I love talking about history.

Witnesses, you weren't on the last call, but I showed a picture of my grandfather that was recreated in the War Museum.

William, this is my Uncle Bert. He was on a corvette which was sunk in the North Atlantic. That's my Uncle Don. He was a tail gunner and was shot down on July 23 over France. He hid with the French underground for a year until after the war.

Colleagues, I'm sorry to bring this up again.

Steve, because I'm new to the committee, you're the first one I have from DND as a witness.

I have a Silver Cross mother who works for me. Her son was killed in action in 2010 in Afghanistan. It was horrific.

With the unveiling of the Afghanistan memorial two years ago, she was notified of that by letter two days after it happened. I haven't had anyone yet who can assure me that the families of the fallen, definitely those from Afghanistan, are notified when there's an unveiling.

I wonder if you know of a process that has been put in place for this, because I'm having trouble finding the answer.

[Dr. Steve Harris]

Unhappily, I had nothing to do with the Kandahar memorial opening at the Carling campus of NDHQ.

However, going forward, for the national Afghanistan monument, which will be across from the War Museum, I know that the Veterans Affairs' plan is to be inclusive. That will happen with great notice.

[Scot Davidson, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

Thanks, Steve. I appreciate that. That was a devastating day here for me and definitely for Mrs. Collier.

Steve, I love your enthusiasm, your story about the crowd that day. I'd like to see a couple of Lancasters ripping it down Wellington a couple of days, showing the Canadian pride. To see that small-town Snowbird thing we had going on last summer, I think was very inspirational to Canadians.

Steve, with the anniversary coming up in 2023, would you say that Canadians' awareness and recognition of the Canadian contribution in Operation Husky and the Italian campaign is where it should be?

When I was looking at Operation Husky, I only knew of Husky Squadron, who were the heavy lifters in the Second World War. I had no idea there was an Operation Husky that took place in Italy. How can we get that message out more?

[Steve Gregory]

Well, let me give you an example. I lobbied the CBC for seven years—seven years—to get them to do anything about coverage. We did receive, on July 30, 2013, approximately two and a half minutes of coverage, followed by a crocodile that was eating golf balls in Florida. The opening reel of footage showed Americans in Okinawa. The coverage that Operation Husky has had is dismal.

I must give credit to VAC and our embassies. Last year, the minister came out, and didn't just go to Ortona, but came down to visit Agira. That's twice that a minister of veterans affairs has come—as far back as we have records.

I'm committed to 2028. I'll tell you, with this Walk for Remembrance and Peace, if we can convince Canadians that this is worthy of the title “Canadian Camino”, we could engage the imagination of Canadians and get them to walk that battlefield, where 562 men died in 28 days and 2,310 were wounded.

My goal is to put Operation Husky on the map by 2023 in a stellar way.

[Scot Davidson, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

Okay. I love the enthusiasm, Steve. Make sure you keep us in the loop on that.

[Steve Gregory]

You'll be in the loop for sure. Thank you, Mr. Davidson.

[Scot Davidson, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

I appreciate that.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.