We could actually take what the Government of Canada is currently doing through the veteran and family well-being fund, which is supporting Wounded Warriors Canada's service dog program, although it's a very small undertaking. Because Wounded Warriors Canada uses the prescriber guidelines, their programs have to be either ADI or compliant with any provincial regulatory body, which currently is B.C., Alberta and Nova Scotia.
It's interesting to note that Nova Scotia did not reinvent fire. They absolutely went out to B.C. and said, “We want to use the standard and the work that you've done. How do we do this?” B.C. said they would just sublicense it to them, and they did. Literally, they brought the entire program across the country.
Now, it is key to note that this is the public access portion that is primarily covered in the B.C. legislation. However, the legislation has been upheld by the B.C. human rights courts. It's a model that works. You can literally take an off-the-shelf solution. What does that look like? The Government of Canada pledges to Wounded Warriors an enhanced funding commitment over a five-year period. That will allow the underlying programs to ramp up their capacity.
If you told us that you want service dogs tomorrow and you were going to fund them, we'd all look at you and say, “Isn't that wonderful. Where are we getting them?” There is a lead time. We use that lead time to solidify the position that Wounded Warriors programs will adopt the national standards that are developed. All of that work has been done at CGSB. The most frustrating part is to know how close we were and to see it explode literally on the goal line when we went to push it over. It causes me to lose sleep at night, because this is what has impeded this program.
Keep in mind that the standards blew up in April of 2018. That was three years ago. Please tell me what's been done. I think the answer is “not much”. We could take a solution and literally start implementation as soon as tomorrow morning if the committee could push this football over the goal line.
Thanks, Darrell.