Veterans Affairs Committee on Oct. 21st, 2025

[The Chair, Liberal, Marie-France Lalonde]

I call this meeting to order.

Hello, everyone.

Welcome to meeting number seven of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Veterans Affairs.

Pursuant to the motion adopted on September 18, 2025, the committee is meeting for a briefing by the Minister of Veterans Affairs and department officials.

I would like to welcome them.

The minister will be with us until 4:30 p.m., and the officials will be with us until 5:30 p.m.

Before we continue, I would like to ask all in-person participants to consult the guidelines written on the cards on the table. These measures are in place to help prevent audio and feedback incidents and to protect the health and safety of all participants, including the interpreters.

To ensure an orderly meeting, I would like to outline a few rules to follow for the minister, the witnesses in the room and all members. You must wait until you are recognized by name before speaking. For those participating by video conference, click on the microphone icon to activate your microphone, and please mute yourself when you are not speaking.

As for interpretation, participants on Zoom have a choice, at the bottom of their screen, of floor, English or French. Those in the room can use the earpiece and select the desired channel.

A reminder that all comments by members and witnesses should be addressed through the chair.

For members in the room, if you wish to speak please raise your hand, and for members on Zoom, please use the “raise hand” function. The clerk and I will manage the speaking order as best we can.

I would now like to welcome the witnesses.

We have with us the Honourable Jill McKnight, member of Parliament and Minister of Veterans Affairs.

From the Department of Veterans Affairs, we have Christine McDowell, acting deputy minister; Steven Harris, senior assistant deputy minister, service delivery; Amy Meunier, assistant deputy minister, commemoration and public affairs branch, joining us by video conference; Pierre Tessier, assistant deputy minister, chief financial officer and corporate services; and Mitch Freeman, acting assistant deputy minister, strategic policy, planning and performance branch, participating by video conference.

I would like to invite the minister to start.

I believe you have five minutes, and then we'll start a round of questions.

[Jill McKnight, Liberal, Minister of Veterans Affairs]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Good afternoon, everyone.

Thank you for inviting me to share an update on the work of Veterans Affairs Canada.

I'd like to begin by acknowledging that we are gathered on the unceded ancestral territory of the Algonquin Anishinabe nation.

It's a pleasure to be with the Standing Committee on Veterans Affairs for the first time as the Minister of Veterans Affairs and Associate Minister of National Defence.

Colleagues, thank you for your ongoing commitment to the well-being of Canada’s veterans and their families.

All Canadians benefit from the contributions and sacrifices made by those who defend our freedom in times of war, armed conflict and peace, and we remain truly grateful to them.

I firmly believe that it is our collective responsibility to ensure that those who have selflessly served our country receive the support they need and the recognition they deserve. During my first few months in this portfolio, I've had the privilege of meeting with veterans and Canadian Armed Forces members across the country. These invaluable conversations have deepened my understanding of the impact of our programs and services. They have reinforced for me how essential it is that we listen to and consider the input from veterans to best match our benefits and services with their need, and how vital it is that we also consider the perspectives of the families that support our veterans. As we know, no veteran serves alone.

My priority as minister is to ensure that VAC's programs and supports adapt to the evolving needs of the modern veterans. Today, the average age of release from CAF is 34, significantly younger than in the nation's past.

Military service has also evolved from fighting for freedom in the Middle East to working with our allies to promote peace and global stability and supporting other countries as they fight to maintain sovereignty. These are some of the missions of today. Disaster relief and humanitarian aid are becoming increasingly important as our Canadian Armed Forces protect Canadians at home while helping our neighbours. These experiences equip our modern veterans with new skills and present them and us with new challenges.

As minister, I'm focused on continuing to improve the way in which VAC's benefits and services are delivered to our veterans, expanding the national veterans employment strategy to empower veterans in the post-service career of their choice, and meaningfully recognizing Canada's veterans for their service, both in conflict and in peace.

Ensuring that Canada's veterans receive benefits and supports in a timely, accessible and responsive manner will always be a top priority for me and our government. As we increase efficiencies, I'm pleased to report that the implementation of the My VAC Account has seen significant uptake, with almost two-thirds of veteran clients using it in the past 12 months. Ninety-two per cent of users report improved communication with Veterans Affairs Canada.

Further, we are responding to the emerging needs of modern veterans, including in the area of mental health. The mental health benefit for veterans provides immediate access to treatment for conditions like PTSD, depression and anxiety without administrative barriers. The health and well-being of our veterans is a responsibility that extends to supporting them through their post-service transition and reintegration into the civilian workforce.

In 2024, the national veterans employment strategy launched as a first step towards supporting the more than 7,200 CAF members who release annually. In collaboration with the private sector, I will implement an expanded strategy to directly connect our veterans with employers and entrepreneurial opportunities.

A core responsibility of Veterans Affairs is the meaningful recognition and commemoration of the service and sacrifice of all veterans. VAC is actively working to increase awareness for the modern-day veteran, including through the department's educational offerings in schools. By helping young people learn and better understand who our service members are, what their service entails and its impacts, it is my hope that we can further inspire generations towards service in the Canadian Armed Forces.

Our commemorative efforts must also evolve to reflect the increasing diversity of the CAF. I'm encouraged by the work, including the work here at ACVA, to increase awareness of the contributions of Black, indigenous, women and 2SLGBTQI+ veterans. As we move forward, we will continue considering these unique perspectives.

I thank the many individuals and groups that have shared their lived experiences and whose input and work are helping us modernize the work of Veterans Affairs Canada.

I'm happy to take your questions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Marie-France Lalonde]

Thank you very much, Minister.

We'll start with our first round of six minutes for each member. I will invite Mr. Richards for the first six minutes.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Airdrie—Cochrane, AB]

Minister, in your opening remarks you referenced the veterans employment strategy that your government launched in June 2024, about 16 months ago.

Can you tell me how many more veterans are employed since June 2024?

[Jill McKnight, Liberal, Delta, BC]

In the time that I've been with Veterans Affairs Canada, we have been working to roll out this program, to build engagement and to ensure that we are working on connecting the skills that veterans are releasing with.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Airdrie—Cochrane, AB]

I have zero doubt about any of that. I'm sure you're doing everything within your strategy.

What I would like to know is what the results are. How many more veterans are employed? Has veteran unemployment reduced?

[Jill McKnight, Liberal, Delta, BC]

At this moment, we are in the process of rolling the strategy out to make those connections so that we can track for that information—

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Airdrie—Cochrane, AB]

I have only a limited amount of time, so I'm sorry to interrupt.

You're telling me that, 16 months in, you're just starting to roll out the strategy. You have no way to tell us if there have been results in 16 months.

[Jill McKnight, Liberal, Delta, BC]

There have been results in terms of the engagement of employers.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Airdrie—Cochrane, AB]

What about the results in concrete terms? How many veterans are employed? At the end of the day, an employment strategy should be about having more veterans employed, should it not?

[Jill McKnight, Liberal, Delta, BC]

Very much so, and—

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Airdrie—Cochrane, AB]

Do we know how many were employed?

[Jill McKnight, Liberal, Delta, BC]

—as you can imagine, collecting that information will take time, because we will need to connect with the veterans to—

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Airdrie—Cochrane, AB]

When would you be able to get back to the committee to tell us a number?

[Jill McKnight, Liberal, Delta, BC]

We will continue to share information as it becomes available.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Airdrie—Cochrane, AB]

What about your veterans homelessness strategy? That was introduced in April 2023, two and a half years ago. Do you know how many homeless veterans there were in 2023 versus how many there are now?

I would hope you're not still rolling that one out; that's two and a half years.

[Jill McKnight, Liberal, Delta, BC]

That program has been moving forward and, simply put, one homeless veteran is too many.

As you mentioned, that program has been rolling out in conjunction with the ministry of housing and infrastructure.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Airdrie—Cochrane, AB]

Do we know what the results are from that? Do we know the number of homeless veterans now compared to what it was in 2023 when it was introduced?

[Jill McKnight, Liberal, Delta, BC]

The last data that we have from the census was in 2021. We will see new information following the 2026 census.

I can speak to—

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Airdrie—Cochrane, AB]

I'm sorry to interrupt again, but I have only a limited amount of time.

In April 2023 you put out a strategy. Two and a half years later, in late 2025, you're telling me that the best data you have is from 2021. You have no way of knowing whether what you're doing is working. If you're going to measure success, don't you need to know what you've accomplished? You don't even know your starting point, let alone where you are now.

Perhaps we'll move on, then, since we don't seem to have any information there.

Let me ask you about services. In the time that your government has been in office, 10 years, the budget has more than doubled for the department. I think there was a 26% increase in the last year alone. I think you'd be really hard pressed to find a veteran anywhere who would say that they think services are twice as good or twice as fast in that period of time. In fact, I don't think I'd have to bet. We can look at your departmental plans, because they contain some metrics. They're a bit subjective, but they're metrics nonetheless.

In those reports, on just about every measure, veterans report lower satisfaction in a number of different areas that your department provides. It seems as though what your government's response has been is to push back the timeline to achieve your targets. You've pushed back most of them in this year's plan from March 2025 to March 2027.

I guess the question I'd have for you is this: If you're not achieving success, even by your own measures, wouldn't it make more sense to change what you're doing rather than just make veterans wait longer for better results?

[Jill McKnight, Liberal, Delta, BC]

I can appreciate that waiting for benefits is incredibly frustrating for veterans. Many of them started their period of waiting perhaps long before their application was submitted.

You referenced the fact that funding has gone up, and so has the number of veterans coming forward looking for supports. We have continued to deliver services for all of those veterans. Whether one veteran or 10,000 come forward, we will ensure and deliver supports for every one of them who is eligible.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Airdrie—Cochrane, AB]

I guess the challenge is that veterans themselves, according to your own metrics, are reporting that their satisfaction in the quality of service they're getting from VAC, in their adjustment to post-service life and in the quality of programs they're receiving from VAC—all of those things—are showing that they're finding less satisfaction in those things, yet you have a bigger budget with fewer results.

You're a fairly new minister. Can you tell us what you've identified that you think isn't working right now and what you're going to do to fix it? What are specific items that you think aren't working right now and specific suggestions on what you'll do to fix them?

[Jill McKnight, Liberal, Delta, BC]

I will counter your assessment that things are not working.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Airdrie—Cochrane, AB]

That's not my assessment; that's your own assessment—

[The Chair, Liberal, Marie-France Lalonde]

Excuse me, Mr. Richards. I will have to interrupt you to allow the minister to answer. It's up to you. We can hear her comments, or you can interrupt her again.

Minister, I will allow you to end your conversation, and then we'll move on to our next round.

Please go ahead, Minister.