Mr. Speaker, I was interested to hear the hon. member's comments with respect to how this budget would purportedly help veterans, and the measures that are in it with respect to the War Measures Act.
The member would undoubtedly know that those measures are a direct result of a five-year court battle that the government waged against disabled veterans. Those amendments should actually be called the “Manuge amendments”, because they are in the budget only because of Dennis Manuge.
While these amendments would stop the clawbacks as the court ordered, they would continue to claw back welfare payments, other payments made by the Department of Veterans Affairs, old age security payments and CPP payments. That is how far this would go. It would go only as far as the court said it had to.
The member stood and said he is proud of what this budget would do with respect to veterans in the Last Post Fund; however two-thirds of all applications to the Last Post Fund were rejected before this budget and would continue to be.
He talked about the investment in the helmets to hardhats program; however the Government of Canada's investment into the helmets to hardhats program is $100,000 to a website. That program is pretty much totally funded by private industry.
My question is for the member. Is he generally proud of what this budget would do for veterans, considering that all the changes in the budget with respect to veterans were forced on the government by the court in the Dennis Manuge case?