Mr. Speaker, on November 28, 2014, I asked the Minister of Veterans Affairs about an announcement he had made in Halifax regarding a $200 million mental health care program for veterans.
I would like to remind the House that this announcement was made because of pressure from the NDP. The parliamentary secretary, at the time, gave his usual response:
...there were only four operational stress injury clinics when our government took office. We have already put in place 13 operational stress injury clinics across the country.
The government says that it has increased services, but the numbers say the exact opposite. I will share a few examples. Last spring, I asked the minister a question about homelessness and, in particular, the fact that in Montreal there are no fewer than 50 veterans who are homeless.
Why was it difficult to help homeless veterans? It is because the Department of Veterans Affairs does not have the resources to do it. The week of November 20 we learned that the department had failed to spend more than $1 billion since 2006. On December 3, 2014, we learned from the Treasury Board's 2013-14 departmental performance report that the number of full-time equivalent employees had fallen from 4,039 in 2008-09 to 3,050 in 2013-14, which is even lower than the forecast 3,115.
Just this morning, December 12, 2014, we learned that a group of veterans known as The Canadian Veterans Advocacy were condemning the Conservative government for balancing its budget on the backs of veterans by closing at least nine Veterans Affairs Canada offices.
I will not add my voice to the chorus asking for the resignation of the Minister of Veterans Affairs. Although we can criticize him because he is overseeing the cuts to services, the person actually responsible for the current situation is the Prime Minister and the disconnect between his combative ideology and his obligation to deal with the effects of war on the soldiers who return home.
If we want to condemn the government and its inability to address these effects, we must have the courage to explain what causes them. Irresponsible military action is the cause of our veterans' health needs, especially the mental health needs that the government can no longer handle.
In 2006, the Prime Minister said, “You won't recognize Canada when I'm through with it.”
Indeed, sometimes I feel like I hardly recognize the Canada I moved to 13 years ago. It is this Prime Minister who is always trying to lead Canada away from the group of countries that work for international peace and co-operation, and towards the group of countries that are looking for provocation, confrontation and war.
There is another mind-boggling aspect of this debate. Not only are the Conservatives indifferent towards our veterans, but they also have such contempt for the public servants who work on the front lines providing services, who, according to the Prime Minister, are merely bureaucrats and pencil pushers. It is really insulting.