Debates of Nov. 4th, 2026

Budget 2025 Implementation Act, No. 2

[Todd Doherty, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George—Omineca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, to my colleague heckling me across the way, I will say it is true. If she would like the information and the proof of it, she can come see me or any of my colleagues who have sat on the veterans affairs committee previously or sat on the MAID committee through the summer and heard the testimony. It is absolutely true, and it is shameful. The colleague across the way, who has been here for a minute, is doubting what I am saying. She should check my record of standing up for veterans and standing up for those who fight for our communities and fight for our country yet have been forgotten by the Liberal government. It is shameful.

Tomorrow is another day, and tomorrow the government has an opportunity to provide more hope and provide real action that will make life more affordable for Canadians. What are we going to see? I hope it is not more band-aids. I know the people in my riding are not looking for handouts. They are looking for an opportunity to work. They are looking for the government to stand up for them when they are at the negotiating table, but it is absent. The government likes to talk a big game, but it is not there.

Debt interest is projected to reach $83 billion a year. Food bank visits, as I mentioned, have doubled. Grocery prices are 33% higher now than they were in 2020. Canadians are working harder and paying more, yet too many are struggling to afford the basics. Conservatives believe the government should respect taxpayers, control spending and put affordability first. How about putting Canadians first? The Prime Minister spends more time in the air collecting air miles than he does in this House.

Canadians deserve a government that makes life more affordable, not one that leaves them paying the price for its fiscal mismanagement. I hope tomorrow brings more sunny ways and not more dark days.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, John Nater]

The member will have about three minutes the next time the House considers this matter. I will also caution that it is not proper to make reference to the absence of members in the House.

Wartime Service Recognition Act

[Anita Vandenbeld, Liberal, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

moved that Bill S-246, An Act respecting the recognition of wartime service, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Mr. Speaker, it is a tremendous honour to be here in this House today as the sponsor of Bill S-246, the wartime service recognition act.

What this bill would do is simple. It asks National Defence to set a national framework that would have objective and transparent criteria on what is considered wartime service within 12 months, and then to apply that criteria to every conflict since 1943 and to future conflicts.

I do not think most Canadians know that Canada has not officially recognized any military operation as wartime service since the end of the Korean War. In fact, Korean War veterans had to fight for 27 years to get it recognized as a war. Persian Gulf War veterans are still fighting after 36 years, for decades, just for their own recognition. Also, veterans of the war in Afghanistan are only now just starting to realize that the government officially, legally, does not consider them to be war veterans.

I know this matters, because a few months ago I was door knocking in my riding, and I met a woman at the door who had served in Afghanistan. When I told her about the bill and she realized that she was not a war veteran, she had to hold back tears. That is because words matter and labels matter. That is why this bill is so incredibly important.

The bill is very simple. It is about correcting the disconnect between what veterans experienced and what we all know. We all note the war in Afghanistan and the Persian Gulf War. Veterans know what they went through. The bill is about correcting the disconnect between that and the label the Government of Canada applies to their service. It is about telling the truth about their service. It is about respect. It is about recognizing veterans, and it is about validating their service.

Bill S‑246 will require the government to introduce a national framework for the recognition of wartime service within 12 months. This framework will have to include objective criteria for designating military service as wartime service based on the level of risk, the nature and intensity of the service, exposure to conditions capable of causing physical or psychological injury, and the existence of armed conflict.

The bill would not specify which conflicts are or are not wartime service. It asks for a criteria. The bill would also not impact benefits or compensation. Why does the bill matter, then? I asked veterans that question myself.

About six years ago, I was at an event at the Canadian War Museum, and we had the Kuwaiti ambassador there. We were celebrating the 30th anniversary of the end of the Persian Gulf War, the first Gulf War, the one that liberated Kuwait. I met several Persian Gulf War veterans. Many of them are here today. I met Harold Davis, Mike McGlennon and others. I heard them say that they felt the Kuwaiti government was recognizing what they went through in ways that the Canadian government was not. That was very disturbing to me.

I asked Mike McGlennon why this mattered so much to him. His answer has always stayed with me. His answer that day was that he just wanted his grandchildren to know that their grandfather was a war veteran. That term, war veteran, is an incredibly powerful term.

A few months later, the Persian Gulf War veterans had a documentary. They said that very few people had seen this documentary, so I hosted a screening here on Parliament Hill. I was not expecting veterans from across the country to come to that screening with parliamentarians. I will never forget that one Persian Gulf War veteran came with a box full of mementos, things he had brought home 30 years ago. He told us that he had not opened the box in 30 years, but that because he was on Parliament Hill, he felt that he could open it and share what was in it for the first time.

I also heard from veterans who said they did not wear their medals because, often, the way we recognize or not recognize veterans is something that gets internalized. Today, I would like to share the words that Mike McGlennon shared earlier. He said, “Please restore our pride that has been stripped from our service.” This bill is about restoring that pride.

I would like to quote from retired Colonel Mark Gasparotto, who said, about the war in Afghanistan, “The Afghan mission was a war by every metric, and the current terminology of special duty area rings hollow when judged against the life and death realities we faced on the ground.” This bill is about those realities. It does not matter if there was an actual declared state of war. It does not matter what the war was called. It is about the lived experience, realities and conditions that the veterans faced.

My parents were liberated in World War II by Canadian soldiers in the Netherlands. My father got his first candy in 1945, when he was five years old, from a Canadian soldier. Growing up, I remember my parents would be walking down the street and they would point to somebody and say, “Do you see that man over there? That man is a war veteran.” Even as a little girl, I knew from the hushed tone and the reverence that that meant the man or woman had done something very important, very special, because those words, the words “war veteran”, matter.

When Canadian military personnel or others return from war, often they do not talk about it. If we acknowledge it by calling them war veterans, by giving them a nod of respect, a handshake or a quiet thank you for their service, that lets them know that we see them, we understand what they went through and we acknowledge them. That is a respect that is so needed, especially by veterans who come home with invisible or visible injuries, and the veterans need to have that validation and recognition from the Canadian government itself.

This is also a very important bill because it is not just about how veterans feel, how they see their service or how Canadians see their service. It is about who we are as a country. It is about understanding the history of Canada as a country. Of course, it is true that Canada is a peaceful country. Canada is a country that will always put diplomacy, conflict prevention and peacebuilding first. However, Canada, historically and today, is a country that has been willing to fight when it was necessary. Canadians have stepped up. We will fight when it is just. We will fight against oppressors. We will liberate. We will fight when it is necessary to restore peace, freedom and democracy around the world, including our own freedom. That is a part of history.

I sometimes hear young people and others ask, “Why do we have a military? We have not had a war since our grandparents' time.” Can members imagine what that sounds like to the veterans who served in war, the living veterans and modern veterans today? Making sure we understand and say that we have sent our Canadian Armed Forces into war is something that will also help young people understand.

This is about the future veterans and the future young people, like a young cadet thinking they may want to serve. The young people who are thinking of serving their country are watching. They are watching how we treat the veterans of today. They are thinking about whether or not they are going to serve as well. This bill would show them that we would provide the right recognition if, God forbid, we ever have to send them into a war.

This bill is also extremely important for women veterans. It was not until 1991 that women in Canada were permitted to participate in combat roles, and 1991 was the Persian Gulf War. For women veterans, for their valour and for their sacrifice, this is an incredibly important recognition of their service.

It is also very important for families. As we know, anybody who serves does not serve alone. Their families are there alongside them. We lost 158 Canadian military personnel in Afghanistan. I would like to read some words we heard earlier today from an incredible young woman who I just met, Olivia Vernelli.

Olivia's father, Master Corporal Scott Francis Vernelli, was killed in action in Afghanistan when she was only six months old. Today, she said, “I grew up without a father. Father's Day meant visiting the National Military Cemetery”. She continued, “For years, Canada's involvement in Afghanistan has been referred to as a mission. However, the word mission does not accurately represent the years of combat, the Canadian soldiers killed in action or the families who lost their loved ones. These are the realities of a war. Calling it a war is about giving that service the recognition it deserves.”

This bill does not amend the Veterans Well-being Act or the Pension Act. It does not make any changes to benefits or financial compensation. Its purpose is to acknowledge what these veterans have gone through and pay tribute to them. It tells the truth about their experiences, about the physical and psychological injuries they are still suffering from today and about the pain and loss experienced by the families of those who died in the line of duty.

I speak of families like Olivia's.

I would like to thank all the parties for their support and encouragement for this bill. It is inspiring to see so many of us supporting our veterans.

I am so pleased that this bill has all-party support in the House. It passed in the other place by Senator Yussuff with a unanimous vote. I am encouraging our colleagues to do no less in the House. There is urgency. We need to pass the bill quickly. It is already 70 years late. We have thousands of living veterans today. With every week that passes, they are getting older. We are losing some of them without them ever knowing their government was going to recognize their service properly. That is why I am asking everyone in the House to please pass Bill S-246 quickly, so we can recognize, see and validate their service.

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for sponsoring the Senate bill here, and for her kind words about our veterans, especially now. Here we are leading up to Veterans' Week and Remembrance Day. It is important that we recognize the service and sacrifice made by so many of our veterans, including those who were in the Persian Gulf War and Afghanistan. I think about Canada's contributions to Libya as well. That was a hot war. Canada was in there kinetically. It was the first time a Canadian warship came under fire, back in 2011.

Conservatives have always stood with our veterans. We have stood with the Canadian Armed Forces. Recognition is important, as is making sure people are properly given the honour, as well as the supports, for their service. I would ask the member this: Could she tell us, from the government's perspective, how quickly we can expect it to do this analysis to ensure that, with respect to those operations of war and conflict, we are properly recognizing the great service of those Canadian veterans.

[Anita Vandenbeld, Liberal, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague from Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman also for all of the work he does for veterans and those who are still serving.

There are timelines in the bill. This was very important to the veterans. It states that, within 12 months, there needs to be transparent and public criteria, a national framework that includes those criteria, and that it needs to be published. It also sets a timeline. They need to go back and make a list of all of the operations since 1953, and then apply the criteria backward. If there is a future conflict, there is six months, 180 days, in which the government must take that criteria and apply it to that conflict, because we do not want other veterans to do what some of the veterans who are here today had to do and fight for decades for their own recognition. In the future, that will be done within six months of the end of the conflict.

[Claude DeBellefeuille, Bloc, Vallée-du-Haut-Saint-Laurent, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate my colleague from Ottawa West—Nepean for her initiative and leadership. She has succeeded in bringing together all members of the House, from every party, in support Bill of S-246 and in securing an expedited path through the legislative process. I attended the all-party press conference she organized and heard veterans speak about how important this bill is to them.

The purpose of this bill is to modernize the criteria for military recognition, but there is also a group of veterans who would like to establish an advisory committee to review medals awarded in the past and make adjustments.

Does my colleague think that moving quickly to establish such a committee could also help veterans receive medals that they may have earned but never received?

[Anita Vandenbeld, Liberal, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased that all parties, including the Bloc Québécois, support this bill.

To answer my colleague's question, I think it is truly something that must be taken into consideration. First we need to pass Bill S-246. If we are going to award medals related to wartime service, that service must first be recognized.

They need to have, almost as a prerequisite, recognized wartime service, not for all medals, but for many of them, such as Victoria Cross and others. I do believe that they need to be able to have wartime service recognized in order to have those medals.

[Lisa Hepfner, Liberal, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for all her hard work. When she takes on an issue, she puts her whole heart into it. Perhaps she can just tell us one story. I also sat on the veterans affairs committee when we studied this issue, and there were just so many stories from veterans who are here today. Perhaps there was one story that really stuck with my colleague and made her realize that this effort was worth her time. Maybe she can talk about that a bit.

[Anita Vandenbeld, Liberal, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would say it is when Mike McGlennon looked at me and asked why veterans have to fight for their own recognition. They should not have to. We will do it for them.

[Alex Ruff, Conservative, Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound, ON]

Mr. Speaker, first off, I want to thank Senator Yussuff in the other place for sponsoring this bill and bringing it forward in the House. I want to thank the Persian Gulf War veterans, in particular Mike McGlennon and Harold Davis for their incredible leadership, persistence and unrelenting push for Canada's Parliament to recognize the incredible service of so many Canadian Forces members and police officers who have served here in Canada. I want to thank all my colleagues across all the parties as well for the collaboration. There are many joint seconders of this bill from every single party, I believe, represented here in the House of Commons.

This is something that is important. As I said, I was talking about the Persian Gulf War veterans. Going back to 2022, even the late Right Honourable Brian Mulroney was pushing the government to recognize the incredible contributions of the Gulf War veterans. He was our prime minister at the time during that war.

The angle I am going to go with on this is that I am just going to tell a story. Let us picture it is early May, just after dawn. There is a Canadian combat team made up of a couple of hundred Canadian soldiers, infantry, armoured soldiers in tanks with mine rollers, engineers, sappers in support and an artillery troop ready to provide close, direct fire support. We have intelligence assessments. We have close air and fast air on standby in the air. Everybody is ready to go. There is even embedded national media travelling with this Canadian formation. They cross the line of departure. Within literally minutes, the enemy combatants open fire and there is a full-fledged fire-on-fire contact going on between the Canadians and the enemy combatants. Intelligence reports indicate that this operation is likely going to result in full combat. Mines are blocking the routes. For many of these soldiers, it is their first time in combat. They have never experienced this yet on deployment to an overseas country. Needless to say, there is chaos. There are snipers. There are rocket-propelled grenades. It does not take long for the Canadian formation to have attack helicopters and support coming in. This goes on for the next three to four hours.

What war am I talking about? Am I talking about the Second World War? Am I talking about Vietnam? No, I am talking about Afghanistan, which according to our Canadian regulations and government was just a special duty area. I do not think so. That conflict, that battle on May 7, 2007, went on for many hours that day. The next morning, on May 8, we were back at it again. It did not take long to come in with different tactics, approach the objective area, but on the way in, let us guess what happened. Another improvised explosive device disabled a tank. Luckily, there were no friendly casualties. As we were dismounted, moving into position to hit this objective area, again, the enemy, the Taliban, open fired.

The Taliban is back in control in Afghanistan. That is something I am not going to talk about at length, but needless to say, they were not the brightest at the time. Our position, our combat team was in what I would call a perfect right flanking position. After about an hour and a half, the Taliban was on the losing end of that conflict. Luckily, no Canadian soldiers were killed that day, but there were incredible examples of heroicism that morning, especially on that second day.

I can remember the squadron's second-in-command having to shoot his tank to take out an enemy RPG position right over the heads of Canadian-friendly soldiers in order to save their lives. I believe what we did in Afghanistan was absolute war, and I do not know why we do not recognize it as such.

There are bigger aspects to this, too. Afghanistan is just one example. I again thank the member for Ottawa West—Nepean for her leadership in sponsoring this bill in the House. We just had a press conference. We heard from the Persian Gulf War veterans. We heard from the Afghan war veterans. We heard from women veterans, indigenous veterans, families and, in particular, a Silver Cross daughter who lost her father when I believe she was only six months old. The sacrifices that families make in combat are incredible.

In Afghanistan, 158 Canadian Forces members lost their lives, but, in reality, that number is not even close. We have lost hundreds and, arguably, 1,000 due to post-traumatic stress, suicide, unfortunately, and other factors that make it so difficult for our veterans who serve in these conflicts to carry on and get up every morning. We owe them. As a Parliament and a country, we need to make sure they are recognized for what they did.

One other aspect came to my mind within the last hour at the press conference when the retired assistant commissioner from the RCMP spoke, and that is police. I have served in Bosnia, Afghanistan and Iraq. Who was on every one of those deployments? It was Canadian police. I am not just talking about the RCMP. I am talking about the Toronto Police Service, the OPP, the Sûreté du Québec and many other community police forces. The importance of this bill alone, once this framework is established, is that these individuals would be formally recognized as veterans. Right now, the way Veterans Affairs Canada is set up, it is only members of the Canadian Armed Forces and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police who have that recognition. We need to fix that.

As the member for Ottawa West—Nepean highlighted, this is about setting up that framework into the future as well. Right now, I do not know the exact numbers off the top of my head, but I think approximately 3,000 Canadian Armed Forces members and, I guarantee, police and other aspects of the Canadian government are in Operation Reassurance, on the front lines in Latvia, in an ongoing mission. I will use that word now. It has the potential to be triggered into an all-out war with Russia at the snap of fingers. We need to make sure we have a framework established to recognize our men and women, when they put on a uniform, for the service they do. I believe Bill S-246 is a step in the right direction.

In closing, I want to take this opportunity to remember six fallen heroes from my deployment in 2007: Sergeant Donnie Lucas, Corporal Aaron Williams, Corporal Brent Poland, Corporal Christopher Stannix, Private David Greenslade and Private Kevin Kennedy. They made the ultimate sacrifice that day in Kandahar province. I again want to pay tribute to the four fallen Canadian Armed Forces members from the tragedy in Wainwright that just happened a few weeks ago.

God bless. Pro patria. Lest we forget.

[Claude DeBellefeuille, Bloc, Vallée-du-Haut-Saint-Laurent, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is with great pride that I rise today to inform veterans that the Bloc Québécois will be supporting Bill S-246, along with every other party represented in this House. Bill S-246, an act respecting the recognition of wartime service, is sponsored in the House by my dear colleague, the member for Ottawa West—Nepean

The bill would establish a transparent national framework for modernizing the criteria used to recognize military service, taking into account both risk level and intensity. It draws on the study from the 44th Parliament entitled “The Persian Gulf War was a war”, an initiative that the Bloc Québécois proudly championed.

The reality is that Canada has not officially recognized a conflict as a war since the Korean War, which took place from 1950 to 1953. Even then, however, Canada was not formally at war with North Korea or China. Our participation was carried out under a United Nations resolution, during what was considered a time of peace. This distinction matters because Veterans Affairs Canada generally divides military service into two categories: peacetime, or special duty service, and wartime service.

The purpose of the bill is to remove soldiers who have fought in modern wars from the administrative category of “peacetime” and officially grant them the title of “wartime” veterans.

Today, veterans of Afghanistan or the Gulf are classified under “special duty service”. On paper, they are entitled to the same amounts. In reality, they face a bureaucratic wall. Under the status of special duty service, it is up to the injured soldier to prove that their trauma or illness is directly due to service. Unfortunately for veterans, that is no recognition of their loyal service to their country. For a long time, they have rightly called for symbolic parity with their predecessors from the two world wars and the Korean War.

It is time for us to fully honour our veterans by giving them the honours that they deserve. Special duty veterans form a huge category in which Veterans Affairs Canada technically includes soldiers sent to Afghanistan, Bosnia and the Gulf, for example.

This would help cut the red tape and ensure proper support for veterans who have served in more than one conflict, veterans like the legendary Léo Major, for whom managing injuries sustained both in wartime and peacetime would have been a bureaucratic nightmare.

With the signing of the Briand-Kellogg pact in 1928, the signatory states, including Canada, agreed that they would no longer use war as an instrument of national policy. The pact laid the legal foundations for declaring acts of aggression between two countries to be illegal. In 1945, the UN charter added a blanket prohibition on the use of force. Only two legal exceptions exist today, namely self-defence and authorization from the UN Security Council for the purpose of maintaining or restoring international peace. The Korean War therefore falls the second exception.

The world has changed. Nations no longer formally declare war on one another. It is illegal to do so. However, our troops are still being sent to the front lines. Think of the Gulf War or Afghanistan, the deadliest conflict for Canada since Korea. Some claim that the bill is merely symbolic, especially since it is explicit about not granting any new financial benefits that do not already exist in federal legislation. The reality on the ground is quite different.

We have seen appalling cases where Persian Gulf veterans who inhaled toxic and carcinogenic substances had to fight with Veterans Affairs Canada to have their cancer recognized. It was not until 2025 that the government began to right these wrongs and address them.

The passage of Bill S-246 will finally make it possible to apply the insurance principle to these modern conflicts. The burden of proof is reversed, which puts an end to the government's administrative harassment of those who served the country. This legislation frees veterans from the administrative burdens imposed by the government.

By refusing to modernize its definitions, Canada has gotten itself into absurd situations. Are my colleagues aware that the Canadian Victoria Cross, our highest military honour, established in 1993, has never been awarded? Canada is the only major allied country that participated in the war in Afghanistan that has never awarded its highest military decoration to one of its soldiers.

Many elected officials and veterans' groups are currently lobbying the government to establish a military honours review board. Take, for example, the case of Jess Larochelle, who volunteered to man an observation post in Pashmul, west of Kandahar City on October 14, 2006. His company was targeted in an initial assault by Taliban forces armed with rocket-propelled grenades. Two of his fellow soldiers were killed, while three others were seriously injured. Despite briefly losing consciousness and sustaining severe injuries to his back and one eye, Jess Larochelle managed to hold back the enemy's advance with his machine gun. When he ran out of ammunition, he fired the post's M-72 rocket launchers repelling a force of 20 to 40 Taliban insurgents. After suffering from poor health due to his injuries in Afghanistan, he died on August 31, 2023.

While he was alive, Private Larochelle was awarded the Star of Military Valour, Canada's second-highest honour for bravery in combat. Former chief of defence staff Rick Hillier later acknowledged that he had made a mistake and requested that the honour be upgraded to a Victoria Cross, but that has still not been done.

Meanwhile, our allies do not hesitate to honour the exceptional bravery of their soldiers, as they have adapted their practices to the realities of the 21st century.

Bill S‑246 would require the government to create an evaluation framework based on modern, measurable criteria: combat intensity, level of actual risk, and exposure to life-threatening conditions. These new benchmarks would allow the new military honours review board to determine whether a military feat finally qualifies for the Victoria Cross.

This bill is simple, fair and necessary. It deserves to be voted on in a non-partisan manner and sent to committee quickly so that we can study it and refine it as needed.

Let us finally give our veterans back the dignity and protection they fought so hard to earn.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to rise on behalf of the New Democratic Party in support of Bill S-246, the wartime service recognition act.

Before I get started, I want to thank all veterans and currently serving members of our military, RCMP and all police services, as well as their families, for their service. I thank the senator who brought the bill forward. I thank my colleague for Ottawa West—Nepean for her advocacy and the work she has done to bring us all together across party lines on something that should not be partisan. I thank my colleague for Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound for such a powerful speech and for his incredible service to our country. He is a true hero, and the people he served with, including those who never came home, are heroes. I also thank my colleague for Vallée-du-Haut-Saint-Laurent for her very powerful speech. It demonstrates how we can work together on something of such importance, supporting our veterans.

At the heart of the bill is a simple principle: When Canadians put their life on the line for our country, then their courage and sacrifices deserve to be properly recognized. This should not be controversial, yet for far too many Canadian veterans, securing that recognition has been a long and frustrating battle. We heard about that tonight, and we heard about it in the press conference.

I have met with veterans who served in the Persian Gulf, Afghanistan and the former Yugoslavia, women and men who have spent years, sometimes decades, fighting to have that service properly acknowledged. For some Persian Gulf veterans, that fight has lasted 35 years. Mike McGlennon and Harold Davis from the Persian Gulf Veterans of Canada have been relentless. They stood with us today. We owe it to them. Just think about it for a moment. It has been 35 years of trying to convince their own government, our government, that the dangers they faced and the conditions in which they served deserve recognition.

These veterans did not choose the conflicts they were sent into. They answered the call of duty, faced life-threatening situations and did everything their country asked of them, yet after all these years, they are still waiting for their country, our country, to fully acknowledge what they went through. This simply is not good enough, and it is the injustice that Bill S-246 seeks to address.

The legislation before us would require the minister of national defence to establish a national framework for recognizing wartime service based on clear, objective criteria and a transparent and accountable process. Whether a veteran's service is recognized should not depend on an outdated definition, an arbitrary distinction or the label that a government happened to attach to a military operation. It should depend on what actually happened. Were our service members exposed to hostile fire or life-threatening conditions? What was the nature, duration and intensity of their operations? Did they face circumstances that could cause lasting physical or psychological harm? These are the questions that should guide the recognition of wartime service.

Importantly, the bill acknowledges something that should be obvious: Wars do not become less dangerous simply because governments choose not to formally declare them. A bullet does not distinguish between a declared war and an undeclared conflict, and neither does an explosive device or the trauma that follows a veteran home, often for the rest of their life.

Bill S-246 would also require the government to consult veterans and their representatives in developing this framework. This is critical, because if we want to understand what military service was really like, we should start by listening to the people who were actually there, as we heard from our colleague for Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound tonight. It should not just be government officials reviewing files in Ottawa but the women and men who lived through these experiences, the ones who served. Their voices have to be at the centre of this process.

The legislation also presents the Liberal government with an opportunity to honour its own commitments. In its 2025 platform, the Liberal Party promised specifically to expand recognition of military service, including reviewing the designation of missions in the Persian Gulf. That promise was made to Canadian veterans, but they are still waiting. Here is an opportunity for the government to deliver, for all of us. The government has already acknowledged there is a problem. Now it needs to do something about it.

Let us be clear about why this matters. Recognition is not simply a designation on a service record. It is about dignity and respect. We heard that at the press conference today. We heard, specifically from the indigenous veterans association, that this is about respect. It is about ensuring that veterans and their families know that their country understands what they have been through and has not forgotten them.

Although this bill is about recognition, it would not, on its own, establish new financial benefits for veterans, but New Democrats believe that recognition needs to be accompanied by meaningful support. Veterans who return home with physical injuries, psychological trauma or other service-related hardships should never have to fight their government to get the care and benefits they have earned. We cannot thank veterans for their service with one hand and put bureaucratic obstacles in the way with another. That is why we need a veterans system that reflects the realities of modern military service, one that is fair, accessible and grounded in respect for the people who have served. Bill S-246 is an important step in that direction.

Every November, as earlier today in the House of Commons, members of this place stand together to honour the courage and sacrifice of Canada's veterans. We wear a poppy, we attend ceremonies and we speak solemnly about the debt of gratitude our country owes to those who served. Those traditions matter, but gratitude cannot end when ceremonies are over. If we truly believe that we owe our veterans a debt of gratitude, then surely the very least we can do is acknowledge what they have done for our country. When someone puts their life on the line in service to our country, the very least we can do is to make sure their service is properly recognized.

Veterans who have served in dangerous and demanding circumstances deserve recognition that reflects the risks they took and the sacrifices they have made. Far too many veterans have spent years fighting for this recognition, but they should not have to ask for it. This bill is an important step to correcting that. It is about making sure veterans who face the dangers of wartime service receive the recognition that they deserve, along with the benefits that should come with it.

Again, New Democrats fully support this initiative. Canada's veterans should never have to fight for recognition after everything they have already done for our country. We owe them more than words of gratitude. We owe them fairness, dignity and meaningful action. It is time we got this right. Our veterans should not have to spend decades fighting for this recognition. They have already done their duty. Now it is time for us to do ours. The Senate moved the bill through rapidly. It moved it through committee. I hope the House can move things through quickly and that the bill can move through committee quickly.

I want to thank my colleague from Manitoba who is leading on the Conservative side. He has been pushing for that. He is pushing for it to move through committee rapidly. We wholly support that. This is an opportunity for us to move the bill fast and for the minister to support it. New Democrats are proud to support the bill, and I urge all members of the House to do the same and to help do everything they can to move the bill fast into law.

[The Deputy Speaker, Tom Kmiec]

Normally the Standing Orders would call for the member for Ottawa West—Nepean to have the right of reply, but I see that the member wishes not to take it. The House, therefore, is ready for the question.

The question is on the motion.

If a member participating in person wishes that the motion be carried or carried on division, or if a member of a recognized party participating in person wishes to request a recorded division, I would invite them to rise and indicate it to the Chair.

[Anita Vandenbeld, Liberal, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I think you will find that it is the will of the House that the bill pass unanimously.

[The Deputy Speaker, Tom Kmiec]

I declare the motion carried. Accordingly, the bill stands referred to the Standing Committee on National Defence.

(Motion agreed to, bill read the second time and referred to a committee)

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I suspect if you were to canvass the House, you would find unanimous consent at this time to call it 6:30 p.m. so we could begin Government Orders.

[The Deputy Speaker, Tom Kmiec]

Is it agreed?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

The House resumed from October 30 consideration of the motion that Bill C-41, An Act to amend the Criminal Code and An Act to amend the Criminal Code (medical assistance in dying) and to make related amendments to other Acts, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Medical Assistance in Dying Safeguards Act

[Emmanuella Lambropoulos, Liberal, Saint-Laurent, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for Etobicoke—Lakeshore.

Today, I rise to speak in support of Bill C‑41, the medical assistance in dying safeguards act. This is a bill that is particularly close to my heart and to which I am deeply committed.

This bill would prevent the planned expansion of MAID for mental illness and would allow for advance requests, subject to strict conditions and safeguards. I believe it takes a careful, compassionate and balanced approach that respects the will of individuals while recognizing our responsibility to protect those who are most vulnerable.

This is a deeply personal issue for me, as it is for many Canadians in this country. This is an issue that asks us to consider some very difficult questions about suffering, dignity and protecting people when they are at their most vulnerable.

I approach the subject knowing very well that we all have different experiences and beliefs when it comes to such a sensitive subject, and I respect that. Whatever our views, as politicians we have a responsibility to listen carefully and remember that every decision we make here affects real people and their families.

Today, I want to explain why this bill matters to me and why I advocated for caution in expanding MAID to people whose sole underlying condition is mental illness. I commend the Minister of Justice and Minister of Health for proposing reforms that would maintain this exclusion, would allow people diagnosed with conditions such as Alzheimer's to make advance requests, where permitted by provinces and territories, and would strengthen the national oversight of MAID.

Let us begin with the first pillar: preventing the scheduled expansion of MAID on the basis of a mental illness. March 17, 2024, was the original date that MAID was to extend to people suffering from mental illness alone. This followed a Senate amendment to the original bill, an amendment that introduced a provision that would expand MAID to mental illness. This would have given people suffering from a mental illness, including depression, the right to apply for assisted death.

Having a background in psychology, I was particularly concerned about what this expansion could mean. Mental illness can cause profound suffering. It can affect so many aspects of our lives, such as our relationships, work or physical health, and our ability to get through the day. For some, this suffering can go on for years. Symptoms can change over time, and recovery can be difficult to predict. People can respond differently to treatments, and finding the right balance of care and treatment can take time.

This left me with some serious questions about how we could determine that a person's condition would not improve and about how to ensure that people had meaningful access to treatment and support before they ever reached the point of applying for MAID. These apprehensions did not sit well with me at all. They led me to speak up and express my concern with my caucus colleagues in order to ensure that these difficult questions received the attention they deserved. I felt compelled to contribute to this discussion and explain why I believed more time was needed and why we needed a more cautious approach.

As the date approached, I felt a responsibility to my constituents in Saint-Laurent and to all Canadians to raise my concerns and sound the alarm. I kept thinking about the people and families who could be affected by this decision, people experiencing profound suffering, some of whom might still be struggling to find the right treatment or supports. I wanted us to take the time to work through these difficult questions and be confident that we could protect those at risk.

Ahead of the vote on a private member's bill addressing this issue, two of my colleagues and I voiced our concerns and worked within our caucus to advocate for the expansion to be postponed. These were constructive discussions about a deeply sensitive issue, and although these conversations were very difficult, I honestly did not believe that going ahead with the legislation as it was proposed with the extension was the right move.

My concern was whether we could move forward safely, whether our health care system was prepared and whether people living with mental illness had access to the treatment and support they needed. Most of all, if it is possible for people to recover from their mental illness and live functional and peaceful lives, would this legislation take this possibility away prematurely? As those important discussions continued, other colleagues shared their perspectives and concerns, contributing to a growing recognition that more time was needed before this legislation could be adopted.

The government decided to create the Special Joint Committee on Medical Assistance in Dying specifically to study whether it should be expanded to individuals suffering solely from a mental illness. That committee found that Canada was not ready to offer MAID for mental illness, and the government subsequently introduced Bill C-62, which received royal assent on February 29, 2024. The legislation postponed the expansion of MAID to people whose sole underlying medical condition is a mental illness until March 17, 2027. It also required a parliamentary committee review of the health care system's readiness.

Bill C-41 would prevent this expansion from happening. Today, I will share some of the main concerns that I raised with my caucus and that have shaped my position on this piece of legislation.

Originally, medical assistance in dying was allowable only in cases where a patient had an irremediable health condition. To have an irremediable condition means that the condition has become permanent and cannot be reversed. According to witnesses at the MAID committee, there is a lack of established criteria to determine if a mental illness is irremediable, as well as a lack of consensus among psychiatrists for if and when a mental illness should be considered irremediable. Furthermore, we are still learning about the brain and continue to do so every day. The brain is neuroplastic, meaning it continuously changes and grows in response to a person's environment and experiences. This does not mean it always changes for the better or that it improves, but it does mean that it can be difficult to predict if a mental illness will be irremediable or if it can be healed.

According to Sharon Reynolds in an article published in the National Institutes of Health journal, there are some properties in some types of psychedelic drugs that have shown promise as therapies for treatment-resistant depression and PTSD. They encourage growth of new neural connections in the brain, so it might be possible to develop related drugs that can promote brain plasticity without causing harmful and hallucinogenic effects. This would be a very promising development.

Another concern that I had with expanding MAID to individuals suffering solely from mental illness is the fact that we do not have adequate mental health care services in Canada. Therefore, people would be applying for MAID without trying other treatments for a lack of accessibility to them. According to the Canadian Institute for Health Information, there are several factors that contribute to unmet mental health needs across the country, and these include cost, as many services are not fully covered by public health insurance; caregiving or work responsibilities; a lack of support in navigating existing services; a lack of trust in the health care system; and the fear of what others may think for needing help in the first place, due to the stigma associated with mental health issues.

The second pillar speaks to another group of Canadians, those living with Alzheimer's or another form of dementia and the families who walk beside them. For these Canadians, there may come a day when they can no longer tell the people they love what they want at the end of their life. Today, under the Criminal Code, they cannot say it in advance. Advance requests are prohibited.

An advance request allows a person who has been diagnosed with a capacity-limiting disease like Alzheimer's to set out the circumstances under which they would want to receive MAID in the future after they have lost the capacity to consent. Canadians living with dementia have told us clearly that they want their wishes respected. Bill C-41 would permit advance requests so that a person diagnosed with a capacity-limiting disease can set one out while they still can. It does so with care, by setting minimum national safeguards in the Criminal Code for the lawful provision of MAID based on advance requests.

Over the past few weeks, people in my riding have put it better than I ever could: People struggling with mental illness deserve care that is compassionate, hopeful, and focused on suicide prevention, not medical assistance in dying. They told me that many people living with mental illness will reach such a low point that they will come to see MAID as the only way to escape their suffering. Furthermore, they asked me a question that has stayed with me: When that person is at their lowest point, what do we, as a society, say to them? Do we reinforce their sense of despair, or do we protect, support and care for them?

If we do not take action, the current exclusion will end on March 17, 2027. Bill C-41 addresses this. It takes a cautious approach, as there is still no clinical consensus and too many Canadians still cannot access the mental health care they need. A parliamentary committee composed of senators and members of Parliament from various parties heard from experts and stakeholders and recommended not moving forward. The bill follows through on that recommendation.

The bill is the result of listening. We heard from parliamentary committees, clinicians, the provinces and territories, disability groups and academics, and this decision follows the evidence so that people get the support they need. To those who are struggling, the bill offers hope and is a promise—

[The Deputy Speaker, Tom Kmiec]

I need to interrupt the member. The time has elapsed for debate.

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Oxford.

[Arpan Khanna, Conservative, Oxford, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I think we all agree on the mental illness component of the bill, and my colleague highlighted that there have been great discussions and great studies at committees, both at the Senate and in this chamber. However, on advance requests, there have been no studies, no debates and no conversations that we have seen in the House, and it seems that the government is rushing through something that should not be rushed, especially when it comes to matters of life or death.

Can the member stand up and tell us why the government is trying to ram something through instead of working with us, passing the mental illness component to satisfy the time restriction we have of March 2027 and listening to experts before it puts policy forward?

[Emmanuella Lambropoulos, Liberal, Saint-Laurent, QC]

Mr. Speaker, of course, the minister consulted with Canadians. Someone who suffers from Alzheimer's disease suffers tremendously, especially toward the end of their life. They lose capacity in many functions in their body, and it is only fair that they get the right to decide to die with dignity if they so choose.

[Gabriel Ste-Marie, Bloc, Joliette—Manawan, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask my colleague about people living with mental health issues.

It is all well and good if certain psychedelic drugs, taken in low doses, may eventually cure these individuals. Under no circumstances should medical assistance in dying become a way out for those who are unable to access care. When I talk to my colleague from Montcalm, who is an expert on this issue, he tells me that this is not at all intended for such people. They would never be granted access to end-of-life care. Rather, we are talking about people who have been struggling with mental health issues for 20 years, who have tried every available treatment and consulted every possible specialist.

What the court has told the government and us, as legislators, is that we must respect the rights and freedoms of people who, after decades of trying everything, have found no relief. We must recognize that mental illness is a health condition, just like physical illness, and respect the rights and freedoms guaranteed to these individuals under the charter.

Is there not a risk that the bill, as it stands, could be challenged before the Supreme Court, forcing the government and legislators to go back to the drawing board in a few years' time?

[Emmanuella Lambropoulos, Liberal, Saint-Laurent, QC]

Mr. Speaker, based on our discussions in caucus, the proposed bill was not necessarily intended only for people who have been living with a mental illness for 20 years. We also know that our health care system is stretched to the limit. I think that doctors need to make informed decisions and verify whether a condition has truly persisted for 20 years.

I think that some people are going to die before their chosen time simply because we lack the supports needed to implement this kind of legislation.