Veterans Affairs committee  Good morning and thank you very much. I will make my presentation, after which Robert and I will be pleased to answer your questions. Today's presentation will be about benefits and services that Veterans Affairs Canada provides to our veterans. Who do we serve? We serve over

Veterans Affairs committee  I'll pass the message on. Thank you. Just to make sure I don't forget, there are four points. For the first one, not everybody who serves their country in uniform in the Canadian Forces necessarily needs assistance or encounters obstacles in their integration into civilian life

Veterans Affairs committee  I don't have the breakdown, but that's something we'll take note of, and we'll get you details of how many receive the earnings loss benefit.

Veterans Affairs committee  In Canada we do have a program for any Canadians over 65. That is often called the “old age pension”. In that case, income security is determined by our society. What was the third question?

Veterans Affairs committee  One of the questions was with the priority for employment. I don't have the data with me, but that's something we will take note of and send you the breakdown of statistics we have for that. Regarding the announcement, I don't think people should interpret that this tool is mean

Veterans Affairs committee  That's a very good question. Over the years the network of clinics has grown. There are a number that are Veterans Affairs clinics, and there are also a number of clinics operated by the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Armed Forces. You are right. It might be dif

Veterans Affairs committee  I don't have the number at hand, but I will make sure to get the statistics to you regarding how many veterans are currently being treated by the network of OSI clinics, and also how many are using this new technology. We'll get those numbers to you.

Veterans Affairs committee  I don't have the exact number, but I can tell you that there are more than 4,000 providers.

Veterans Affairs committee  Before the Veterans Charter, what we had seen.... As I mentioned, the average age of release is around 35. The average age is mid to late thirties. With the suite of programs we had before, we only had the disability...the pension program, which was the monthly pension. There was

Veterans Affairs committee  I'm not the best person to answer that question—

Veterans Affairs committee  I'm sorry, sir, but we'll make sure that you get something, a prepared response.

Veterans Affairs committee  Yes.

Veterans Affairs committee  I would just like to correct that. If he is only getting one, it's probably because he only needed one aspect of the program. Please keep that in mind. It's not that he didn't need it and we didn't give it to him. It may be that he might not have needed that component at the time

Veterans Affairs committee  No, we always paid based on what receipts were submitted by the veterans. What we changed in the procedure is that if the veterans are entitled to reimbursement for health-related travel, they are no longer required to submit their benefits. We asked them to keep them for a year

Veterans Affairs committee  Normally it's for travel within Canada, but we'd have to research to see if we had recent cases where travel abroad was required. I can't answer.