Veterans Affairs committee  No, it's not a decision of the minister; it's a government-wide decision. The minister doesn't get involved in the classification. That's the administration of government, and the minister is not involved with setting the levels of compensation.

Veterans Affairs committee  Not necessarily; the access the ombudsman or any GIC—or anybody in the department, for that matter—has is determined by a memorandum of understanding or by what their contract is. In the case of the veterans ombudsman, there is an order in council that very specifically gives him

Veterans Affairs committee  I can't speak for the ombudsman. All I can tell you is that I'm not aware of any information that he or his staff has ever been refused, with the exception of items that are cabinet confidences or matters of solicitor-client privilege. From my standpoint, if he is being refused i

Veterans Affairs committee  The relationship between the ombudsman and the minister is very clear. He gives a report to the minister. I or other officials do not see it. It goes to the minister. Then it will be published. The officials of the department are not involved with vetting, nor are we involved wit

Veterans Affairs committee  I know what I read in the transcripts here, and if he has not completed his report, then I take it he hasn't completed his report.

Veterans Affairs committee  I would agree.

Veterans Affairs committee  I think the first thing is that it's really important to make a connection with the veterans and try to establish a relationship based on trust, so when we say we have these programs and services, we are there to help veterans. Sadly, some of the people we're dealing with are in

Veterans Affairs committee  I would like to go back to the start. I think there's a clarification that's required. If I understood well, I don't recall something about there being an ability to remove the ombudsman. I don't think that was the nature of the discussion. Let me come at it this way. The ombud

Veterans Affairs committee  First of all, clients will call numbers that they may choose to call. If somebody is calling and saying they didn't get their cheque, for example, it could be simply the fact that their last change of address wasn't processed before the cut-off time for the computer system. It's

Veterans Affairs committee  Not that I'm aware of. I haven't seen such a report. He did make reference to a document when he appeared before the senators some weeks ago, but I have not seen any such report, which probably, given the arm's-length nature, shouldn't be a surprise. Certainly from my standpoin

Veterans Affairs committee  In some cases, yes. In some cases, the veterans were not ready. I think again it's very important for us to understand that the people living on the street live in a very different world and a very different life from us, who generally have jobs and go to work every day. In som

Veterans Affairs committee  If you look at the order in council, which really gives the ombudsman the authority, I can speak to it somewhat, having been the executive responsible for making recommendations to government on this particular file. The reality is that the ombudsman really operates on two level

Veterans Affairs committee  Yes.

Veterans Affairs committee  I wouldn't characterize it as adjudication. I would characterize it as a further review or a further advocate. The ombudsman does not have the authority to overturn the decisions of the department, but he does in fact have the authority to bring items to our attention. It's anot

Veterans Affairs committee  No. The actual members of the board are GICs, the same as the ombudsman. The staff of the Veterans Review and Appeal Board are staff of the board. Without getting into all the mechanics of it, the quick answer to the question is that employees, other than GICs of the Veterans Rev