As Remembrance Day approaches, Ottawa is moving to quell vocal criticism of the way it treats the country’s youngest wounded troops by revamping its much-criticized system for compensating injured veterans.
Experts see it as a long-overdue shift in the way Canada’s public and its government view the country’s 21st-century military – as an active force with the same potential for trauma as their Second World War predecessors. This is occurring as Ottawa begins musing aloud for the first time about extending Canada’s military presence in Afghanistan
But the most vocal advocates for veterans’ rights – many of whom held rallies across Canada over the weekend – argue the changes proposed are designed largely to save face, and may not be dramatic or comprehensive enough.
Greg Kerr, parliamentary secretary for Veterans Affairs Minister Jean-Pierre Blackburn, said Sunday on CTV’s Question Period the government plans to address the troubled system of lump-sum payments introduced in 2006, replacing lifetime pensions.
“Lump sum will be addressed very quickly,” he said. “It's certainly one of those items that's been pointed out that, although the intent is certainly the right one, as it turns out it has a number of problems in terms of the implementation, so we've listened and I think those changes will happen within the next week or two,” he said, declining to specify exactly what those changes will be.
“The general suggestions and recommendations we've received are to make it more flexible, have different types of payouts and so on. And I think the response, when it becomes official, will reflect those recommendations.”
Sophie Doucet, Mr. Blackburn’s communications director said the minister is trying to give veterans more choice, but added the government won’t return to the old system of providing all injured veterans “a monthly pension for life.”
The sentiment is nice, said veteran Sean Bruyea. But he’s worried the changes, once they’re revealed, won’t alter much: Keeping the compensation amount identical but dividing it into multiple payments won’t help, he said.
Mr. Bruyea became the face of veterans’ fight for fairer treatment when his personal medical and psychiatric records were circulated throughout the Veterans Affairs department in a ministerial briefing note while he was fighting the department’s Veterans' Charter. He has since launched a suit against the government, and privacy commissioner Jennifer Stoddard found the leak constituted a serious breach of Mr. Bruyea’s privacy rights.
“We’re a country that’s based on fairness and equality. We’ve sent soldiers to fight for those values, to die for those values,” he said. “Why are we not treating all soldiers fairly and equally? Why are we not providing for all of them?”
But more than a month after Ottawa announced $2-billion in enhancements for wounded veterans –details have yet to be fleshed out – veterans Ombudsman Patrick Stogran said Sunday’s announcement feels like little more than conveniently timed rhetoric.
“It’s slick marketing,” he said. “These are all empty promises. Let's walk the talk now. Let's table some legislation.”
David Bercuson, a historian and director of the University of Calgary's Centre for Military and Strategic Studies, said the country is only beginning to think of veterans as something other than “an old guy with white hair, a blazer and a whole bunch of medals, not a vital young kid back from war and trying to get on with his education.”
“I don’t think they’ve spent sufficient time thinking their way through it. … Veteran policy has been made on an ad-hoc basis for quite some time now,” he said. “Our perception of veterans has changed as a result of Afghanistan, and it’s time we took a holistic look at the issues.”
