- Member of Parliament
- Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the King’s Privy Council for Canada and Minister of Emergency Preparedness
- Liberal
- Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne
- Quebec
- Voting Attendance: 67%
- Expenses Last Quarter: $117,520.90
- Government Page
- May/2/24 8:14:05 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I have not had a chance to work with the colleague opposite. I want to thank him for his service to this country.
I have been here nine years this fall, and I think I have developed a reputation in the House for not taking personal potshots. I do not heckle. I work across the aisle. I think everyone who has worked with me knows that.
When we talk about our military and talk about veterans, I think we almost all agree in the House that we need to support them. However, here we are having a debate, and included as part of that debate are personal potshots. Imagine what we could do for those same people who we all claim to love if we worked together. It is a crazy idea, I know, but that is what they want us to do. They do not care if it is a Liberal government. They do not care if it is a Conservative government. What they care about is that we work together for them because they are there to defend us.
Does the member opposite agree? I look forward to working with him on a defence file. Does he agree that it is time to put away the partisanship and work together for our Canadian Armed Forces?
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- Oct/20/22 8:31:57 p.m.
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Madam Chair, I want to thank the member for bringing that up. I will be honest that when I read that, my first thought was that person should not be working anywhere near veterans. That is my position. That person who suggested to a veteran in need to consider medical assistance in dying should not be working with veterans.
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- Oct/20/22 8:28:34 p.m.
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Madam Chair, I want to thank my fellow military mom for that question. It is pretty hard for me to put a price tag on this, to be honest, because that was the reason I ran in 2015. I was not happy about supports available for veterans. I knew my kids in the service would be taken care of, but God forbid they should need support when they got out. Would it be there? Therefore, I am really a bit biased on this one because, to me, one cannot put a price tag on the supports we need to give those who put their lives on the line for our freedom and the families who support them. I cannot answer that with a dollar figure, because to me one cannot put a price on that.
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- Oct/20/22 8:22:59 p.m.
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Madam Chair, I will be sharing my time with the member for Richmond Hill.
This is a hard conversation for many us in this chamber, many of us. It is tough to follow my colleague, who just gave an incredible speech about veterans.
As many people in this chamber know, I am the mother of two serving members of the Canadian Armed Forces, the mother-in-law of a member of the Canadian Armed Forces now, the daughter of a firefighter and the spouse of a firefighter. As I said in 2016 when the incredible member for Cariboo—Prince George brought forward Bill C-211, I was one of the first members of the government to say I am in, because, unfortunately, PTSD has a chair at my kitchen table.
When we come together tonight to talk about mental health, we are talking with one voice. Whether it be occupational stress from serving in the Canadian Armed Forces, emergency responders or people who face trauma, we all have someone in our lives who has suffered from mental illness, maybe even someone in this room, and we need to share those stories. We need to be together when it comes to mental health.
The last two years of the pandemic were really difficult for some people. Our young people had a lot of difficulties. When I talk with parents, I see that they fear for their children.
We need to make sure the supports are there when they are needed, and not three weeks later and not here as a referral paper. I am delighted that we are going to be moving forward with a three-digit suicide hotline number, thanks to my friend from Cariboo—Prince George, because when time is of the essence those supports need to be there.
This debate is so important because people are feeling anxious, whether it is because of the pandemic or because of inflation and the rising cost of living, which is a huge stressor. Financial insecurity and breakdowns of relationships all play a factor in suicide ideation. We have heard of this.
Therefore, we need to come together. We will put the partisanship aside, and together we are going to come up with a solution to get the supports to the people who need them and the families who are watching, because the families are the first who are seeing it. We have heard this time and time again. For the veteran who is suffering in their basement, self-medicating because they are hurting, it is the families who are dealing with it and looking for help, and we need to be there for them.
I am committing tonight, in front of my colleagues around this chamber, that I will always stand to support those who need us. We did it in the past. Let us continue to do this. Let us get it right. Let us make sure those who are suffering have the support they need when they need it and that those who care about them are getting the supports. We have all received those calls in our offices to talk to that person. I am not trained in this field, but when I get the call that there is a veteran in crisis, I am taking the call. We have all been there.
I want to thank the opposition for bringing this debate forward. Again, as my colleague said, it is not a debate; I think we all agree. Therefore, let us put it aside. Let us figure out how we can get this done, because coming out the pandemic my fear is that the need for mental health supports is going to be much larger than we are even anticipating. We need to be ready. We cannot be reactive. We need to be proactive in this regard.
I know we can do this. We have done this before, and we can do this. When it comes to mental health, we all agree. With that, I welcome questions.
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- Oct/20/22 8:18:21 p.m.
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Madam Chair, having served with the member opposite on the veterans affairs committee, I would like to thank her for bringing this issue up, because it is incredibly important. I know that she ran out of time, and so I would like to give her a moment if she would like to finish her thoughts.
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