- Member of Parliament
- NDP
- North Island—Powell River
- British Columbia
- Voting Attendance: 65%
- Expenses Last Quarter: $145,542.18
- Government Page
- Mar/27/23 3:09:04 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, Veterans Affairs has been clawing back pensions from women RCMP veterans. These women experienced extreme brutality while protecting our country, and the government is denying what they are owed as directed by the Merlo Davidson lawsuit.
The New Democrats have been calling for these clawbacks to stop and, after months, finally the minister agrees. These women deserve action.
Will the minister apologize to these women, stop the clawback and reimburse the money they are rightfully owed from their pensions?
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- Mar/7/23 3:19:21 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, for decades, women in the RCMP suffered a shocking amount of sexual harassment and discrimination. Now Veterans Affairs is clawing back their disability pensions. Months ago, following the Merlo Davidson lawsuit, the ombud recommended the clawbacks stop. However, the minister has done nothing. He is making these women who served their country suffer all over again. When will he fix this and make it right?
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- Nov/3/22 11:43:38 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the amazing member for Edmonton Griesbach.
When I reflect upon this report, I remember back to 2019 when it was initially tabled. There was a sense of urgency from all parties in the House that this needed to be a priority for the government and action needed to be taken, so it is frustrating to be having this discussion again, knowing this report from 2019 was retabled by the committee, which had been waiting for a response from the government. The committee has now received that response. However, it still does not address the key issues. When we retabled this, I wrote clearly in the supplementary report that it has been a full three years, yet very little action has been taken on this critical issue.
I think also of how many veterans I have spoken to, how many veterans have come to the House of Commons to be a witness for us and how many veterans have sat at the table at the Standing Committee on Veterans Affairs. Many times they are asked if they would serve again, and they always say yes. What surprises me as well is how many of them, when asked if they would encourage their own children or relatives to serve, say yes.
When we look at the reality of it, about 5,000 veterans are homeless now, without a safe place to live and dealing with things most of us cannot imagine, and they are still there. Even though they are there, they would still serve our country again. Their commitment to service runs that deep. It is important we remember that when we have these discussions.
Their dedication to service is so profound, and our dedication to serve should, at the very least, match theirs. Our service to veterans, as parliamentarians, is to make sure they have the best services they can, that they are accessible and that they are not waiting a long, long time for them. We have to make sure that 5,000 veterans are not going to bed tonight without a safe home to live in.
When I think of this, I think of recommendation 3 of the report, which reads, “That Veterans Affairs Canada, in cooperation with Employment and Social Development Canada and organizations supporting academic research, continue its efforts to better understand veterans’ homelessness, taking into account the overrepresentation of women and Indigenous peoples.”
It is important to research this, but at the same time, we need to figure out what is going on and do actions. I talked earlier today about the work being done in London, Ontario, to collectively identify veterans in the community who are homeless and make sure they have a safe place to live. It is important we recognize this.
We know, sadly, that of those veterans who are homeless, the number of women and indigenous people in this population is really high, when all of us in this place know that are they are still a very small part of the forces who serve us. Why is that? We need to figure out why that is. We also need to acknowledge that sometimes these groups are marginalized groups within a larger group who are even more marginalized by our systems. It is important that research is done, and that we honour that.
I come back to something else I also mentioned earlier today, which is the fact the Auditor General, in their report, was very clear that Veterans Affairs Canada does not collect data in a way that allows it to identify where the problems are. When we have veterans who do not have a home, who are waiting for the services they need and falling through the cracks, and who feel a great deal of distrust for the ministry, the department and the people who work there, we also need to look at the fact that the data is not there to provide the information to correct the problem.
What we see continuously is money being poured in, but we do not know if that money is being spent effectively because we do not know where there are bottlenecks. We do not know where the blockages are that veterans just simply cannot get through. We do not know that, and that is on the government. It is on the government to fix this core problem.
I know that we can talk about a lot of exciting things that get people really upset, but having good data means better services to veterans. I am very firm that we cannot stop talking about how important this is because a lack of data means veterans are not getting the services they deserve.
Recommendation 4 specifically talks about a “partnership with other federal, provincial/territorial and municipal organizations concerned, and with the community agencies”. In my riding, I have 11 Legions across some of the smallest communities we will ever see. The Legions are cornerstones to those communities because they provide support and services, and they create a place where a community to get together.
Those organizations want to do the work. We asked the government to take all of those stakeholders and make sure to work with them to implement an action plan, such as the national housing strategy, to actually get to the core and eradicate homelessness for veterans.
What we do know is that there are piecemeal investments under the national housing strategy in 2021. It really focuses on Edmonton and Ottawa, but it does not have any concrete plan to address this. That is a concern, and we know it can be done. Strategies can help veterans get into homes.
In fact, and I will say it again, on February 16, 2021, in London, Ontario they did just that. They did it. Built for Zero Canada, working with the Canadian Alliance to End Homelessness on the national effort to address the problem, monitors the progress of 12 participating cities. It endorsed London's claim that the city had the first Canadian community to attain the status of functional zero for veteran homelessness because the groups focused on the issue, gathered the relevant data, looked at community-focused solutions and did it.
This is a model that we could be implementing by working with communities, regions, organizations and municipalities to identify what is happening in their community and which veterans are falling through the cracks. This is important because veterans do not often complain if they are homeless. They are ashamed that they are homeless, as though it is their fault, and they do not step up to disclose it.
So many witnesses have come before us to say that often, when veterans are homeless, they will not disclose that they are veterans, so they do not even know how to connect them with those resources. They have shame and also a feeling that the department will not do anything for them. Those things need to be addressed. They need to be taken seriously, and we need to demonstrate for veterans that there are solutions and that, if they reach out for help, they are actually going to receive it.
Not too long ago, I had a family member come to speak to me about a veteran in their family. She is an indigenous woman. She spent many, many years serving this country, and now she is couch surfing. She is living on the edge because how she left was not a good way to leave. I do not have permission to share what happened to her, but it was not a good thing. She left in desperation for her own safety from the military.
Now she is sleeping on couches, and she has so much need, but no matter how much her family loves her and no matter how much they reach out to her, they cannot get her to ask for the services because she no longer trusts the system. We need to look at that. We need to own that in the House and stop pointing fingers. We need to start saying we are going to stop doing that and we are going to start serving veterans.
In closing, I want to talk about recommendation 7, “That Veterans Affairs Canada and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police...sign a memorandum of understanding to make RCMP veterans eligible for the Veterans Emergency Fund under the same terms and conditions as Canadian Armed Forces veterans.” We have heard from the president of the RCMP Veterans' Association that this has not gone into place. However people have served this country, we have to show them that, on the other side of their service, they will be respected enough to get the support they deserve. I am here in the House asking for that to be a reality because veterans have served us. We had best serve them back.
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- Jun/22/22 3:17:37 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, three years ago the Liberals created a $150-million veterans survivors fund. As of today, zero dollars have been spent. Yesterday, the PBO found out that almost double is required to make this right.
Thousands of veterans' widows are living in poverty, and the government continues to break its promise to eliminate the sexist, archaic “gold-digger” clause.
When will the current government stop punishing veterans for finding love after 60?
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- Jun/13/22 3:54:15 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, today I am here to present a petition on behalf of many Canadians across the whole country who are very concerned about the fact that Canada is still implementing the “gold-digger clause” that was put in place in the early 1900s. We know that so many veterans, RCMP and public servants who marry after 60 do not qualify for survivor pensions for their loved ones when they pass on. The National Council of Veteran Associations, the RCMP Veterans' Association and the Armed Forces Pensioners' Association of Canada are all in support of this. We believe it is important not to punish veterans for finding love after 60.
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- Jun/3/22 11:27:28 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, it has been seven years and still Veterans Affairs has not met its service standard for processing disability claims. This week, the Auditor General's report told us what veterans have been saying all along: that they are waiting far too long and it is causing suffering to the veterans and to the people who love them. Weak data collection means that Veterans Affairs cannot provide reliable, truthful information about their numbers, while internal human resources issues are leaving veterans behind.
How many reports are required before the government looks after veterans?
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Madam Speaker, one of the issues that is very concerning to me, and that was not addressed in this budget at all, is marriage after 60. We know that if veterans, military folks, RCMP and our federal civil servants get married after 60, their partners get no survivor benefits after those members pass. Right now, we are working with an amazing human being who put away $153,000 out of his own pension to look after his partner when he passed. Now, she is very ill, and it does not look like she is going to make it. I think it is very concerning that the $153,000 is not going to be returned to that person.
Could the member speak about how important it is to recognize the people who served us so well, and their partners?
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Mr. Speaker, the second petition I am tabling today is one in support of my bill, Bill C-221, which talks about removing the gold digger clause. Many people across Canada do not understand that the spouses of veterans, including common-law partners, who married after the age of 60 are not entitled to the automatic survivor pension under the Canadian Forces Superannuation Act. It also means that veterans, RCMP veterans and, in fact, all federal public servants, if they marry after 60, do not receive any pension for their loved one when they pass on.
Bill C-221 lays out the ways to eliminate this clause and move forward, and at any point the government could implement this fully. When one has talked to the people who I have talked to, one knows that this needs to be done, especially when there are those with over 25 years of marriage.
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- Dec/13/21 3:29:40 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, members from across Canada have signed this petition. It is based on the fact that we still have the gold digger clause, which disallows pensions to survivors of veterans who married after the age of 60. We know the National Council of Veteran Associations, the RCMP Veterans' Association and the Armed Forces Pensioners' Association of Canada have advocated for the elimination of this clause, and we also know that the Prime Minister's 2015 and 2017 mandate letters to his minister of veterans affairs directed the elimination of the “marriage after 60” clause.
I am hoping this will be dealt with.
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