Minister of Defence: "Decade of Delivery" after "Decade of Darkness"

[The Bread Guy]

First time I've heard this term, so sharing it here.

This from Oral Questions in the House of Commons yesterday - highlights mine:

Mr. Justin Trudeau (Papineau, Lib.):  Mr. Speaker, yesterday I spoke with Corporal Glen Kirkland, who was in Afghanistan and was seriously injured in a rocket attack that also killed or wounded fellow soldiers. His fight for the honourable treatment of our veterans is the latest chapter in his story of bravery.  Will the Prime Minister make two commitments for our honoured veterans? Will he ensure that no solider injured in combat is involuntarily discharged from the forces before qualifying for their pension? Will he reverse the closure of nine veterans service centres in communities like Sydney, Kelowna, and Brandon?

Hon. Rob Nicholson (Minister of National Defence, CPC):  Mr. Speaker, again, the department works with those individuals to make sure that they are ready for the transition to civilian life. Nobody has made this more of a priority than this government.  I have to ask the hon. member this: After a decade of darkness, when the Liberals did nothing on this file, why is it only about a week before Remembrance Day that they discover this file? We make this a priority 52 weeks of the year. That is the difference.

Mr. Justin Trudeau (Papineau, Lib.):  Mr. Speaker, yesterday I spoke with Corporal Glen Kirkland, who was seriously injured in Afghanistan. His fight to ensure that veterans are treated with dignity is just the latest chapter in his tale of courage.  Will the Prime Minister make the following commitments to our veterans? Will he ensure that no soldiers injured in combat will be dismissed from the forces before they are eligible for their pension, and will he reverse the decision to close nine veterans service centres in cities like Windsor, Thunder Bay and Brandon?

Hon. Rob Nicholson (Minister of National Defence, CPC):  Mr. Speaker, we give our thanks to Corporal Kirkland, indeed to all those men and women who have served in the Canadian Armed Forces.  The message I have for them is that after a decade of darkness here, now they will experience a decade of delivery under this Conservative government.

 

[pbi]

I' not sure about the facts here (as opposed to politicians trading rhetoric in an effort to embarass each other).

I don't recall that under the Liberal government we had anything like the volume of complaints by and on behalf of veterans, that I have heard in the last, say, three years.

Does this mean that the real problem is a "time-delay fuze" on changes wrought by the Liberals, so that we only see their effects now (this seems a bit far fetched, considering how long the Liberals have been out of office...), or are the Tories actually failing veterans (which seems counter-intuitive as compared to their normal pro-military, patriotic stance...)

In any case, thinking up  more bumper-sticker terms isn't really going to help anybody, and will just fuel the slanging match.

 

[Edward Campbell]

I' not sure about the facts here (as opposed to politicians trading rhetoric in an effort to embarass each other).

I don't recall that under the Liberal government we had anything like the volume of complaints by and on behalf of veterans, that I have heard in the last, say, three years.

Does this mean that the real problem is a "time-delay fuze" on changes wrought by the Liberals, so that we only see their effects now (this seems a bit far fetched, considering how long the Liberals have been out of office...), or are the Tories actually failing veterans (which seems counter-intuitive as compared to their normal pro-military, patriotic stance...)

In any case, thinking up  more bumper-sticker terms isn't really going to help anybody, and will just fuel the slanging match.

That's because the New Veterans' Charter was passed into law only weeks before Prime Minister Paul Martin's minority government was thrown out of office in the 2006 general election.

 

[Edward Campbell]

I' not sure about the facts here (as opposed to politicians trading rhetoric in an effort to embarass each other).

I don't recall that under the Liberal government we had anything like the volume of complaints by and on behalf of veterans, that I have heard in the last, say, three years.

Does this mean that the real problem is a "time-delay fuze" on changes wrought by the Liberals, so that we only see their effects now (this seems a bit far fetched, considering how long the Liberals have been out of office...), or are the Tories actually failing veterans (which seems counter-intuitive as compared to their normal pro-military, patriotic stance...)

In any case, thinking up  more bumper-sticker terms isn't really going to help anybody, and will just fuel the slanging match.

The Liberals, under Prime Ministers Jean Chrétien and Paul Martin, faced with real, hard requirements from troops they had sent into combat, delivered or put in motion many things for which the Conservatives take credit. No government likes spending on the military ... the public doesn't like it. When they need to spend they do: Conservative and Liberal alike.

 

[MarkOttawa]

The message I have for them is that after a decade of darkness here, now they will experience a decade of delivery [emphasis added] under this Conservative government.

So what have they been doing over the last seven and three-quarters years?  Merely being dim?

Mark
Ottawa

 

[Nemo888]

The NVC had support from all the parties. Plenty of blame for everyone. So we went from a decade of darkness for kit to almost a decade of darkness for wounded soldiers. It would not surprise me if the massive savings from the NVC are roughly equivalent  to the new spending on kit. The complaints from the bean counters in the medical group in '05 was that veteran's benefits would cost more than prosecuting the war on the old charter.

I posted elsewhere the government proudly boasted earmarking 5 billion in extra benefits for Vets. But when you look at the budget, payouts only increased by 1.2 million in 2012. The 65 million for Last Post Fund is even more of a sham. They forgot to mention that the did not change the eligibility requirements. The  Parliamentary Budget Office estimates that at best only $18.4 million of the 65 will be given out.

This is just a shell game. They are PRETENDING to support Vets. Bragging about unusable funds which will then be claimed as budget surpluses and cost savings during the next election cycle. They think soldiers are too dumb to do basic math.

 

[Remius]

I posted elsewhere the government proudly boasted earmarking 5 billion in extra benefits for Vets. But when you look at the budget, payouts only increased by 1.2 million in 2012. The 65 million for Last Post Fund is even more of a sham. They forgot to mention that the did not change the eligibility requirements. The  Parliamentary Budget Office estimates that at best only $18.4 million of the 65 will be given out.

I listened to an interview last night on the radio about the last post fund and how it has near impossible to meet the requirements.  Basically you need a yearly salary of 12,000$ or less to qualify.  Nuts.

 

[pbi]

The Liberals, under Prime Ministers Jean Chrétien and Paul Martin, faced with real, hard requirements from troops they had sent into combat, delivered or put in motion many things for which the Conservatives take credit. No government likes spending on the military ... the public doesn't like it. When they need to spend they do: Conservative and Liberal alike.

I have often thought this was true, although it is perhaps only "fair game" and I'm sure that the Liberals would do it in their turn.

I remember that when I was still in uniform, I thought that we had a good combination  in the early day of Afghanistan with PM Martin and his MND Mr Graham (although I didn't vote for them). They seemed to be more pragmatic and common-sense about military requirements than I expected from Liberals.

The current govt frequently cloaks itself in a very strong and persistent rhetoric about the brave men and women of the CAF, and support for things military, and how anybody opposed to them is unpatriotic. 

The old saying may prove itself true: "Patriotism-the last refuge of scoundrels"

 

[Edward Campbell]

I have often thought this was true, although it is perhaps only "fair game" and I'm sure that the Liberals would do it in their turn.

I remember that when I was still in uniform, I thought that we had a good combination  in the early day of Afghanistan with PM Martin and his MND Mr Graham (although I didn't vote for them). They seemed to be more pragmatic and common-sense about military requirements than I expected from Liberals.

The current govt frequently cloaks itself in a very strong and persistent rhetoric about the brave men and women of the CAF, and support for things military, and how anybody opposed to them is unpatriotic. 

The old saying may prove itself true: "Patriotism-the last refuge of scoundrels"

Which is all you really need to know to succeed in politics throughout the world ~ it is about the same in China as in the Canada or the USA.

 

[The Bread Guy]

This is just a shell game. They are PRETENDING to support Vets. Bragging about unusable funds which will then be claimed as budget surpluses and cost savings during the next election cycle. They think soldiers taxpayers and voters are too dumb to do basic math.

FTFY

 

[pbi]

OK, so exactly what is the basic problem? Is it that we have a government of careful money managers who genuinely see veterans' benefits as a potential risk to the federal coffers? This could be true, since my general impression of them is that they are pretty tight in their fiscal thinking.

Do veterans expect too much? Probably not, but if you look at some web forum comments, you certainly see that opinion from time to time expressed by members of the public. Is the government reacting to that? My feeling is "no": that the people who make these comments are not going to vote Tory anyway. They're too busy making white poppies.

Or, are the Govt just cynically pretending to support veterans while callously chipping away at benefits, in the hopes that the dirty work will all be done and forgotten before the next election? That certainly doesn't match their Info Ops.

Sorry..."Influence Activities".

 

[Edward Campbell]

OK, so exactly what is the basic problem? Is it that we have a government of careful money managers who genuinely see veterans' benefits as a potential risk to the federal coffers? This could be true, since my general impression of them is that they are pretty tight in their fiscal thinking.

Do veterans expect too much? Probably not, but if you look at some web forum comments, you certainly see that opinion from time to time expressed by members of the public. Is the government reacting to that? My feeling is "no": that the people who make these comments are not going to vote Tory anyway. They're too busy making white poppies.

Or, are the Govt just cynically pretending to support veterans while callously chipping away at benefits, in the hopes that the dirty work will all be done and forgotten before the next election? That certainly doesn't match their Info Ops.

Sorry..."Influence Activities".

I'm repeating myself, but: it's a bit of all three: there are some Conservatives who want to control cut spending everywhere; there are some more who think that all social programmes have a fair degree of waste built in to them and there are even more, especially, I think, amongst elected members who actually believe the bureaucrats who tell them that this is just good, sound management and only a few vets are upset. There are, I think, a few veterans ~ not many, in my opinion ~ who are trying to milk the system and, of course, when the bureaucrats point them out to MPs that reinforces the belief that the system can be cut without doing real, serious harm. Finally, the government's information propaganda machine is, indeed, pretending to support the troops ~ I'm repeating myself again, but no government likes spending money on defence (or military pensions).

 

[DBA]

Any action seems to garner over the top criticism these days since it's become political. It makes doing incremental improvements not worth the effort even though they could help at least some veterans in a timely manner. So between major changes things end up festering leaving everybody unhappy - government for not getting better results for the money being spent and veterans for not receiving them.

The basic premise of the new (well not so new anymore) veterans charter look sound to me: retraining and assistance to get back into the rest of society. The low pay and small lifetime pension was never going to transform into good pay and large lifetime pensions with all the other expenses added in and growing.

Veterans act better these days, I don't think a repeat of something like the 1918 Anti-Greek riots in Toronto will happen, but they are also much better taken care of than for example those returning from early tours of Cypus were or from the various missions in the Balkans.