Another Remembrance Day has come and gone, with politicians mouthing the correct sound bites about how much they revere and respect our military veterans.
Politicians of every stripe also love to visit war zones, strap on a helmet and flak jacket and send photo-op images back to voters.
But their real commitment to our troops doesn’t come close to matching the rhetoric or the imagery.
Exhibit A is the New Veterans’ Charter, which was passed by Parliament in 2006, under the old Liberal government.
It was supported then and has been since by Prime Minister Stephen Harper.
The charter, presented to Canadians as a radical enhancement, is a money grab.
Wounded personnel used to qualify for a lifetime pension for pain, suffering and recognition of injury-induced limitations to their earning capacity.
Now the charter gives them a single lump-sum payment, up to $250,000 for two legs lost in battle.
In generations past, Canadian armed forces personnel also qualified for extensive education funding, land grants and other compensation in recognition of their service. All that is long gone.
Harper, to his enduring credit, created the post of Veterans’ Ombudsman in 2007, to help injured and retired troops navigate through the bureaucratic minefields of Ottawa. His first choice was retired Col. Pat Stogran, a highly respected and decorated soldier.
Stogran was aggressive and relentless — too much so for Harper’s taste — in defending the interests of armed forces personnel on active duty, in rehabilitation and in retirement.
Stogran spoke publicly and disparagingly about the mindset in Ottawa. He likened it to that of an insurance company, fixated on controlling costs rather than delivering timely services to personnel in grave need.
In thanks for building a credible organization from ground zero, Stogran was tossed overboard by the prime minister after three years.
He was replaced by an interim ombudsman, who served 14 quiet months and had little discernible impact; then by Guy Parent, who has finally come into wide public view this week to protest looming budget cuts at Veterans’ Affairs.
Our federal government, which claims to respect and revere our troops, plans to demonstrate that commitment by reducing its budget by $266 million, and chopping 500 of its 4,200 employees.
Steven Blaney, the minister of Veterans’ Affairs, assures Canadians that these cuts are needed to help the government reach its balanced-budget goal three years from now. He assures Canadians that needed efficiencies can be achieved with no reductions in service by simply “cutting red paper.”
It’s hard to imagine this can be fully true, while acknowledging that some employees in his department have curiously deficient work habits.
Veterans who speak out publicly about Blaney’s department have had their personal and private files improperly accessed by departmental staffers.
It happened frequently to Stogran. It happened excessively to Sean Bruyea, a former military intelligence officer who was grievously wounded in Afghanistan.
Bruyea successfully sued the government for breaching his privacy after his personal medical files were improperly searched by the government more than 1,000 times.
Similar things apparently happened more than 100 times to disabled veteran Dennis Manuge. Manuge is now the lead plaintiff in a massive group lawsuit against the federal government for shabby Veterans’ Affairs treatment.
Stogran’s experiences taught him that disabled vets have come to be seen as the enemy within the department. He also learned that when it came to disbursing money, the bureaucratic high rollers were the first at the trough and the enlisted forces came last.
“Deputy ministers make more on average in one year than a person who loses two legs in Afghanistan can expect to be paid out in a lifetime,” Stogran said a year ago this week.
What are the chances that any deputy ministers will be chopped in the coming round of cuts? Your options are slim and none.
We used to operate on the premise that if you put your life on the line for the nation, Canada would help you for the rest of your days if you were disabled.
Now you get a single cheque if you are lucky enough to prove a direct, incontrovertible link between your symptoms and a battlefield incident.
Joe McLaughlin is the retired former managing editor of the Red Deer Advocate.