NDVA Committee Meeting

STANDING COMMITTEE ON NATIONAL DEFENCE AND VETERANS AFFAIRS

COMITÉ PERMANENT DE LA DÉFENSE NATIONALE ET DES ANCIENS COMBATTANTS

EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Monday, January 26, 1998

• 2205

[English]

The Chairman (Mr. Robert Bertrand (Pontiac—Gatineau—Labelle, Lib.)): Good evening, everyone. I would like to welcome you all this evening to the first leg of our journey. Before we do anything else, I would invite Admiral Moore to say a few words.

Rear Admiral Russell Moore (Commander of Maritime Forces Pacific (MARPAC), Canadian Armed Forces): Mr. Chairman, members of SCONDVA, members of the military community, the navy family, and all our friends, it's tremendous to see such a turnout this evening.

I have only two roles tonight. One is to welcome SCONDVA officially to Maritime Forces Pacific. Your visit has been much awaited and the results are much anticipated. We have great expectations, sir, of your work and of the work of your committee.

My second role is just to tell you a little about what has happened so far in the program. The SCONDVA committee embarked in HMCS Vancouver in Vancouver this morning and during the passage to Victoria had a chance to see just a little of what we do in our ships and our aircraft and what we contribute to Canada. We also had a round table, where a number of the ship's company and some of the staff of my headquarters involved in personnel issues had a chance to talk to the committee.

I was told there may be some hesitation; if an admiral and other senior officers were around, you would be reluctant to come forward to give your views. I have assured the committee that is not the case. Please don't hesitate to step forward to the mike during the open sessions and express your many concerns. This is your opportunity.

Again, thank you for coming this evening. I think you have some very clear messages and concerns for this important committee. They are here to listen to you.

The Chairman: Thank you very much, Admiral.

What I would like to do first of all is ask the different members who are here tonight if they would like to introduce themselves. After that we can go straight to the presentations. We could start with Mr. Hanger.

Mr. Art Hanger (Calgary Northeast, Ref.): Art Hanger. I'm the member of Parliament for Calgary Northeast and the Reform Party defence critic.

[Translation]

Ms. Pierrette Venne (Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert, BQ): My name is Pierrette Venne and I am the Bloc québécois Member for the riding of Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert.

[English]

Mr. John Richardson (Perth—Middlesex, Lib.): John Richardson, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of National Defence.

Mr. Bob Wood (Nipissing, Lib.): Bob Wood, member for Nipissing and vice-chairman of the committee.

• 2210

Mrs. Judi Longfield (Whitby—Ajax, Lib.): Judy Longfield, member for Whitby—Ajax.

Mr. David Pratt (Nepean—Carleton, Lib.): David Pratt, member for Nepean—Carleton.

The Chairman: My name is Robert Bertrand. I'm the MP for Pontiac—Gatineau—Labelle and the chair of the national defence committee.

Without further ado, I would now ask Mr. C.M. Thomas to make his presentation, please.

Just as a point of explanation, after your presentation is done, if the members have any points of clarification, they will ask the witnesses to clarify certain statements. I stress here that it's not a cross-examination, it's more a point of clarification. If everybody agrees to that, we're ready to go.

Mr. David Pratt: Mr. Chair, to expedite things for members of the committee, it might be useful if people were to stay away from using acronyms.

A lot of us around this table don't have the exposure you folks do to these acronyms. I know they leave me scratching my head, wondering what we're talking about.

The Chairman: Mr. Thomas.

Vice-Admiral (Ret'd) C.M. Thomas (President, Defence Associations National Network, Pacific Region Branch (DANNPAC)): Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, I resigned from the armed forces about six years ago. I was vice-chief of defence staff. I did so on an issue of principle.

I'm going to discuss the remit you have from the Minister of National Defence. You are to examine the type of support and compensation that should accrue to members of the armed forces. That remit goes all the way back to Mr. Young. It is pure Ottawa bureaucratic ploy: when there is a really unpleasant problem to solve, have somebody study it. It's process instead of progress, and the evidence is clear.

Your data, the briefings you've received, and some of the questions and answers that you've indulged in and that I have seen, thanks be to ATI, or access to information, and brown envelopes, make it clear that these folks out here who are the servicemen and -women in your armed forces are hurting. They are suffering.

The data you've received and the briefings are muted. There is a tone of “defence of the realm” about them. That will flow from the influence of the deputy minister. He is responsible to the Prime Minister's Office and the Privy Council Office, and they don't like waves. That's civics lesson one when you first go to Ottawa.

Some of the questions you've asked beg criticism of the government. Serving officers can't criticize the government. Unless you put them under oath, you're going to get less than full answers. You remember what happened to the last guy who stood up and spoke outwardly and clearly in support of his troops. That was Admiral Murray, and he got fired. It's a sure recipe for a short career.

If time permits, I would love to go over the questions and answers you had with Admiral Maddison and give you what an admiral who isn't restricted thinks the answer should be.

There is some evidence of internal debate in DND. There is a tell-it-like-it-is school versus those who say, if we tell it like it is and we don't get any good results, then people will know how badly off they are and how ineffective the DND leadership is. Well, it's time for a reality check. You have enough data to determine that the people in the armed forces, the services, are getting shafted and they are getting short-changed. They know that, so don't be worried about telling them.

• 2215

The present methodology of equivalency with the civil service says that they are 4% to 12% behind what the civil service is being paid. That's not an event; it's a condition. It's been that way for years, and 4% to 12% of your gross income that isn't there for years affects not only your standard of living at the moment but also your way of life. Also, it affects your pension, and they work a long time for their pensions.

The system of arriving at compensation, no matter how Solomon-like you are at the end of your deliberations, doesn't matter if the will to be fair and just does not exist. That is the present case.

How hard do they work? Two hundred days a year away from home, plus twenty to thirty days for custodial care of the ship and being away on courses.

There is some comparison in the data with merchant service and the ferry business. That's nonsense. Two hundred days away from home on a naval ship means being away from home. In the ferry service you go home every night, and you get paid overtime.

Remember, it's not just this year; it's every year.

Alternate service delivery, which is the new buzz-word in management of DND, means that the seashore jobs ratio, the hypothetical 70-30, doesn't exist any more. So for at least half their career all these sailors are going to be in ships and stay at sea unless they are in Halifax on courses.

There isn't any overtime. It's not like the Sûreté du Québec or the hydro workers or all the other folks who get called out in all the emergencies.

By the way, in this town these people can't qualify for a mortgage on a starter house at about $180,000 until they are a master warrant officer. When they're a master warrant officer they're getting ready to retire.

Rentals follow the same pattern. Indeed, in the five years of the pay freeze the government has put up the rent on married quarters by as much as $250 a month.

You just tell me what this committee or a committee of Parliament would do with a major corporation or a bank who did that to their employees?

The letter to you from the Minister of National Defence, if you exclude the bureaucratic weasel wording, says that they do serve with unlimited liability; that the social and economic aspects are adversely affecting the morale of the personnel and their families—these are quotes; that there are deficiencies in these areas and that they lag behind the public service. It admits to the financial penalties and fluctuating disposable income associated with physical moves to new places of duty and the need for “adjustment” to offset higher costs of living, etc.

The letter from the Minister of National Defence also admits to a social contract between the Government of Canada and the members of the armed forces. As it happens, I wrote the minister an open letter on this subject the day he was appointed. I've given it to your staff. I think he's adopted the wording, but not the concept.

It isn't a difficult concept. Let me summarize it for you.

The lives and the labour of the armed forces members will not be wasted or spent lightly. If Parliament or the cabinet is going to send them in harm's way, then it is because it is doing so for interests that are vital to Canada. It isn't sufficient to be lusting after a Nobel Prize.

Governments, secondly, and Parliament will not send the armed forces to do work for which government and Parliament have not bought the necessary tools. That means spending in the capital account. It is the submarines and the helicopters and all that stuff the army needs. It is today's government investing so that tomorrow's government will have options in tomorrow's crises. It is a fundamental welfare issue for the people who are being sent.

• 2220

Finally, the government and the Parliament must be responsible for the people of the armed forces, for their welfare and for the well-being of their families.

By any criteria, you and Parliament and the government are failing in your obligations to the people of the armed forces. The contract is broken and the people are hurting. Twenty-five percent of those leaving—this is from your data—do so because they can't support their families and they have to try something else. It's a scandal and it's a shame.

I think this committee and its members will have to determine whether the normal patterns of political advantage and debate and caucus discipline are going to pertain, or, conversely, whether you individually and collectively might decide to do something useful and soon about the appalling, even immoral, treatment of the servicemen and servicewomen by their government.

If you wish to search for a more magical system of compensation in the meantime, do so. But right now get on with actually paying them what they deserve. Close that gap between the servicemen and the civil service. Make the existing contract work. That means about a 10% pay raise across the board.

Don't be put off by that phrase in the minister's letter to you where he avoids responsibility by referring to fiscal reality, affordability and achievability. The Canadian Armed Forces should not depend on the people of the armed forces paying the bill out of their hide so we can have an armed force. It is the people of Canada who should be paying for the armed forces.

This all echoes of Rudyard Kipling, you know. When it's pay and allowances and the necessary equipment to do their job, it's Johnny this and Johnny that, and get the boot behind. But when it's Kanesatake, the Persian Gulf, the Saguenay, Bosnia, the floods in Winnipeg, central Africa, or the ice storm, then it's hero of the nation. That's not good enough.

I think the leadership of this country ought to be ashamed.

Your committee has the opportunity to right a grievous wrong. Please take it.

I'll be pleased to answer your questions.

The Chairman: Madame Venne.

[Translation]

Ms. Pierrette Venne: You compared the salaries of federal public servants and of members of the armed forces. Is that comparison necessary? The Standing Committee on National Defence has asked the Library of Parliament to carry out a study in order to determine whether there is a country anywhere in the world where the salary of the members of the military and the public service are compared as we do here in Canada.

• 2225

The study done by Mr. Koerner, who happens to be here, states that such a comparison is not done anywhere else in the world in countries where armed forces are made up of non-conscripted? military professionals. Do you think it is essential in light of that that we continue to function in this way? It seems to me that this does not work well. Why not simply have a separate system for the military?

[English]

VAdm C.M. Thomas: You'll excuse me if I respond in English. It has been years since I've had an opportunity to speak French, and my accent is from British Columbia and it's not pleasant.

I don't think it matters what system you have or what system it is that this committee arrives at. Certainly different countries use systems different from ours. What does matter is that the resultant compensation will be fair and just and not put a penalty upon the people of the armed forces.

It is a fact that some years ago the Government of Canada decided there would be a linkage between the military remuneration, pay, and the pay of the civil service. They struck that bargain but then have not kept it.

So you have a two-stage task. You have to honour the present relationship first, and then arrive at any other system you wish to arrive at. At the moment you're not honouring the existing system and they're suffering. So long as you're studying it they will continue to suffer, because your study is an excuse to do nothing, and the bureaucrats love that. They don't want to do anything. Every dollar they spend on defence they can't spend on something else they're interested in.

Not many people in this country are interested in defence. There is no constituency for defence in this country until the Saguenay occurs or the ice storm occurs or there is a crisis in Bosnia. That's the only time there's a constituency. So there is not going to be a popular vote mandating that the members of the armed forces be fairly treated. It is a moral responsibility of government, and, in my opinion, of parliamentarians, to do what is right.

The system doesn't matter. The consequences and result matter a great deal. What has happened over time is that we've drifted the members of the military into the working poor, and that's not good enough.

The Chairman: Mr. Hanger.

Mr. Art Hanger: Admiral, I appreciate your very candid comments.

• 2230

I would like to point out that I am one of the committee members—I know others here are in the same situation—who have just come into the defence committee and have a lot to learn. I think we're going to make some errors of judgment and statement as we do in fact learn, but that's no excuse for what your presentation here is all about, I have to say.

One thing I have found alarming in my very short time here is that a budget has been placed on military spending. It is designated to be around $9.2 billion. It currently sits at approximately $10 billion. That has dropped $2 billion from about three years ago. Major gaps are already showing up. The pay level is one. What is going to happen with another $1 billion knocked out of that military spending? It will knock it down to $9.2 billion. And even that may not be the end. If you describe the situation—and we all know what it is right now, basically—what is another $1 billion going to do?

VAdm C.M. Thomas: You can only have the defence of Canada you're prepared to pay for. When I was the vice-chief—that's the general manager of the department—the budget was $12.3 billion. I resigned because the policy paper was promising to deliver capability you could not deliver for $12.3 billion, given the way it was being spent. If in any technological organization—and that's what this is—you aren't spending 30% of your total budget on new capital equipment, you're on your way to being bankrupt. This organization is on its way to being bankrupt. The capital budget is tending to single digits.

If you're going to send our young people to these ugly, difficult, dangerous places in the world, you have to equip them so they are better equipped than the bad guys they are being sent to sort out. And there is no more peacekeeping according to Lester Pearson. Mr. Pearson is dead and so is that idea. It's peacemaking. It's chapter 7 by the UN rules. That's war by another name. The objective in war, as Patton said, is not to be killed for your country, it's to make somebody else be killed for his.

We are putting our young people in jeopardy when we send them to the Somalias and the Bosnias and the central Africas and the Adriatic Sea and the Gulf and we don't properly equip them. We're putting them in jeopardy when we don't give them sufficient money to support their families. We're making them second-class citizens. It's not good enough.

You can't have the defence policy that is now called for at $9 billion or less and pay them properly and equip them. You had better decide what defence policy you want to have and you are prepared to pay for; but you must not take it out on the backs of the people.

If you want to spend less money on defence, then don't fall in love with so many microphones at conferences around the world and volunteer to do things. It may be we can't do the things we have done in the world as a responsible middle power. But whatever it is you do decide to do, put the money and the equipment in it to do it properly. Otherwise we're going to bring two hundred or three or four hundred of our young people home from one of these adventures in body bags, and you will be responsible. Every parliamentarian in the country will be responsible, not just the minister of the day.

Mr. Art Hanger: In the very short period this committee has been on the road and at some of the other locations I have personally visited, bases, etc., it became evident that a study was done about two years ago on this very issue we're talking about tonight. Questionnaires and the like were filled out. Now it seems as if this committee—and I don't care which committee in Parliament you're talking about, they all operate in basically the same way—really is a sort of make-work project to some degree. We can come up with some perfect ideas or dandy ideas, or even sound statements, but it's a top-down process that we have in Parliament. That makes our job that much more difficult.

• 2235

I speak here as an opposition member. I don't speak on the government side. They may have a different view on the issue, but this is what seems to happen.

We're going to travel the country and we're going to talk about these issues all over, and the statements about what some of the major problems are are coming back loudly and clearly. But to translate that into that front line in Parliament is another job in itself. That's probably going to be the most difficult aspect, even if this committee agreed 100%.

We can go out and study, study, study. For many in the military, no doubt they've gone through these studies, but very often the system is almost a one-way stream.

I could see our committee being much more effective if we beat the drum as one unit in the media and a few other places when the opportunity arose, and I think there are always opportunities. But to carry it one step further, what more could you or anyone else in this room do to help us as a committee deliver this message loudly and clearly down there?

VAdm C.M. Thomas: Well, I'm not sure when you speak to anyone in this room, because those folks back there are pretty severely limited.

Mr. Art Hanger: Yes.

VAdm C.M. Thomas: They have unlimited liability, but they have limited citizenship. They're not allowed to be critical. This is a very rare occasion.

You, it seems to me, as members of the committee, and perhaps particularly on the government side, have a moral dilemma. Which is more important, doing right or maintaining caucus discipline? I say this because by your arrival here you raise expectations.

I noted with disappointment that this is a public hearing of a parliamentary committee in a significant city but there was no advance press notice of the fact that you were going to be here. There was notice within the military community, but no general notice to the public. Somebody in the public ought to be asking why.

Because you're here and hearing the things you're going to hear, you raise expectations. I tell you truthfully that the people in the armed forces don't need their expectations to be diminished one more time.

We have a marvellous armed force. When I was the CO of a ship or the admiral...give me 300 young Canadians in a ship's company and I can move the world. You can do anything. But it is a very difficult job to be an effective leader when you go “Yo-ho” and you look behind you and they've all left for some other career because that's the only way they can support their family. That's what you're inviting at the moment.

Does that answer your question, sir?

Mr. Art Hanger: It does indeed. Thank you.

The Chairman: Mr. Wood.

Mr. Bob Wood: I have just one question. I asked this this afternoon and I got a neat answer, but I just want to get one from you.

In my mind, the priorities changed somewhere down the road. I say that because I think priorities always used to be people. I think they've changed and I think we have to get that back. It's time that maybe the number one priority of any armed force should be its people and maybe not some of the esthetic things they buy to complement the armed forces.

Did our priorities change along the line? You were there.

• 2240

VAdm C.M. Thomas: Not mine.

Mr. Bob Wood: No, I'm not saying yours. I know where your priorities are, and you should be commended for them. But did they change?

VAdm C.M. Thomas: No, I don't think so. I spent the majority of the last 15 years of my career buying the new ships the navy now has. If you don't have new ships you don't have a navy; but if you have ships and no ships' companies you don't have a navy either.

You can't parse this thing into discrete packages and pay one bill and not pay the other. You either pay for the whole or you don't have an armed force. If you have an army and you pay them well but don't buy them equipment and send them to Bosnia with spears in their hands and the other guys have T-54 tanks, they are all going to die. We did that once already, in Somalia. We sent our troops to Somalia and there were some terrible consequences. We never funded that commitment properly. We sent them there for six months without a cook. They never had a hot meal in six months. You could save money by putting the federal penitentiaries on cold meals, box lunches, for six months, but the Canadian Human Rights Commission won't let you do that to Clifford Olson. But we did that to our army.

You can't parse it. It won't work. You either buy the equipment and pay the people or you don't have an armed force.

There isn't a change in priority. The change in priority is that governments think defence is less important. The Berlin Wall has fallen and therefore the money has been taken away, without the bills being paid first.

It is a legitimate choice for a democracy to decide not to invest in defence. I wouldn't agree with it, but it is an intellectually legitimate choice. But as long as you have decided to have a defence capability you have to pay for it. There is no cheap route.

I hope that answers your question, Mr. Wood.

The Chairman: Mr. Pratt.

Mr. David Pratt: Mr. Thomas, about solutions, you mentioned one in your comments earlier, a 10% pay raise across the board. I presume that's for all ranks.

VAdm C.M. Thomas: Absolutely. I have done a quick calculation of the area under the curve that they have been screwed out of while they have been short 4% to 12%, lo, these many years. If you did 10% now while you figure out what the new system of remuneration might be, whether you're going to copy an American system or a British system or whichever system you copy, they are liable to be better off.

Mr. David Pratt: That was the other part of my question, really. Have you any other specific suggestions for remedying the situation we're faced with right now?

VAdm C.M. Thomas: The first requirement is will. You have to have the will to do what is right. You have to have the will to say we will not have the circumstances we now have where people can't afford to live in this town and are commuting from Duncan; and because they are commuting from Duncan, their wives can't get jobs.

We're all two-job families these days. When I was a commander my wife was the only commander's wife who worked. Now they all work. It's an economic necessity. But you can't do that if you're moving and if you're living so far away from the centres where there are jobs that you can't get one. All you do is live at a lower standard.

I don't have a Solomon-like prescription of copying the British, or copying the Americans. I actually don't mind this equivalency with the civil service. At least it gives you visible benchmarks. But you have to stay with the system you decide to have and make it right.

That's the problem. We had a system and it has been cheaper. They could get away with it—for the government to screw the serviceman and not pay him what he should be being paid. It has been going on for years.

The bureaucrats don't care, and they ought to. If they don't, you ought to. I think parliamentarians are the leaders in this country, and I think Parliament is more important than caucus.

• 2245

The Chairman: Thank you very much, sir, for your presentation.

I will now ask Mr. Jerry Frewen to make his presentation.

Mr. Jerry Frewen (President, Royal United Services Institute of Vancouver Island): Our organization is made up of serving and retired officers of the three branches of the armed forces and the RCMP. The institute is associated with the Federation of Military and United Services Institutes of Canada. There are 27 institutes in Canada from coast to coast, with a combined membership in excess of 12,000 people.

The aims and objectives of our institute state in part that we will encourage the enhancement and maintenance of effective Canadian national security and national defence policies and capable armed forces through study, research and development, and promulgation, submission and presentation of briefs, position papers and policy proposals to government and government bodies. That is why I'm here this evening.

I wish to discuss two issues that are of the utmost concern to sailors serving Canada in Victoria. Both of these concerns potentially have a negative impact on morale and the sense of well-being that is so necessary to maintain a fighting force. They are housing and pay.

In the Canadian Forces 73% of married personnel are posted to bases and wings. Since all personnel need to obtain and pay for accommodation wherever they're posted, they need to be assured, for obvious reasons, that they'll be able to find housing at an affordable price at whatever location that happens to be.

This arrangement, whereby our serving members are required to pay for housing, is in contrast to the existing policies in effect in the armed forces of Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States. In those countries the provision of government-paid military housing is part of the overall compensation package.

I do have some slides, which, in the interest of brevity, I will forgo presenting to the committee.

Basically, the gist of the slides that I have prepared, but which we will forgo, is that for a very basic starter house in Victoria you're looking at in the neighbourhood of $175,000. The income needed to carry that kind of mortgage with a 5% down-payment and taxes of approximately $200 a month equates to the salary of a chief petty officer, class 1, or a naval lieutenant on pay increment 5.

I have included in the package the current military salaries for non-commissioned members and for general service officers. I will table this with the committee.

• 2250

The total number of naval personnel in Victoria is just over 4,000. That figure can be broken down as follows. There are 2,300 single people, half that number serving ashore and the other half in ships. The remaining 1,800 personnel are married. To accommodate the naval community, there are 720 personnel married quarters.

The housing authority maintains two waiting lists. Priority is given to people with children. I have a breakdown of the lists. Of people with children, non-commissioned members, there are 50. Of junior officers there are 11, and of senior officers there are 2. Of the people without children there are 150 non-commissioned members, 21 junior officers, and 2 senior officers.

Some of these people may well qualify to buy or rent housing on the local markets. As the admiral has previously mentioned, since the imposition of the five-year pay freeze, married quarters rents have been increased five times. In one instance the family is now paying $250 a month more for the same quarters.

I have some specific recommendations I will propose to you. No doubt in your research you have come across the accommodation assistance allowance. It is recommended that this accommodation assistance allowance be extended to all people and to include home buyers, to offset additional interest charges on mortgages incurred by those buying in areas of high housing costs, such as Victoria.

In addition, we should apply the same methodology used by the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Department of International Trade for a non-taxable foreign post index allowance. We should have that apply to Canadian Forces personnel posted within Canada. The methodology exists.

We should make accommodation assistance allowance benefits non-taxable. I'm sure the members of the committee have some knowledge that this is not without precedent. Members of the committee are in receipt of a non-taxable allowance to offset housing costs.

The next issue of concern is closely linked to the housing problem. It can be said that pay is the root cause of the inability of sailors to obtain affordable housing in Victoria. The inadequate pay levels of some junior NCMs, our non-commissioned members, have caused some to seek help from civilian social services. Assistance has been provided in areas such as food, clothing, financial counselling. This is a disgraceful situation, brought about by circumstances beyond the control of junior members, and it must surely be a cause of humiliation to these people, and it's a cause of embarrassment to our military leaders.

There are some intrinsically dysfunctional features in the Canadian Forces pay system. Since the introduction of the public service-linked pay scales for military personnel inequities have existed, to the detriment of the military. For example, entry-level Canadian Forces pay rates have no public service equivalent. The military member starts at a much lower pay rate than his or her civilian counterpart and never catches up.

Here I have some slides that show the comparative rates of pay. The red line is a non-commissioned member's typical profile. If you notice where that red line starts and compare it with the black line, there is a horrendous disparity; and that gap never closes. The downstream effect of this is that the military person suffers an income lag, and it has far-reaching consequences when you look at it in terms of pension.

• 2255

This one is a comparison of maritime engineers versus civilian equivalents, professional engineers, with a typical career progression over time. Again the red line, except for a couple of momentary excursions, falls below the civilian equivalent, and again the long-term effects are reflected down the road in pension benefits.

This is a comparison of military mobile equipment operators versus the local transit authority. If you look at the disparity there at the start, it is horrendous.

This so-called linking to the public service obviously has not worked and will not work. We must look at de-linking the process.

Again, to address these problems the following recommendations are offered for your consideration.

We should review the pay structure with the objective of creating a level playing field by revisiting the benchmark criteria used to establish the public service linked pay system and correct the inequities that have evolved over the years. We should consider a return to the practice used formerly by the public service of adjusting pay rates to reflect the prevailing local cost of living. Thirdly, restoring the incentive pay system in a seamless manner—that is, the incentives that were lost due to the freeze should now be compensated for by way of back pay in the amount of the accumulated loss.

In conclusion, it should be pointed out that west coast sailors, with regard to housing and pay conditions, cannot achieve the same standard of living or quality of life as their east coast colleagues. Most people do not have and cannot gain an adequate down-payment, and for those who do find it, it isn't sufficient to replace the standard of housing that they have left. Most sailors find that their income is too low to qualify for a mortgage, and their spouses must find work in order to compensate for the increased cost of living. There is a direct financial penalty imposed on sailors posted to Victoria, based on the increased cost of living, lack of employment opportunities for spouses and the high cost of accommodation.

Finally, to reinforce what the admiral said, I have a word of caution to the committee. These proceedings may have the effect of raising hopes to unrealistic levels of expectations and lead to a subsequent sense of betrayal if the perception is that nothing is being done to address the concerns that have been outlined.

Thank you, ladies and gentlemen.

The Chairman: Thank you very much, Mr. Frewen.

Are there any questions?

Mr. Bob Wood: Mr. Frewen, did you go through all your recommendations on housing? You said you weren't going to. Would you mind? I think you mentioned that you had recommendations, but you were just going to leave them.

Mr. Jerry Frewen: I have some slides, which I will table with the committee.

Mr. Bob Wood: Can we hear your recommendations so we can make a note of them?

Mr. Jerry Frewen: Yes. They will be tabled also, Mr. Wood.

The recommendations are these: extending the accommodation assistance allowance to include home buyers to offset additional interest charges on mortgages incurred by those buying in an area of high housing costs; secondly, applying the same methodology used by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Department of International Trade in the non-taxable foreign post index allowance for Canadian Forces posted within Canada, and using the same methology to derive a system that would give assistance in high-cost areas.

• 2300

Mr. David Pratt: Do you have any idea how much that would work out to?

Mr. Jerry Frewen: I was chair of a committee for many years when I was in the public service, and the blue book is published every two months. It's in constant fluctuation. It involves currency fluctuations and disruption of service for any number of reasons: famine, flood, wars, etc. It is quite a dynamic exercise to try to keep up with the changes that occur.

Third is to make the accommodation assistance allowance benefits non-taxable.

Does that answer your question, sir?

Mr. Bob Wood: Yes, thank you. The one that caught my eye was the Foreign Affairs one. What was that one again?

Mr. Jerry Frewen: That's the Department of Foreign Affairs and Department of International Trade. They have a system whereby they compensate public servants who are posted abroad. I'm looking at a similar type of system or methodology to compensate our members who are in high-cost areas in Canada.

Mr. Bob Wood: Yes, it's a good idea. I just wanted to get a little more information on it. Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you very much, Mr. Frewen.

I would now ask Mr. Kinsman to come forward.

Mr. William Kinsman (Chairman, Maritime Affairs committee, Naval Officers Association, Vancouver Island): Ladies and gentlemen, the Naval Officers Association of Vancouver Island believes that within the question of social and economic conditions in the forces and their effect on morale lies the fear that the government will again call on our troops to act in dangerous situations without the appropriate equipment. Canada's defence requirements are again in a critical state, following a series of regrettable personnel cutbacks and cancelled or deferred equipment projects, which could lead to a disastrous decline in morale and efficiency.

In February 1994 the Minister of National Defence stated:

But the reality in Canada is that over the past 30 years the defence share of federal expenditures has declined from 24% to 7%. ... Equally, one can argue that defence spending did not cause the unacceptable federal deficit.

Between 1989 and 1998 there was a total reduction of $21 billion in defence expenditures. The government now plans to reduce defence funding and manpower further.

Because of today's instability and changes occurring in all parts of the world, Canada supports the UN use of armed forces in one capacity or other; hence the need for a reasonable-size, combat-ready, well-trained defence force with fully adequate equipment. Responsible Canadians would not accept the suggestion that our participation be limited to operations that would not endanger our troops.

For this we need effective and flexible naval forces, to meet calls ranging from national and NATO or UN protection and surveillance duties, as they now do, to highly hostile deep-sea or overseas coastal operations. Such operations could involve antagonistic submarines, missiles, or aircraft, since these exist everywhere and are increasing in numbers and capability throughout the world and are sometimes in unpredictable hands.

The vital equipment area, which is not generally understood, is the need to replace the very old O class submarines. The question is asked, who needs submarines and who needs anti-submarine equipment now? It is worrying that more than 40 nations have been acquiring a total of 410 conventional submarines over recent years. Obviously those countries are very aware of the tremendous advantage and shift in balance between forces that occurs when even one submarine is entered into the picture. It is a threat to even the most powerful navies.

• 2305

For Canada the benefits of having submarines are as follows.

When used for sovereignty and surveillance patrols, they are cheaper than surface ships to man and operate. They are capable of very long and concealed patrols without refuelling and, because of their very effective long-range sonar, can cover large areas and greatly assist ships and maritime patrol aircraft operations. They can conduct both submarine and anti-submarine operations and covert surveillance duties in typical UN types of activities, especially in coastal waters where friendly nuclear submarines may not be as effective. The fact that submarines exist, even if they may not actually be in the area, will always be regarded as a threat by a possible foe.

They are essential for AS, anti-submarine, warfare training for Canadian, U.S. and U.K. forces, who need to train against conventional submarines, which can be more difficult to detect than nuclear submarines. The provision by Canada of anti-conventional submarine training to the RN and the USN, who do not have such submarines, could provide a beneficial payback in other fields.

If we lost our submarine capability and know-how, we could never replace them in time when the need arises. Furthermore, as non-nuclear, under-ice submarine propulsion becomes available, we would have lost any ability to conduct arctic sovereignty surveillance and research by submarine.

Our navy must have the capability both to use this submarine flexibility and also to oppose submarines in any kind of maritime operation, large or small. We urge the government to snap up the highly beneficial opportunity of acquiring four Upholders from the U.K.

Turning now to helicopters, it took 15 years to design and build 12 Canadian patrol frigates. It had been planned that their capability in any of their foreseen roles would be increased tenfold by the addition of the EH-101 helicopter, which was the only helicopter with the design capabilities to meet the operational requirements. These are excellent ships. They must be given that essential, over-the-horizon capability which a high-performance helicopter can give them. In any operation the ships may be called upon to undertake, whether it is involved in aerial surveillance or anti-missile or anti-submarine protection of other forces, new, suitable helicopters to replace the Sea Kings must be acquired as soon as possible.

My destroyer experiences in the Battle of the Atlantic and later in wartime submarines taught me the tremendous effect that submarines can have in any campaign. Today they're even more effective and very versatile. Believe me, if you personally were in a ship where there was a possibility of even one hostile submarine being in your area, you would be praying that your escort had an effective anti-submarine capability.

The Canadians who proudly serve their country in the forces deserve fair recognition and treatment. Unlike their civilian contemporaries, they've offered their lives for Canada. We owe it to them to make sure that their service conditions are right and that they have the right equipment to carry out any operations called for by the government on our behalf.

Mr. Chairman, I thank you and your committee for your patience. We urge you to give our recommendations your most careful considerations as Canadians, not as political party members. Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you very much, Mr. Kinsman.

Mr. Hanger.

Mr. Art Hanger: Mr. Kinsman, I have a question in reference to a comment you made to do with sovereignty. You tied equipment and morale... My note here says “morale versus equipment”, but from your comments there you're saying equipment and morale go hand in hand. You need the good equipment, you need to be able to function well, and with that operational capability your morale is also enhanced.

• 2310

Back on sovereignty, we were up in Yellowknife two days ago and we spoke with the commanding officer at the base up there. There's a major concern over the islands in the northern part of Canada—not having enough of a presence up there. Would submarines really enhance our presence up there, under the ice pack? If the newer Upholder class—I think that's the British type—were to be used, would they in fact be able to accommodate our navy in a sufficiently good way?

Mr. William Kinsman: The Upholders could not operate under the ice pack. But as you know, a company in Vancouver called Ballard is working on fuel cells and air-independent propulsion, which could be installed in Upholders in due course of time and which would give them an under-ice capability. But I wasn't shooting for that right now. I'm just telling you that's an opportunity.

Mr. Art Hanger: Is our sovereignty in jeopardy?

Mr. William Kinsman: Any time you don't let people know you're looking after your own interests, someone will come and look after them for you. At the moment the United States Navy is sending nuclear submarines up into our waters in the Arctic and we have no control and no knowledge. They don't even tell us. If we get out of the submarine business they will tell us even less. The USN submarine service doesn't even tell its own navy what it's doing. It's a very secret service. They go up there and do all kinds of things. We have no way of knowing whether they are there. At one time there was talk of putting down acoustic cables to listen to them; but then you had no way of coping with them if you found them.

Until we get an under-ice capability, our sovereignty up there is bound to be in doubt.

The Chairman: Mr. Pratt.

Mr. David Pratt: Mr. Kinsman, I must say I personally agree with you about the need for the submarines and the ship-borne helicopters and some of the other projects that have been held in abeyance for the last number of years, but that doesn't solve the political problem that exists. We have over 300 members of Parliament, and not all of them are sitting around this table tonight, able to hear your comments and the comments of the people who are here tonight. How would you suggest we begin to try to sell the case, not just for improvements in the pay and benefits of members of the Canadian forces but for the need to provide them with the equipment that's absolutely vital to do the job?

Mr. William Kinsman: I wish I could answer your question, sir, because I have been involved with the Defence Associations National Network, of which Admiral Thomas is president. We publish a newsletter, which goes to all members of Parliament and the media. We write letters to the editor continually. I must say locally we're getting some support from national defence columnists, but on this coast we've found the Globe and Mail to be a solid rock barrier. We can't get anything published by the Globe and Mail. We try to get people who are ex-service to write and lobby in any way we can, but I wish you could tell me what the answer was.

Mr. David Pratt: Do you see any change in the public mood even over the last month? People I know in my area... We were very seriously affected by the ice storm. Half of my riding was out of power for over a week. It seems ironic, but over the past year or so the stock of the armed forces has gone up tremendously in relation to things they are not trained to do.

Mr. William Kinsman: That's right.

Mr. David Pratt: I can tell you that in my own community people were lining the streets as the Royal Canadian Dragoons left town after their work was finished. It was an incredible sight to see.

• 2315

I guess that's what I'm getting at. How do we capture that appreciation that exists out there and turn the tide in terms of public opinion and the need to do the things that are necessary?

Mr. William Kinsman: I agree with you. There certainly has been tremendous support for the forces as a result of the floods and the frozen affair in Quebec and Ontario. The Canadian public is like that. It welcomes help, and there are very good social things happening within the communities, which no one thought would happen before. But unfortunately when you say “submarines”...that's an ugly word. In the minds of the older people it refers to World War II, and for the younger people it's the Cold War, and to the very young people it means nothing.

If you say you want to buy a submarine, people ask why you need submarines. They can't visualize what happened before World War I and what happened before World War II. Suddenly we're at war. I'm just suggesting that somebody should be educating our school children about what happened before World War II and our being unprepared. I was told that in Ontario you can't get history before 1945 in high schools. Is that right? I'm told it is.

Mr. David Pratt: You may have put your finger on part of the problem.

Mr. William Kinsman: These people don't know what can happen. They are very much involved with their daily lives and technology and the Internet; everybody's excited about that. But there are a few people who'll endeavour to tell the world and Canada what could happen and how we should be prepared for it, and our small group is one of those groups.

Thank you.

Mr. David Pratt: Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you very much, Mr. Kinsman.

Martine Brisson, please.

[Translation]

Ms. Martine Brisson (President, Board of Directors, Resource Centre for Military Families): My name is Martine Brisson.

[English]

I am with the MFRC, which is the Military Family Resource Centre. I am chair of the board of directors and also a spouse of a member of the armed forces. I have lived in a number of places in Canada and abroad. In each location I was involved with the military community and heard about the hardships faced by military families.

One hardship that stands out is the financial pressure on our military families during long periods of separation from our spouses, far from our extended families. Frequent moves often mean negative impacts on family income. The life of a military family is hard enough without the added burden of constant financial problems.

One of the feelings communities express to the Military Family Resource Centre board is that military families are not well supported financially. During these short five minutes, I will touch on cost of living compensation for moves and the increase on the public service health care plan.

As you are well aware, armed forces personnel are paid the same regardless of where we serve in the country. We are not compensated when we are transferred to areas such as the west coast, where the cost of living is notoriously higher than it is in other parts of Canada.

Most Canadian families nowadays are dual-income families. This is almost impossible for military families since our lives are disrupted by frequent moves, making it difficult for spouses to have careers. If at a particular location a spouse is lucky enough to find employment, once transferred here, she or he finds herself or himself unemployed. This, added to a higher cost of living, heightens the financial burden.

We realize that families who are renting are entitled to the accommodation assistance allowance. We strongly feel that an equitable cost of living allowance available to all would be better and would stabilize the quality of life of our families. This cost of living allowance could be more effective than the accommodation assistance allowance and should not discriminate between renters and homeowners.

On the topic of home ownership, the average price in Victoria for a two-bedroom condo is $150,000. For an average house it is $248,000. When we are transferred, we hope to sell our homes quickly and without a loss. Unfortunately, in some markets a loss can be inevitable, especially in a condo here in Victoria.

• 2320

As it stands now, we have to lose 10% before we can be compensated for our loss. In Victoria this means a loss of $24,800. But if we lose only $24,700, there is no compensation. A $24,000 loss of equity is a loss that few people can afford, especially when it's through no fault of our own. We are moving because our government needs us somewhere else.

Another quality of life issue is that as of a year ago, the public service health care plan increased the annual deductible for family coverage from $40 to $100—an increase of 150% at a time when pay has been frozen for a number of years. This has had a negative effect on our disposable income. At the same time, our dental coverage changed routine dental examinations to every nine months from every six months, making us feel like second-class citizens.

In closing, I'd like to reiterate points for your consideration: we would like to see the implementation of a cost of living allowance; we would like to see better relocation benefits; and also, if there are to be any increases in our medical and dental plans, they should be more reasonable, more in line with the cost of living index and also with our pay.

I would like to thank you for taking the time to listen to our concerns. We hope for positive results from this consultation.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

We have a couple of people who want to ask questions.

[Translation]

Mrs. Venne, if you please.

Ms. Pierrette Venne: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Allow me to make an aside: I don't know if this has anything to do with cuts to the National Defence budget, but we are freezing in here.

[English]

Mr. Chair, I don't know if it is a result of the reduction in the national defence budget, but we are freezing here, so I hope that tomorrow morning it will be warmer.

[Translation]

Madam, we know that financial problems often lead to other problems such as family violence, alcoholism and the use of drugs. Have you noted such problems and if you have, to what extent are they present? You did not mention them.

Ms. Martine Brisson: Since I only had five minutes, we decided not to discuss them. We will, however, be giving you a written brief.

We did indeed note an increase due to financial problems. We retained the services of a social worker who offers counselling, and also provided a financial adviser. We noted a marked increase in the requests for counselling from those two specialists. This is a side effect of the financial problems military families are experiencing.

Ms. Pierrette Venne: What size of an increase are we talking about here?

Ms. Martine Brisson: I could not give you an exact figure, but I know that they are very busy.

Ms. Pierrette Venne: Thank you.

[English]

The Chairman: Mr. Hanger.

Mr. Art Hanger: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

• 2325

Ms. Brisson, would you mind telling this committee what kind of situation you face in your daily, weekly, monthly routine? You're the spouse of an armed forces member. Do you work at another job?

Ms. Martine Brisson: Currently I'm one of the lucky few, yes, who could find employment in Victoria.

One of our problems is that when we move every two, three, or five years it's difficult to keep up a career. We have to be either under-employed or unemployed. The cost of child care is also involved. The fact that Victoria is more of a service-based economy means most of the employment available here in Victoria is at low wages. That means if you have two children you have to have child care for, it's not feasible to work, because of the child care costs versus your pay.

Also, career-wise you have to be under-employed, because people say you're going to be here, what, two years, three years; we don't really need you; we want somebody who can stay for a long time. So it's rather difficult to find employment from one place to the next as a military spouse. They see you coming as such.

Mr. Art Hanger: Do you live in government housing or do you live in your own accommodations, rented or bought?

Ms. Martine Brisson: We bought.

Mr. Art Hanger: You bought a house.

Ms. Martine Brisson: Yes. We took a chance, especially here in Victoria. I work for Canada Mortgage and Housing, so the numbers I've quoted are real numbers from our market analysis. Since 1994 the market in Victoria has gone down, notoriously down. We know for the majority of people, if they have to leave tomorrow, they will lose a significant amount of money. Because of that famous 10% loss, if you lose only 9.7%, you're not compensated, and if that happens with two or three or four postings we don't have any equity left in our homes.

For civil servants, it's nicer in Ottawa. You buy a house and you stay there for most of your life. For us, we have to buy every three, four, or five years. We cannot afford to lose each time we move.

Mr. Art Hanger: Can an ordinary seaman's spouse make ends meet on that wage, with the rental they have to pay here?

[Editor's Note: Laughter from the audience]

Mr. David Pratt: I think you have your answer there, Art.

Ms. Martine Brisson: I also work as a labour companion. The families I've followed, families of ordinary seamen, cannot make ends meet here in Victoria, even living in military quarters.

Mr. Art Hanger: Okay. I want them to tell me that, and tell us. I'm aware some of these very questions were asked earlier, but I think it's important for us to hear it from the general crowd gathered here today. It's an important question.

Now, I understand rental is somewhere in the neighbourhood of $900 a month—

Ms. Martine Brisson: If you're lucky.

Mr. Art Hanger: —if you're lucky, and I believe that is for government accommodations, military accommodations. Is that basically the fee that is charged?

Ms. Martine Brisson: Military accommodations are supposed to be in line with civilian accommodations. That's why they have been going up. But it's not the same with our rate of pay. People may have owned their own home in Moose Jaw or Trenton, but when they move here they find they cannot buy in this market in Victoria. Also, their rent here is higher than their mortgage payments were at their previous base. That makes for a lot of hardship for people. They have almost no disposable income left after paying rent.

Mr. Art Hanger: Right. It appears generally from the comments made that on the west coast, and especially in this particular area, the situation is quite grave, but even in some of the smaller centres in other parts of the country the situation is tenuous for a lot of people. One emergency in that household and suddenly they are on their credit card to meet the expenses for that month, or there's a trip to the food bank to supplement the food.

• 2330

Ms. Martine Brisson: That happens to members of the armed forces. We have people going to food banks, yes.

Mr. Art Hanger: Another question I asked one of the DND persons, one of the military officers...

Ms. Martine Brisson: I just want to point out one thing. Maybe in a small community, when they have an emergency, they have to go to their credit card. The difference here in Victoria is that the spouse might be deployed on a ship somewhere and his spouse is alone here to fend for herself on top of that.

Mr. Art Hanger: Yes, it is different. Agreed.

It came to my attention that many of the soldiers in particular had to buy equipment for their job because a lot of the issued equipment was not suitable. Is that happening with navy personnel as well?

Ms. Martine Brisson: I'm not aware of that. I'm here to represent military families, not the members who buy their own equipment.

Mr. Art Hanger: I can appreciate that. What I'm getting at when I ask that question is this. If a soldier has to go out and buy his boots, for instance, or some other piece of equipment, those are dollars taken away from what's going to go to that family. I know this to be a fact. It was even admitted by the chief of staff, land forces.

The same question I am asking is if the equipment for the navy personnel is insufficient or incomplete, you're looking at dollars coming out of the pockets of the family. There's no reimbursement for it. Do you know if that is the case?

Ms. Martine Brisson: I'm not aware of it.

Mr. Art Hanger: Thank you.

The Chairman: Mrs. Longfield.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: I want to thank you and the other presenters for your very frank and candid approach. We appreciate it. I can tell you that the impact of seeing you sitting here, listening to you, facing you, looking at you eyeball to eyeball is very significant, and it's certainly having an impact on my views.

We haven't heard much about children in this situation. I'm concerned specifically about the difficulty for parents trying to transfer children from one school system to another, often mid-year. As a former educator I know it's always very difficult for children to adjust, and your children are having to adjust far more frequently than others.

I have two questions. One, is there any support in terms of guidance? I know it's not available in the schools, particularly because there'd be small numbers coming at any one time, but is there guidance within the military to help children get over some of those problems associated with moving and readjusting?

Ms. Martine Brisson: Yes, we have some programs, especially here in Victoria for deployment, when the father or mother is deployed for three, four, five, or six months. We have programs for different age groups to help them cope.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: That's coping with the social structure inside the home. I'm wondering if there are any to help them cope with the actual curriculum disruptions they would be experiencing.

Ms. Martine Brisson: No.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: Further, I would think there are many occasions when the spouse does not transfer at the same time because of their desire to see a child finish a year in a particular school with their friends. Is there any assistance at this particular time for maintaining two residences?

Ms. Martine Brisson: Yes, there is. That's something that happens quite often. A member will be going on his or her own while the family stays behind, for financial or other reasons. Yes, there is some compensation. I'm not quite sure how much from the military, but there is a little bit.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: Is it for an extended period of time? Is it just for that school year, or could it extend for a year or two in a case where a child is ready to perhaps graduate from that particular level?

• 2335

Ms. Martine Brisson: It's when the spouse moves on his own and leaves the family behind.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: No, I understand that, but you don't know how long.

Ms. Martine Brisson: No. That's more a military policy issue. I know there is some help, I think, for the duration of the transfer.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: Thank you.

The Chairman: Mr. Pratt, I believe you had a question.

Mr. David Pratt: Thank you, Mr. Chair.

The general rule of thumb for most people in terms of the amount of their income they spend on accommodation is roughly around 30%—for most people in the civilian world at least. Has the family resource centre tabulated any figures or calculated roughly how much of their income is being spent on accommodation?

Ms. Martine Brisson: Not for rent, no.

Mr. David Pratt: Just another quick question. In terms of the level of maintenance of the PMQs and...

[Translation]

Ms. Martine Brisson: People are not satisfied with the way in which the discussion is conducted.

[English]

They're not satisfied with the maintenance for the PMQs. There are lots of complaints. They find them impossible to heat.

Mr. David Pratt: Impossible to heat. The insulation standards are not what they should be.

Ms. Martine Brisson: Yes. They're old, small. They're very dissatisfied with the military quarters.

Mr. David Pratt: So we're not maintaining the houses as well as we seem to be maintaining the ships.

Ms. Martine Brisson: Well...

Voices: Hear, hear!

The Chairman: Okay. Mr. Wood.

Mr. Bob Wood: I have just one quick question. We heard a rather heart-wrenching story today about single parents on ships. What kind of support do the human resource centres give single parents who find themselves in this situation? Are there a number of single parents?

Ms. Martine Brisson: Yes, there are. Especially nowadays there are more and more of them. Unfortunately, the resource centre can only give short-term help if an emergency happens. If somebody is going for a six-month deployment, we'll help them a little bit, but we're more for short-term emergency. If something happens and they have to go tomorrow, we'll help them.

Mr. Bob Wood: Is there any other place where they can go for help?

Ms. Martine Brisson: There are different civilian agencies and we have a number of social workers that will help them.

Mr. Bob Wood: But nothing that the armed forces has to help single parents that are on ships.

Ms. Martine Brisson: No.

Mr. Bob Wood: They have to fend for themselves, get their nanny, do the whole thing.

Ms. Martine Brisson: Yes.

Mr. Bob Wood: You don't get involved. Don't you think you should? Is it a matter of resources?

Ms. Martine Brisson: It's a matter of resources. We're a young organization. The family resource centre is just starting. We're a young organization and we're trying to get involved with as many things as possible. We are currently underfunded. Next year it should be resolved. We're trying very hard to get involved in every area that needs our attention. Child care is one of them.

The Chairman: Thank you very much for your presentation.

Voices: Hear, hear!

The Chairman: I would now ask for Mr. D. Provost, please.

Mr. Doug Provost (Vice-President, Toronto-Dominion Bank Financial Group): Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, good evening. My name is Doug Provost. I am vice-president of the Toronto-Dominion Bank Financial Group, or TD Bank Financial Group.

I'm here tonight to share with you some of our observations as a financial institution in dealing with military personnel. I thought I'd cover two basic topics, housing being the first and personal financial management being the second.

• 2340

Firstly, with respect to housing, without question the cost of housing in Victoria is the major issue that we hear about at all levels of military personnel. The majority who transfer in from other bases to Victoria find it very difficult to make ends meet here in our city due to our cost of housing. Rarely do we see mortgage requests from the junior ranks, mostly non-commissioned officers and up, and they often require help from their parents, even in this low interest rate environment we are now in.

Often we hear of long waits for military personnel to get into the PMQs—the military quarters. I understand it is a little better now, but I don't have any confirmation of that. However, when it does occur, it causes added financial strain. We've even seen potential downpayments eroded while these people are having to rent in the open market.

We almost always hear of real frustration from new home buyers that they will lose the accommodation assistance allowance, the triple A, which you've heard of already tonight, when they buy a home. Clearly, this is viewed as a disincentive to buy. In the past, we've heard of and seen personnel who could afford to buy but chose to stay in PMQs, as they saw no incentive to try to buy their own home. I believe this is probably compounded by the waiting period to get into the PMQs. And I understand the maximum period someone can stay in a PMQ has been limited.

I suggest that consideration be given, which has already been mentioned tonight, that the triple A be made available to homeowners to encourage home ownership among our military personnel.

With respect to personal finances, generally our observations will be surrounding those of the junior and middle ranks. Some of them follow.

The general attitude seems to be a heavy reliance on pension, hence a lack of financial focus and planning. A big issue is the family being able to manage finances, and of course the household when sailors are at sea, which was mentioned earlier. Among the junior ranks, we rarely see savings plans or RSPs in place. Very often we see minimal or even negative net worth and people who are truly under financial pressure.

Loan requests that we do see in the junior ranks are most often for cars, motorcycles, or first-time items like stereos and computers. Unfortunately, many times it's debt consolidation loans they're looking for.

The knowledge level on RSPs and retirement planning is seen as being generally low. This includes individuals who have just received or are about to receive separation or retirement packages.

We often see credit card accounts with balances that have run 60 to 90 days or more in arrears. Of course we all know that does many things to an individual, but it also tarnishes their credit rating. New and often single junior ranks tend not to save, which is unfortunate, as this is often a great window of opportunity for them to do just that.

As a suggestion with respect to financial management, I think consideration should be given to a financial management and planning program to be established and provided to all military personnel, or at the very least the junior ranks. This should be an at-work program to ensure attendance and should include sigificant others, spouses, etc., because we heard what happens to the families when the members are at sea.

Once the program has run its course, then it could be altered to new recruits, so that as people are coming into the military they're getting appropriate financial training.

• 2345

What I'm really talking about is rather than having to increase resources over the long term to help people with major financial problems, provide training with a view to avoiding or at least reducing financial problems—positive and proactive support versus reactive.

Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you very much for your presentation, sir.

Now could we have Chief Petty Officer Wilmot please come to the front.

Chief Petty Officer Wilmot (Base Financial Counsellor): Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen, I am Chief Petty Officer Wilmot. For the past 12 months I've been employed as the base financial counsellor. In that time I have interviewed or counselled approximately 325 military members experiencing some degree of financial difficulty. These interviews will generally fall into two categories: preventative, approximately 200 cases, or remedial, about 125 cases.

Preventative counselling is used in cases where there are small but pressing debts, typically income tax arrears, overpayment on claims, vehicle repairs and such. More often than not a small loan from the Canadian Forces personnel assistance fund can clear up this debt, leaving the member with a low-interest loan and a manageable repayment schedule.

Remedial counselling is reserved for the more severe cases. These generally involve considerable accumulated debt. The reasons for these debts are about as numerous as my clients; however, they generally boil down to abuse of credit. No doubt six years of no or minuscule pay raises are a contributing factor.

For the more senior people who seek my assistance, their debts are usually a result of a perceived requirement to have all those material things that we need now. Consequently, they have a number of charge accounts. The combined costs for servicing the accounts inevitably exceed their ability to pay.

Divorce has caused considerable debt as well. On average, I have seen two cases per month. Many of these cases involve court-ordered child support payments. Although this is necessary, and generally speaking the costs that are awarded are in line with the Department of Justice federal child support guidelines, problems do arise when a military member willingly or otherwise assumes full responsibility for the family debts or becomes the victim of a vindictive former spouse. Depending on the circumstances of such cases, the individuals can apply through the Canadian Forces personnel assistance fund for distress assistance. Other recommendations for these cases range from bank loans, consolidation loans, to orderly payment of debt programs sponsored by provincial governments.

As for the more junior members, there seem to be two recurring problems. Number one, young people are being enrolled into the armed forces and bringing with them considerable financial baggage, generally in the form of student loans. I've seen cases up to $10,000 to $12,000. Many of these loans have gone to collection before the ordinary seaman has sought assistance or been referred for assistance or advice.

The other situation is ordinary seamen with three or more dependants trying to cope on an ordinary seaman's pay. In the past year I've counselled six ordinary seamen who collectively have 21 children. Two of these ordinary seamen are single parents and they're in seagoing trades. According to Stats Canada, these families are living below the poverty line for a city population of 100,000 to 500,000 people. And they will continue to live below the poverty line until the sole wage earner attains the rank of leading seaman, usually in four years.

These problems are compounded by the higher-than-average cost of living here in Victoria. To date, four distress loan applications have been submitted on behalf of ordinary seamen. Only one has been accepted as presented. Another was given a grant of a lesser amount. The third was rejected, and the fourth is still under consideration.

• 2350

Although this assistance helps in specific cases, it is not the solution to the greater problem, nor is it the purpose of the Canadian Forces personnel assistance fund. We must pay our junior ranks a wage that allows them to support their families, or we must be more selective in our recruiting. Our recruits' marital and familial status should be taken into account when assigning trades.

One other area of concern to me is the En Route cards. A few years ago it was determined that issuing En Route cards would streamline and be more cost-effective in dealing with claims for people travelling on temporary duty. I should clarify also that these En Route cards are to be used only for duty travel. However, in the last six months I've seen at least 25 requests for small loans to reduce debts that include an outstanding balance to the En Route. Ordinary seamen make up only part of these numbers; the majority of requests come from leading seamen and above.

Interviews with ordinary seamen indicate that with the current base policy, both here and at recruit school at St. Jean, these cards are issued routinely, regardless of the actual need.

This problem is presently being addressed at all levels of command. Any change or replacement of this card must come with some control over its issue. At very minimum, a proof of actual requirement to use the card should be demonstrated.

Thank you for your time, sirs and madam.

The Chairman: Thank you very much, sir.

Our first person to ask a question is Judy.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: Thank you.

Does the Canadian Forces personnel assistance fund have a maximum?

Chief Petty Officer Wilmot: Yes, it does, ma'am. There are four types of assistance through the Canadian Forces personnel fund, or CFPAF for short. The self-improvement loan, which is the most popular, has a ceiling of $4,000, and there are certain conditions that have to be met to receive that amount.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: And what's the repayment schedule? Is it variable? What's the interest rate?

Chief Petty Officer Wilmot: The interest rate is 3%. Loans of $2,000 or less must be paid back within a year, and for those up to $4,000 it can be over two years.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: You indicated that was just one type. What would the others be?

Chief Petty Officer Wilmot: The other type is the distress fund. Again, very stringent conditions have to be met in order to qualify for that. The fact that a military person has ten credit cards and runs them all to the limit does not qualify for distress. That fund can go up to a maximum of $15,000 at zero percent interest.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: I'm sorry, what was the amount?

Chief Petty Officer Wilmot: It is $15,000, at zero percent interest. Along with that, they may qualify also for an outright grant of $5,000. It's a committee in Ottawa that determines these amounts.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: That was my next question.

Have you had anyone reapply for a distress loan? I mean, they have received one and then come back looking for a second assistance.

Chief Petty Officer Wilmot: It is not normally done. As I said, I've only been in the job a year, and yes, I have one case, an ordinary seaman.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: Thank you.

The Chairman: Mr. Hanger.

Mr. Art Hanger: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Sir, I—

Chief Petty Officer Wilmot: Chief, please.

Mr. Art Hanger: Chief. I'm aware that there's been a drastic cut in the support level fund, if you will, for military personnel that was scheduled at $13 million and now sits at $6 million.

Chief Petty Officer Wilmot: Sir, I don't involve myself with that.

Mr. Art Hanger: You're not aware of this particular—

Chief Petty Officer Wilmot: Yes, sir, I'm very aware of it, but that's not my field.

Mr. Art Hanger: That's not your field. What is this field we're talking about here, this cutback?

• 2355

Chief Petty Officer Wilmot: I have no cutback in my budget, sir. I am the base financial counsellor. I counsel military members and their spouses, if they so wish, on debt, budgeting, personal finances. My budget doesn't come out of the $13 million, sir.

Mr. Art Hanger: So who administers this fund, this money?

Chief Petty Officer Wilmot: The politicians and NDHQ.

Mr. Art Hanger: They can't. It has to go through someone, I would suggest, on a local level here.

Chief Petty Officer Wilmot: It would be the admiral then, sir, not a lowly chief such as I.

Mr. Art Hanger: You're not aware of how this particular money then—

Chief Petty Officer Wilmot: No, sir.

Mr. Art Hanger: I'm going to ask you this question, then, because this kind of bothered me when I heard of the cutback way back when, approximately four months ago. It's a support level fund to assist military families. It went from $13 million to $6 million. Now, who does the evaluation on a local level if you don't?

Chief Petty Officer Wilmot: I'm not certain of that fund, sir. The fund that I administer, the Canadian Forces self-improvement loan, is military money, military people's own money. It started way back in World War II with the army benevolent funds and it's carried on today. It's non-public funds. That is the military members' own money. It's not public. I have no idea what that budget is about, sir.

Mr. Art Hanger: Okay. Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you very much, Mr. Hanger.

Chief Petty Officer, could you tell me what the En Route cards were used for again?

Chief Petty Officer Wilmot: Yes, sir. Prior to their introduction, when a military member went from Victoria to Halifax on course or temporary duty, there were travel costs and general costs incurred. We used to get an advance on that, go on our course, come back to Victoria, go back to the pay office, settle it up. If there was money owing to us it would come, and if there was money that we owed to the crown, it would have to be paid back.

To streamline the thing, the decision was made at NDHQ to go to En Route credit cards, sponsored by Diners Club. The thinking behind it allowed the military person to use this credit card, incur his travel costs, his temporary duty costs, come back, settle up his claim and then pay En Route. There would be zero percent interest on it.

The stipulation was that it was to be used only in accordance with Treasury Board directives. But the person signing for the card is responsible for it, so who is to say he can't use it or won't use it for personal purchases? The bottom line is it must be paid in full by the due date. Some people, especially some ordinary seamen, take cash advances on their En Route card just to live. As I said, the ordinary seaman with one dependant in Victoria is living below the poverty line. You get an ordinary seaman with a wife and three or four children and his predicament is that much more grave.

The Chairman: I may not have been listening a while ago, but could you tell me if this practice is still being done?

Chief Petty Officer Wilmot: As I said, sir, it's being handled at all levels of command. My understanding is that it's being replaced and more stringent guidelines placed on the use of the replacement card.

The Chairman: But it's still in effect now?

Chief Petty Officer Wilmot: It is, sir.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Go ahead, John.

Mr. John Richardson: I appreciate the insight to some of the problems you face being in the west and having to communicate sea to sea completely if you're going to take courses in Halifax. I understand that there have been some adjustments made on the base to try to have some of the courses run here at the base to save money and time away from home by the members here. It seems to me it's a wise move. I think the people who are running the base should try to leverage that. I understand though that some courses require enough personnel to load them; because they're so specialized they may have to be run either here or in Halifax.

• 0000

There's no doubt that there is hurt here, very serious hurt. There is a need to take the message back that although there have been a few wage adjustments—they said they were frozen for five years, but there have been some small wage adjustments along the line, although certainly not enough to meet the needs we're hearing here in this forum.

There cannot be a happy camper nor a happy family when there's always pressure to meet ends with budgets, to make a career and work hard and see no progress, whether it be material or spiritual. I don't mean spiritual in a religious way but in your own way about feeling good about yourself.

I think the message we got tonight, starting with Admiral Thomas down to yourself, was a strong message. We will be reporting such back to our full committee in the House of Commons. I hope we have the impact and the support down the line to follow through on this. It will not be quick, but we do hope it will be quicker than it has been in the past.

Thank you very much.

The Chairman: Thank you very much, Chief.

Voices: Hear, hear!

The Chairman: Mr. Pratt.

Mr. David Pratt: I have a quick question. One of the things we heard today from some of the people we talked to was that their financial woes were beginning to interfere with the performance of their jobs. Do you have people talking about that in terms of saying “I'm so worried about what's happening back home, I'm not able to concentrate like I used to on my job”?

Chief Petty Officer Wilmot: Some of my clients are referred to me by their divisional chief commanding officer because the debt situation or other factors in their personal life have started to affect their work habits and stuff like that. I guess we're all too proud to admit that we have financial problems. It's like I said in my presentation, sir: an ordinary seaman living in Victoria lives below the poverty line, and he can't expect to be above it until he's a leading seaman—or she, as there are some of those.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

I notice that on our list we have one more witness. I would suggest that we listen to Colonel White and then take a 15-minute coffee break and then we can come back and throw it open to the floor.

Colonel White, please.

Colonel (Retired) William White (Commander, 39 Canadian Brigade Group): Mr. Chairman, members of the standing committee, I'd like to thank you for the opportunity to speak to you on what I consider to be an essential issue confronting the army today, and that is the well-being of our soldiers.

I'm the commander of 39 Canadian Brigade Group, and I'm here to speak on behalf of both regular and reserve soldiers within British Columbia. This includes the units in the interior, the lower mainland, and Vancouver Island, in total more than 1,200 strong and growing.

I thoroughly reviewed the submissions to your standing committee, starting with the chief of defence staff, the chief of reserves and cadets, and the commander of the army. The predominant themes throughout these presentations are bang on: first, to acknowledge the commitment and work ethic required of the Canadian soldier and the fact that it is unique in the Canadian workplace, there must be an acknowledgement that soldiers want and expect to be properly compensated for their efforts and sacrifices; second, soldiers want the tools to do the job asked of them; third, soldiers want recognition and understanding from their employer, and for reservists this will have to include their civilian employer; finally, soldiers are looking for a reasonable quality of life for themselves and their families.

• 0005

I support fully the points made in previous submissions. However, I am here today to speak to you about those issues that have been specifically brought to my attention by the units in my brigade. A key concern, which affects all the issues, is the constant pursuit of minimum service standards. Whether it concerns support to the soldier, the delivery of goods, or the provision of alternate service delivery, the troops have come to expect a minimum standard and the lowest bidder. For example, soldiers in Vancouver go to an industrial complex in Richmond for their glasses because the lowest bidder met the minimum standard.

The chain of command supports the concept of quality of life, but it must be also recognized that in the current climate of financial emergency, clawbacks, and reduced budgets, quality of life issues are the first to be adversely affected. To be specific, there are three areas of concern. On delivery of pay and services, the Chief of the Defence Staff and the commander of the army have emphasized the unique commitment of the solider and the relative comparison to the public service employee to whom she or he has been benchmarked. The forces have not had a significant pay raise in more years than we can remember. This most significant quality of life issue is well known. For years we've heard that the economy is in trouble and that all Canadians are hurting. Today the economy is in much better shape, but the soldier is still hurting.

The commander of maritime staff outlined the major inconsistencies associated with finding adequate affordable accommodation on the west coast compared to other military postings. We need a comprehensive benefits package, which would include an increase in accommodation assistance allowance, a cost of living allowance for homeowners faced with large mortgages, and a freeze on Canadian Forces housing authority rates. Canadian Forces housing authority rates must reflect a national standard and not the cost of local real estate.

These pay and benefit packages must be accompanied by a steamlined, efficient delivery system. Recent implementation of the revised pay system for the reserves isn't working. The revised pay system for the reserves has seen only 291 of 1,200 soldiers being paid through this system and the remainder being paid by a means of contingency and local payments. The pay system for the reserves is causing anxiety and a considerable administrative workload. National systems must be tested and debugged prior to implementation.

Now to recruiting and retention. The first step in a soldier's career is the recruiting process. Centralized recruiting for the primary reserves has led to a large, unresponsive machine, in which the individual is lost. Very recent cuts in both attraction funding and recruitment personnel are affecting our ability to convince Canadians—especially young Canadians—to join and actually enrol in the reserves.

The next challenge is to retain the soldier. Unsatisfied reserve soldiers vote with their feet. They simply stop parading. The primary causes of dissatisfaction are poor equipment and clothing and the inability of our training system to offer career courses with sufficient vacancies during predictable timeframes when the reservist is available. For these reasons, our attrition rate is too high.

Perhaps the most significant issue of dissatisfaction for the soldier is the shortage of clothing and equipment. Simply put, soldiers want the tools to do the job. The recent shortage of equipment as basic as combat clothing, including rucksacks and wet gear, has caused great difficulty in the reserves' ability to train effectively.

The lack of operational equipment is equally disturbing. An armoured unit, for instance, which should have Cougars at unit level, may only have the Iltis, a jeep-type vehicle, on which to train. You may recall that the Bison, an armoured personnel carrier, was purchased as a reserve training vehicle. The reserves haven't got any.

• 0010

There was a time when our doctrine dictated that soldiers should train with the same equipment they would use to conduct operations. It's time to return to that doctrine.

Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen, there are many dimensions to the quality of life and many more issues than I've had time to cover tonight. But the issues I've raised are the most important ones, and certainly in support of those who have briefed you previously. My contribution has been to focus on the concerns of soldiers of 39 Brigade in British Columbia. I suspect that I've been somewhat blunter than some in describing quality of life shortfalls. To be even blunter, what we have so far are action plans rather than action.

I'll conclude with the reality from the armoury floor that the most significant quality of life shortfalls are poor and inconsistent pay, inadequate equipment, and the mechanisms required to recruit and retain young Canadians.

Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen, thank you for your attention.

The Chairman: Thank you very much, Colonel.

Ms. Longfield.

Mrs. Judi Longfield: Colonel, you started your presentation with articulating the items that soldiers want. I'm hoping we get a copy of your written submission.

With your permission, sir, I would like to substitute in each of those cases of “what soldiers want” with “what soldiers deserve”. I think that if we as members of the committee reach that mindset and then are prepared to make those kinds of recommendations to our government and then have the fortitude and the will to stand behind those recommendations and to work, we might actually achieve some results. I am certainly going to approach it from that perspective, and I think it's probably fair to say the other members of the committee will as well.

I thank you for your presentation. As I said before, seeing you and the others face to face has made a tremendous impact.

Colonel William White: Thank you.

The Chairman: Mr. Hanger.

Mr. Art Hanger: Colonel, I have several families in my riding that have youngsters in the reserves. Some of the complaints they have are that they have to buy some of their own equipment, clothing in particular; that their pay cheques are never on time, which in fact is quite a frequent comment that I've heard; and that the organization, when it comes to some operational event they may attend, is not very well organized and it seems like everyone is trying to piece things together. As a result, a couple of the families have advised me that their youngsters aren't going to remain in there. They're just not happy with the attention, the equipment, and this constant uncertainty. Does that describe all of the reserves?

Colonel William White: I don't think it does describe us all. I would say that units in my brigade are relatively well organized in terms of their training. We do follow battle procedure when on exercise. So I'm not aware of that situation.

With respect to the purchase of equipment, there's no question that a number of years ago, when we had rain gear that leaked, in fact we found that the American rain gear worked better. Therefore soldiers bought those and were wearing those. There has been a recent change in the quality of rain gear that we have and in fact that situation is improving.

• 0015

With respect to pay, I can tell you that in my civilian job I've worked for the federal government now for close to 25 years, and I've never had a pay problem on the civilian side. But on the military side, I and a number of other reservists over the years have had inconsistencies in pay and problems. It's been an ongoing issue for us. It is certainly one that affects the morale and the retention of soldiers. I can tell you that we're working hard to improve the situation within the brigade.

Mr. Art Hanger: I think the reservists are probably as close to the community as you can get. Yet there doesn't seem to be that kind of presence. When I say that, I'm implying that there doesn't seem to be a move to say here's career day in this high school or that high school. That doesn't seem to be part and parcel. Whether it is on the part of the school or the reserve commander, I don't know. Is there a structure in place that deals with that, a kind of an advertisement, if you will?

Colonel William White: As you know, we're going through a restructuring period. One of the issues the units are being evaluated on is their footprint in the community. Units over the years have done a lot to be visible within the community and be involved in community events. I think that is much easier to do in a smaller community than it would be in say the city of Vancouver, where it's quite a large population. For any organization to be noticed it takes some effort. Units are doing that, but that is obviously not their prime role. They use a number of mechanisms to promote themselves through their honorary colonels, through the regimental associations, through contacts with the community that they have. Certainly there are examples in British Columbia where units are recognized and well known within communities.

Mr. Art Hanger: Thank you, Colonel.

The Chairman: Thank you very much, Colonel.

Colonel William White: Thank you.

The Chairman: We'll now take a 15-minute break. When we come back the floor will be open to whoever wants to come up and give his or her opinion. You don't have to be afraid. If there are 100 or 200 who want to come up, we will stay and we will listen to you. I just wanted to make that perfectly clear.

• 0018

• 0035

The Chairman: I will ask that you identify yourself before you make your presentation, please, and after that we'll see if any members have questions for you.

Ms. Shannon Lemire (Individual Presentation): Members of the committee, my name is Shannon Lemire. I have been involved with the military for 28 years, pretty well a quarter of a century of my life, first as the daughter of a military member and now as the wife of a military member.

Over these years I have watched many changes happening to the military, not all of them good. The quality of life has definitely declined for the members. As my father has put it, in his day the military used to be a choice job that many men would want to pursue. These days the military is no longer thought of as a career; it is thought of as just a job, a nine-to-five job, which is actually more than nine to five, but a place to go to work to earn a pay cheque. Pride and morale have definitely decreased over the years.

I may not be an expert or have studies to back me up, but I have watched and seen over the years.

I do have a question for Mr. Pratt. Should it take a natural disaster for people to have pride in their military?

Mr. David Pratt: I don't believe it should, quite frankly, but that's just what happened with some of the people in eastern Canada. It took a natural disaster for them to have any appreciation whatsoever. I think that's terribly unfortunate, but I think there's a silver lining in every cloud. I think what it has done is increase the appreciation for the military. But I think there's a window of opportunity here because of the tremendous goodwill that has been created towards the military as a result of some of these things.

Ms. Shannon Lemire: May I say on that point, then, why shouldn't more of the good that the military does be publicized, such as building orphanages in Haiti or other good things they have done in Bosnia and Sarajevo? Why shouldn't these be brought to public attention and not as much the awful things that have happened?

It seems frightful to me that my father, after 26 years in, would advise my husband to get out of the military because it's going nowhere. That's a frightful proposition, for once it used to be a career. The word “military” no longer generates as much pride; it's becoming a dirty little word.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Ms. Dolores Kimak (Individual Presentation): My name is Dolores Kimak. I've been a military spouse for almost 24 years, so I've seen a tremendous amount of change over those years. I have been on my own because my husband was posted with the UN for seven months. I've been on imposed restriction because in the last four years my husband has had four different postings in different areas because of the cutbacks. It's not fun being left behind on your own.

The question was brought up about imposed restriction. It's at the base commander's discretion. One year they let you go, but each subsequent year it's at the base commander's discretion. So it poses a lot of problems for spouses, and this is the norm.

I have one child in Ottawa right now, and I have one who is back in Kingston because she has to finish her grade 13. She had serious dental problems and had to have major surgery, so I had to go back and be there for her. Then I have a son here now who was one credit short of grade 13, but because of the educational system he has to do a make-up year here in B.C.

So with the four postings my husband has had, our kids would have to go through three major educational systems that are totally different. Nova Scotia grade 12 is senior matriculation. Ontario grade 13 is the entrance for university. Out here you need grade 12, but they don't accept grade 13 from Ontario.

So it's really tough on the kids. They have to leave their friends behind, they have to readjust to a whole new educational system, and there isn't any support for these kids, except if they have... For the one who is in Ontario, they do pay to board her, but only up to a certain amount. So we had to look around to find a place for her to board that would accept the rate that the military allows you.

• 0040

Another thing is that when you're moving, there is the cost of driving out here. It cost more to drive one of our vehicles out here than the amount the military reimbursed us. That's a big expense out of our pockets.

During our move, some of our furniture was damaged. Well, the insurance had just been cancelled. Not too many people are aware of that, but there's no insurance covering your furniture. It's up to the mover. So you have to fight back and forth with the mover for damages to your furniture, which is not fair.

I had to leave behind the support of family and friends. I had to give up my part-time job. The spouses really suffer.

I'm a teacher by trade, but I've never been able to have a full-time job because after three years you're posted. So you're always at the bottom of the ladder. You do subbing and you're getting there and you just get yourself worked into a full-time job, which I had been offered for the fall, and then you get posted. That has happened over and over again. The chances for a wife to have a career are next to impossible, and that creates a financial strain.

When we moved out here from Kingston, our rent for living in married quarters more than doubled, and the house is not as big.

No one has mentioned groceries. Groceries cost three times what I paid in Kingston. I can give you some examples: a can of pineapple, 88¢ in Kingston, $1.98 here; McCain's pies, which I love, 99¢ in Kingston, $2.99 here. I can go on and on. It takes about a year for you to figure out where you're going to shop to get the best deals. You wait for those flyers to come so you can keep your groceries within a reasonable amount.

So the cost of living in Victoria is really hard on all of us, regardless of what rank we have. The cost of living just puts you down. We have less disposable income this year than we had last year when we lived in Kingston. It's dramatically different.

Medical care is another thing. As somebody mentioned, we have to pay $100 deductible. That's one thing. But because I have a medical problem I have to have treatment almost on a weekly basis. It's $15 more for that same treatment in Victoria than it was in Kingston. That comes out of my own pocket. Finding doctors, the waiting lists—it took me a couple of months just to get a regular doctor and then I have to go through that to get specialists.

So I have to start all over again every time I move. That sets the family back, and my health has deteriorated because of it. I have not been able to keep up with my medical treatments, because they do things differently in Ontario than in B.C. and it's more expensive in B.C. We are not compensated. That hasn't been taken into consideration.

As for our housing, you think it's cold in here. This is what it's like in most married houses. They're drafty; they're not insulated.

[Editor's Note: Applause from the audience]

Ms. Dolores Kimak: We asked about insulation, and they said we could insulate the basement; they would give us the materials if we would do the work. Well, there's a lot of work in insulating the basement and caulking around there, and we could move in two or three years and so somebody else would get the benefit. If they were to take so much money off our rent or something if we did the work, then we wouldn't mind. But when we're doing it, spending all our time for maybe two or three years in the house just to be warm, we figure it's not worth it, especially when we do it over and over.

We're in married quarters now because when we lived in Winnipeg we lost $10,000 on our house. For us that's a fair amount of money. When that happens over and over again, you don't want to buy, because you can't afford to. We looked at houses out here and we cannot afford to buy a house. We'd have to be mortgaged up to the hilt. We just can't afford it. So it's a real strain on us.

When most people retire, their houses are paid for. Very few people in the military can have that luxury, because we're moving. When we move, we don't have a choice to sell. If the market is up when you buy, it might be low when you sell. But you don't have that choice. When you move, you have to go.

• 0045

Another thing I want to point out—and this goes down the road, but it will affect all of us—is with regard to widows of military spouses. My mother-in-law, who is quite ill, and we have to bring her back to Canada, can't get DVA housing because she's a widow. But if her husband were alive, she'd be able to get housing. Also, the pension she gets is cut in half, dramatically cut, because her husband is dead.

So far, I've given 24 years of my life to the military as a spouse. If my husband were to pass away, automatically we'd be cut in half. So even though we've given up our careers and we've dedicated ourselves to moving with our husbands and raising kids, we don't benefit. We get big cuts. I think that's an issue that needs to be looked into for retired military people, because quite often you can't afford to own your own home. A lot of military people could benefit from subsidized housing just because of the financial strains put on them.

I hope you really look at these considerations. I have my hopes away up here, but every once in a while I have a reality check and I say, well, I know what happened to a lot of committees, and the reality is down here. So I hope you prove me wrong and that something really does come out of this.

Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Ms. Alison Davies (Individual Presentation): Mr. Chairperson, members of the committee, my name is Alison Davies. I am the spouse of a military member. As well, I'm the public relations chairperson for the Military Family Resource Centre and the secretary to the board of directors for the Military Family Resource Centre.

There are just a few points I would like to bring up. Some of them will be repeated.

First of all, speaking about military housing, I wanted to make it really clear that when people are talking about different costs...if a person is posted to Halifax, they might be paying about $300 to $400 for the same level of PMQ as they would rent in Victoria, and there's no cost of living allowance that would compensate for that difference. Since this is military housing, although it is regulated through CFHA, which is the Canadian Forces housing, it makes no sense to me that a military member would be penalized for being posted to the west.

If you're looking at different costs of living, that's something else we need to look at, with triple A and cost of living allowances as well, but I think there's something that can be done more immediately in terms of what the members who are living in the military housing here are paying.

As well, I wanted to address another issue for families with children with special needs. As for myself, my daughter is mentally handicapped. We were posted here from Aldergrove, so it wasn't as much of a hardship for us as it may have been for a family that had, say, been posted from Halifax or anywhere else in the country.

But I can say for us specifically... What you need to do is apply to where you're going, to the CO of new ship. It goes through whoever it needs to go through. You can ask for extra funding for your posting allowance or for your house-hunting trip. In our case, to come over to a new place with a special needs child, we have to go through the various agencies to find new places where she can get education, different support agencies, etc. In our case, we were denied that request, so I personally came over on the ferry six extra times. That is a minimum of $100 every trip. I think of the devastation that could have caused if I had been coming from Halifax, since I wouldn't have had that option at all.

Then, of course, when you're coming to a community you know nothing about, you're trying to find all the best locations where you could live that would be close...understanding the bus routes. Those kinds of things can be really devastating for a mentally handicapped person who is just trying to function. Day-to-day life can be hard enough.

• 0050

So those are a few other things.

Mr. Wood, when Martine was speaking you asked her questions about whether we don't think the family resource centre should have something for these parents. We certainly do, and we would welcome any and all pressure you could put on to get them extra money so we could have these things in place and the single parents wouldn't have those kinds of dilemmas. Most of us on the board are either military members or military spouses. We're just like anyone else, trying to get together and do the best we can do. We would appreciate any help that would come our way.

The Chairman: Mr. Wood.

Mr. Bob Wood: Alison, I have just a couple of questions. Can you tell me how much the budget is that you work with? Do you have a number?

Ms. Alison Davies: Actually, it has just been changed, so I'm not completely sure what that would be; I'm told $461,000.

Mr. Bob Wood: That's what you people work with?

Ms. Alison Davies: It will be. That would fund all the programs, any day care... There are three different centres and all the staff that would go with them, plus the vehicles...everything, yes.

Mr. Bob Wood: The other thing I've really found odd is... Can you tell me who turned down your request when you came over to look for your home? Was it somebody in Aldergrove or was it somebody here?

Ms. Alison Davies: No, it was the person who was on the ship my husband was posted to. The place you come from knows you. They understand your family. When you apply for something else, sometimes you're just a memo going across someone's desk.

Mr. Bob Wood: That's really hard to believe.

Ms. Alison Davies: Yes, it is, isn't it? It is really is. I say the same thing.

Mr. Bob Wood: Unbelievable.

Ms. Alison Davies: It's always really hard to believe.

Mr. Bob Wood: I can't comprehend that. I don't think anybody in this committee can comprehend somebody doing that—

Ms. Alison Davies: Probably most of the people who are standing behind me could comprehend it quite well.

Mr. Bob Wood: Obviously, yes. It's an eye-opener that somebody would do that.

Thanks a lot.

The Chairman: Thank you very much. Next.

Ms. Elizabeth Anthony (Individual Presentation): Hello, Mr. Chairman, members of the committee. My name is Elizabeth Anthony. I've been a member of the military for about 37 years. I know I don't look that old, but I grew up in the military as a child. I joined the military myself. I did some time there, had some children, married a military member. I'm still involved with the military 37 years later.

The first thing I would like to do is reiterate Alison's comment about having special needs children. That was one point I wanted to make. When you're posted to a new place, of course you get your house-hunting trip, five days, which often is not nearly long enough. It would be beneficial to military families, especially those looking for medical care, to have extra time to be able to do that.

I moved here from Calgary. When I left Calgary I had all the services in place that I required for my son. I'm here a year and a half later and I still haven't got all the services I require for my son.

Physiotherapy is different in every province. Some provinces fund it, some don't. When you need to deal with eight specialists, which is probably about the average for what I have to deal with for my child, it gets pretty tedious trying to arrange it all and then trying to come here as a single-income family, because you give up your full-time job at your other place, and that makes for added pressure.

I wanted just to reiterate that.

One comment I wanted to make goes along with the concern about single members in the military being deployed and not having child care. I was fortunate enough to be involved in amalgamating, starting up, a 24-hour child care agency for CFB Calgary. I'm sure if you're heading that way they will be able to tell you about it. I was fortunate enough to be involved in that.

It was a very profitable organization in being able to provide single parents with the option of not having to farm their children off to grandma and grandpa during their deployment. They were able to have their children in a family home that was monitored and supervised. The caregivers were trained and educated, and it was quite a network of support. If a caregiver felt she was getting too burnt out, we were always there to provide assistance. If she needed a break, we were able to provide that with other caregivers. It was a wonderful program.

• 0055

I would like to see—and I think Leslie Climie in Ottawa would probably reiterate this—a national day home agency concept across the board on bases that have long deployments, or even short deployments. The military has to be one of the few jobs where you are working 24 hours a day at times, and it's important to have child care around the clock.

That's all I have to say to the committee. I welcome any questions.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Petty Officer Ken Waldron (Individual Presentation): I'm a marine engineering artificer. We call ourselves stokers.

I could talk for hours on suggestions I have, but I'll stick to a couple of main points.

Quality of life is not just a money issue. I know money makes things a lot different and money is a problem, but I would really like to stress that quality of life is not just a money issue.

If I could just have the committee do a little thing for me...while I'm talking about my first point, if you get bored with what I'm saying, look through the audience and see if you can determine who is in the military and who is a dependant or a significant other of military personnel.

My first point is on the uniform. I joined when we were green. I'm not sure if members of the committee are familiar with the history of the Canadian Armed Forces, but we all used to wear green, whether we were sailors, soldiers, or airmen. We now have a really nice uniform for the sailors when we're in our best rig, and about every year or so since we got that nice uniform the other parts of it have changed. We've been promised repeatedly over the past five years, since I've been keeping track, that yes, we're going to make a decision on what you're going to have to work in, what you're going to have to go back and forth in, what you're going to have if you're sitting behind a desk. Well, no, just a minute, we changed our minds. You can go and buy this at CANEX and wear it, but we'll change our mind on when you can wear it.

What I'm trying to say here is that we need to either give the sailors a uniform they can wear or give them a place where they can buy uniforms they can wear, but make a decision, whether it's politically motivated because of the textile industry in other parts of the country or it's motivated by what's best for the sailor. We need a decision on what uniform a sailor is going to wear.

If you have looked around the audience, as I asked the members of the committee to do while I was making that point, and formed a mental picture in your mind of what personnel are in the military, I will wager that very few of you were able to accurately determine which females in the audience are in the navy. The guys kind of stand out; they have short hair. The females can have their hair however they like. I have nothing against long hair per se; I have a lot against long hair on a ship. But I have a really big problem with a government, or a department within that government, preaching to the general public—we were talking about PR earlier, Mr. Pratt—that we have equality in the Canadian Armed Forces, that there is no sexual discrimination, no sexual harassment. Yet because she's a female she can have her hair however long she likes.

This leads into the final part of this, which Mr. Pratt mentioned, about public opinion.

I'm a newcomer to the military; I have only 17 years in. My grandfather and some of my cousins have spent their whole lives involved in the military.

Public opinion and the ability of the military to do the job required, when required, are not connected. Canada is the best country in the world. Ask anybody who lives in any other country and they'll be glad to explain why. It is imperative that we, the members of the military, and you, the personnel making decisions on what's in the best interests of Canada and the military, realize that the average Canadian expects the military to do their job when called upon. Public opinion is not the tool to decide whether or not to fund it. Canadians expect it to happen and it must continue to happen.

Thank you very much.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

• 0100

Ms. Kathy Couture (Individual Presentation): Hi, members of the board. I'm the spouse of a military member.

My issue tonight is mostly on forced moves, people who are forced to move. The military dangle this thing over our heads called “pension and security”. In 1998 there's not much of that out there on civvy street, so you can't throw it away. You virtually have to move. Although the salary isn't great when you move and there is no raise in it, we still do it.

Along with our moves we do lose our homes, our houses, our friends, spouses' employment, etc. We personally lost our house. Between the loss of the house with this so-called military buy-back plan, which is just not very peachy keen for most of us who took it, we lost over $17,000... Some was from military buy-back; the rest of it was from what we call interest differential. Because our bank seemed to penalize us in one way or another, we had to pay a penalty on our mortgage. If it had been a three- or a six-month penalty, the military would gladly have given that back, but because we bought our house at a high interest rate and sold it at a low interest rate, it was, “I'm sorry, we can't control that, so we don't pay you back”.

We lost enough money... When we moved to this province, which is more expensive than Halifax, we went to the food bank. My husband is a master seaman and we were at the food bank. We went to food banks, we went to neighbours, we went to friends, we went to credit cards—we went to everything. We had a secure home, and the military said, “Sure, you can buy a house; you're going to be there for at least five years”. Eleven months later we have a posting message.

We ended up at the food bank. We ended up going to Value Village and the Salvation Army because our kids need sneakers and shoes and clothing. Not only that, but we did end up doing the credit card thing too and had to go to see the base financial counsellor for consolidation of debt.

The worst thing was when we got here and lost all that money; trying to find a bank that would give us a loan to pay for what we lost on our house. Try to find a bank to give up to $11,000—we had a little bit—when you have nothing to show. You've just lost your house, you've just lost your job, you're moving to a more expensive province, and you're not making very much money. You're forced to live in military housing because you can't live on the economy. You're forced to take a house, whether it fits you or not. Either you take this house or you are put to the bottom of the list. So you take a house that is not necessarily fit for your family. You're taking a house whether or not it has a basement, whether or not it has enough bedrooms; you're taking it because you can't live anywhere else. It's unfortunate for people to have to go through that.

Not only does the move come with the loss of money, of jobs, of morale, and everything else, but you do lose your family. My family is back east. We had no choice but to move here. We are now living on virtually nothing and just making ends meet because of credit cards, which is unfortunate. Back east we had a good job, a house, we had money in the bank, we had a nest egg. Here we have nothing.

Not only do I have nothing, but I feel I don't have enough support for this nothing. My family is back east. I don't know if you've heard of these service flights, but you don't get them unless your husband has a high rank and lots of points.

I'm sitting here, probably for five to seven years, without any money in the bank to go and see my family, to get the support I need, to take my children to see their grandparents. It won't happen, because I have no money in the bank because of a forced move. “You either go or get out” were the exact words said to my husband. It is your choice. You either move or you get out.

The way they worded it, his COS date, which is the date to arrive here, would be his release date. We have three children and the security of a job and a pension at the end. We had no choice. My husband could pump gas on the east coast, sure, but with the economy the way it is, we thought, well, do we live on the economy or do we keep this security, this pension we're going to get eventually, and live on a low salary? We chose to move but because we felt we had to.

Now I'm here, over 7,000 miles away from my support...not being able to get military service because either my husband doesn't have enough years in or because, well, you're not a priority. We can send you, but we can't guarantee to bring you back. I'm here and unfortunately I don't like it. I think there are a lot of people in my situation. I do the best; I do the best for my kids and I do the best with what I have, but this is hell.

Thank you.

• 0105

The Chairman: Thank you very much. Next.

Ms. Donna Hooper (Individual Presentation): Good evening, Mr. Chairperson and committee members.

My name is Donna Hooper. I'm now a military spouse. I'm a mother. I used to serve in the military. I was in the reserves in 1982 and then in the regular force. That was followed by another stint in the reserves, until professionally, morally, and ethically I could not put up with that life.

Also, I would like to note that military life and being married to somebody in the military is not something I could do. If you are going to do that, somebody is going to have to make a choice. In this day and age of cutbacks, it's not possible for two people to maintain a career in the military.

I have a couple of concerns. I'll make just a couple of points, although they have been raised before.

I would like you as committee members to go back to whoever is in charge and question seriously the guaranteed home sale plan. To those of us who were left and had to leave home, I don't know what the military paid for. I know I spent $52 to fax documents to a company in Toronto and never heard back from that company at all. I was never offered a a price on my home. I followed up with a nameless, faceless person in Toronto, who told me only that he was too busy and maybe he would get to me in six months. Is that what the Government of Canada is paying for?

I would also like to discuss a little how I was treated as a spouse, again with reference to postings. Luckily for me, I had some experience in the military, so negotiating the BOR was something I could do, also with the support of friends I had in the military. Had I not had that experience...and even with that experience it was dreadfully overwhelming.

For example, I was told by administration staff that I would have to accept the fact that I would have to go on a house-hunting trip alone for nine days because it was cheaper to book me on a service flight. The fact that my husband had been in Bosnia for eight months didn't matter to anybody at all.

I found as well that with this posting I was severely financially punished because I was required to use my vacation time in order to negotiate for and find a place for myself and my family to live.

I also found that things were not communicated. There seems to be no obligation on the part of the military to communicate information to spouses. For example, when was I ever going to find out when my husband was posted, if not for the intervention of friends I had at our home base in Winnipeg? My husband was not being given that information in a timely manner when he was in Bosnia. We had a house to sell. That information was communicated to us at the end of April, at the height of the flood in Manitoba. I challenge all of you to put yourselves in my shoes and know what it was like to know I had less than a month and a half to sell my house, at the height of a flood.

I also have a great deal of distress from administrative staff booking appointments and not keeping them. On several occasions I arranged for sitters. I took unpaid days off from my own employment and arrived for appointments that had been cancelled arbitrarily because of luncheons and so on, or because the person I had booked the appointment with had merely forgotten. I found this treatment unacceptable, and again, it was at financial cost to myself.

I found our treatment by the movers in our move to be unacceptable. Movers are appointed by DND. As of this year they bear no responsibility; DND will not associate itself with what happens with problems with the move. We were lied to by our moving company because we signed on the wrong line, as directed by the drivers. We are now not able to recover costs unless we secure legal support to obtain those costs back from the moving company.

About housing, since we were coming from Winnipeg, the housing market...despite what we had for a down-payment, we were unable to afford or to contemplate, even at my husband's present rank level, the purchase of a home in the future. PMQ rates are also matched to civilian rates. With one child, I did not qualify for a PMQ. I had sold my home and I had no place to live, because of the waiting list.

Those are some of the concerns I have addressed. There are many others.

I have in my hands the business cards for the wing services officer in Comox, who unfortunately cannot attend. If I could pass those on... It is her request that some committee member contact her about her own dreadful story about life and the effects on her family. It highlights, for example, somebody who is a serving member on imposed restrictions. This individual is living a dreadful life and has gone through some severe things. It's at her request that I forward these cards, with the names of her and her husband. If you could contact them...

• 0110

I myself know other people who may or may not come forward, but the military doesn't support families. My former supervisor in the military was required to appoint guardianship of her two children because she and her husband lived with separate postings for over two years. This is not a thing I would contemplate, and therefore, again, my life in the military had to come to an end. I wouldn't live like that, and I don't expect any of you would either.

The Chairman: Thank you very much. Next.

Ms. Margo Lisick (Individual Presentation): Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, my name is Margo Lisick, and I'm a military spouse. I'm also the deputy mayor of the Work Point Community Council, and we would like to welcome you to our community. Tomorrow Mayor Jean Lavallée will be addressing you on behalf of the council, but tonight I personally would like to express my dissatisfaction with the medical and dental plans.

Last year our deductible, as you heard earlier, was increased from $40 to $100. For our family, with food and environmental allergies, a $100 loss is a big deal. Some items, such as dust mite covers and other asthma-related items, aren't covered in our medical plan, so these come out of our pocket. When we have had to pay for these—the dust mite covers for my son's bed, for example, were $125—we felt we could wait for those, even though it was essential for his health. We had to wait four months in order to be able to afford it. Even at that time I had to charge part of it on my credit card.

Sometimes we've had to wait when it comes to medicine, because we couldn't afford to pay for the medicine that month. We have had to wait till next month, or we charged it on our credit cards, which are often at the maximum as it is.

Our children are entitled to visit the dentist only every nine months, not every six months, as most dentists recommend. I find this is detrimental to their health, their teeth, their growth. You can take them in for specific visits if there is a problem, but you have to have a specific problem in order to be there, and they do not get a cleaning, they get a check-up on that problem only.

About housing, we pay a higher rent here than at most bases in Canada. This rent the military housing pays all across Canada comes into one pool, through CFHA. All the money is pooled together and then used as it's needed across Canada. What we would like to see here in Victoria, since our rent is higher, the cost of living is higher, probably the building materials to keep up these buildings are higher, is for the rent we are paying to be used for our houses, which need more insulation, better roofs. We would like to see a focus on our own housing. Maybe they can offer this plan across Canada; I don't know.

Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you very much. Next.

Ms. Christina Wheeler (Individual Presentation): Mr. Chairman and committee members, my name is Christina Wheeler, and I am a military widow. I live in Victoria by choice, because my family is here, my long-time friends are here, my support network is here. But living on a VA pension is not easy, as you've heard from these people here before.

• 0115

My issue tonight is not my finances, but our life and our treatment by the military since my husband was killed.

Six years ago there was an accident that never should have happened. It would not have happened if everybody had been following the proper safety procedures. The military have admitted negligence but have not accepted responsibility or accountability.

My children and I have been treated as non-people since the beginning. We have no status, no access to people or information. I was given a pension; I was swept under the rug with no answers, no accountability and no closure.

A year ago I started a new campaign to reopen the investigation. That investigation has been completed, but one week before my scheduled meeting to receive a copy of the report the meeting was cancelled. There is no new date. No valid reason is offered as to why, and there is only silence again.

My husband died serving this country in peacetime. My children and I deal with that every day, but we also have to deal with the knowledge that his death was so insignificant that it was deemed a minor incident and there's no responsibility, no accountability and no truth.

My daughter has learning disabilities. She has problems with self-esteem, problems with confidence. She can't get past her father's death. We need answers. Without them, I cannot help her. I'm asking you to help me.

In the House of Commons, my MP is going to bring up this issue. I hope you'll listen to him.

Thank you.

Leading Seaman Jessen (Individual Presentation): Honourable members of the committee, I would like to welcome you on behalf of Calgary ship's company. My name is Leading Seaman Jessen and I've been posted on board the Calgary for approximately three years now.

This past year I had the benefit and the honour of being the United Way representative on board the ship. That job basically entailed collecting funds for the United Way in the Victoria area. Everyone's familiar with the United Way.

We did very well this year. The thing that stuck most in my mind, though, above everything I learned over the period of time of collecting the money, was the members of the ship's company who couldn't give because they were in fact receiving benefits from the United Way. Almost 5% of the ship's company of 225 guys are receiving benefits from the United Way.

Members serving honourably put their trust in their government. They still have to get benefits from an outside agency. That should not be happening. There's no way that should be happening.

It's very heart-wrenching to see an ordinary seaman—and it's not all ordinary seamen, it's junior ranks as a whole—have to receive any kind of benefit, not to be able to live on their own with the funds they should be making, going to work daily, on a day-to-day basis, for their country.

Nobody's mentioned it, but we did have some catch-up pay. Just before Christmas we had some small benefits. We referred to it on the ship as catch-up. That's all it is, really. They tried to pair us with what they felt—whoever felt—we have lost over the few years we haven't received a pay raise. However, the CPP and UI have both increased, and even with the comparability increase we've had, over 90% of the ship's company right now is making less because of the increases.

Last week they announced that the triple A accommodation assistance allowance is going down. It went down by $20. That's not a lot to somebody who is making a lot of money, but to a young ordinary seaman who counts every dollar, it's not only kicking you while you're down, but you're already knocked out.

• 0120

These people are being kicked. This should not be happening. Any recommendations you can make to help our situation will be much appreciated.

We've talked about forced moves and things like that. I'm currently employed—I always will be employed as long as I'm in the forces—as a marine engineering technician. You can't have ships going to sea without stokers. We're the guys who make the ship go. It's as simple as that. We have a shortfall of what we call senior tickets. You need these tickets in order to go to sea. We have a shortfall on the west coast. There is a surplus on the east coast. The navy's solution, obviously, is to move these guys from the east coast to the west coast. They don't want to come here. They're being forced to move.

From my point of view, I've been at the same rank now for a little over six years. I've been in the navy for ten, nine of which have been at sea. I have no hope of getting a shore posting because I can't afford to take one—I'll lose my sea pay—and the house I currently own... My wife has to work. I'm not able to have children; if we do, I'll lose my house. It's as simple as that.

These people from the east coast don't want to come here, but there's an excess amount of people at my rank right now on the west coast. I have no hope of promotion in my career. I know that in the next ten years I am in the navy I have a hope of maybe one promotion. That's it.

Instead of promoting these eligible bodies on the west coast, the navy is bringing them from the east coast. They're not only lifting them from their roots in the east coast, but they're denying me a chance of promotion by bringing these guys out here. I don't know if the members of the committee are aware of that or not, but it's happening, not only in my trade but in many other trades in the navy right now. It's a very undesirable situation.

We can get 25% or 30% pay raises and that's only going to scratch the surface. There have been many great leaders over the years who have said—and they're not false in saying this—that pay does not increase morale in the long term. It's a short-term benefit. Of course it's going to help, but there's a definite problem with morale as a whole in the navy, and things have to be brought around to correct them. Forced moves are only one way of increasing the morale in the navy as it stands now.

The lack of promotions also denies us the ability to have that pay increase. I'm staying at the same rate of pay regardless. If we get a pay increase, of course, then we're going to get more money, but if I don't get promoted, that's the only way I have to make more money.

As a couple of speakers have already said, you have to be at the rank of chief warrant officer or chief petty officer in order to own a home or be able to get a mortgage. If I can't get promoted, I can't make the extra money. To get a pay raise would be nice, but we also have to do something about the promotion problem.

That's what I have to say. Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Corporal Richard Clark (Individual Presentation): Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, I've been a serving member of the Canadian Armed Forces for almost 14 years now in one capacity or another, whether it be reserve or regular force. I was posted here in 1994.

I concur with a comment that one of the ladies made, that when they were posted here, their COS date would be their release date if they did not take it.

I did not know that at the time B.C. actually meant “bring cash”. If I had known that, I would have made other arrangements for my career. I came here with the hope of furthering myself, bettering my career, and hopefully being able to provide more for my family.

• 0125

My wife is unable to attend. She wrote a letter that I would like to read to you:

Dear Members of SCONDVA,

Sorry I could not attend tonight but we could afford a babysitter. I am a military wife and we have a five-year-old son. My husband, a corporal, has been in the army since 1986 and excels at his job. We were posted here to Victoria from Calgary in August of 1994. When we lived in Alberta we had two cars, savings, RRSPs, and money left at the end of the month. We had a social life and never worried about money. When we first arrived here we waited a year for an MQ. We were forced into renting an overpriced apartment with additional costs for storage. We were forced to sell a car that we could not afford to insure. Our income tax increased and we faced PST of 7%. Food costs more, as do gas and utilities. All dreams of home ownership disappeared. When we got our MQ we paid for another move and for all of our utility hookups again plus replaced a shed and fence that we were forced to leave behind.

Now in 1998 we have no savings, are overdrawn at the bank, our RSPs are gone. Clothes are a luxury, we dread Christmas and do not attend any functions that have to be paid for. I have a serious chronic medical condition but often skimp on my medication because I cannot afford it—especially since the deductible went up by more than 100% on the medical insurance plan. We visit the dentist less now than recommended due to changes in the same plan.

The 4.2% increase in pay in 1997 has disappeared. Our AAA decreased, CPP went up and our rent is also going up. We no longer can afford fresh fruit and vegetables as often as before. I do not get my hair cut, I take a calculator to the grocery store to stay within my meagre budget. My son does not get the extra-curricular activities and sports he wants.

We live in sub-standard houses with no insulation and higher incidences of asthma and allergies. We are required to purchase our own refrigerators and stoves, window coverings and carpets—wall to wall tile is a little cold.

Through all this my husband works very hard for the DND. He received an Award for Excellence last year. I serve on the community council, my husband works for the youth centre. We are both involved with the school. We try and keep our yard nice and take a great deal of pride in our home. We deal with separations on a moment's notice, long work days, and duties with pride. We deal with relocation, leaving family and friends and starting over every few years. In return we need some sort of recognition. We should not be one pay cheque away from welfare and the food bank! We need a decent salary, and a cost of living allowance for areas notorious for being expensive. Considering the condition of the houses the rent is high. We think that we are worth more!

Thank you for your consideration of the concerns of one military dependant.

Mr. David Pratt: Mr. Chair, I wonder if we might get a copy of that letter for the record.

Corporal Richard Clark: Yes, sir, you may.

The Chairman: Next, please.

Ms. Kim Loeper (Individual Presentation): First I would like to thank Judi Longfield and Leon Benoit for responding to my earlier submission to this committee. I've since done some research and found some new information that I believe will be of benefit.

The biggest issues for the west coast military community are pay and housing—you've heard that over and over and over, and you will continue to hear it—and how these two items influence our quality of life. Also, you should understand that if the two items are addressed, pay and housing, I believe there will be further issues. They have been mentioned in brief this evening. According to Maslow's hierarchy of needs, one needs to be confident that their basic needs—and I mean pay and housing—are provided for. Then one looks at safety. I believe this is covered.

• 0130

It should be mentioned that the very nature of the military lifestyle is judgmental to one's social needs. We are separated from our extended families and moved away from our friends. Then our nuclear family is destroyed on a regular basis when one spouse is sent to sea or on a course. Although this part of it cannot be entirely changed, it does deserve consideration.

Esteem and self-actualization needs will come when the base of the pyramid is stable, and military members will start demanding at that point job satisfaction, opportunity for advancement and other personal satisfaction.

My greatest fear is not the number of people who are here tonight, but the number of people who are not here. I fear that the military community has become complacent, apathetic and discouraged. I would suggest to you that in a worst-case scenario, such as the mid-1930s in Germany, someone will take advantage of these people and their emotions.

We, as citizens and military community members, have been asked a number of times what is important to us and what we want to see changed. We have written to politicians, told our stories to the newspaper. We've gone on welfare. We've tried to make our vote count, but still nothing changes.

Many of the higher ranks have placed a great deal of hope on this committee and its ability to change things. I beg of you, as you have heard here this evening, please do not let this opportunity pass you by.

The press has done little to help the morale of the military community. We have seen little good and many horrible things that have come out of the military. All of these items did need to be brought to light so the guilty would not be allowed to hide behind the old rule of secrecy and the boys' club. But the press also owes us the courtesy of bringing forward the good we do.

I believe the bad press is also contributing to the lack of morale.

I'm not going to read the whole thing.

Military members have not had a pay increase since 1992. I spent some time at the library to determine what that really means as a reflection of our buying power. My numbers are attached for your review, but I don't want you to forget my name and my face as the person who discussed them with you.

With all the pay raises that we've had this year, in 1997, our gross income has gone up by $1,000. That's gross; we haven't been taxed on that yet. We've also experienced increases in CPP, supplementary death benefits, disability insurance and income taxes. We are expecting a decrease in accommodation assistance, but ours hasn't come yet. It will. We are also expecting an increase in our rent.

The government—whoever they are—don't want us to feel that our recent raises are being eaten up, though we know they are.

The minimum wage in B.C. in 1992 was $5.50. On April 1 of this year it's due to go up to $7.15. This is a raise of 30%. The military has not seen any such raise.

Housing: We currently rent a double-wide mobile home on the base for $697 plus equal billing payments of hydro of $73 a month. We are continually being told by the housing agency that we have to pay rents that are consistent with the housing market in Victoria as set out by the Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation. My question has always been why?

The base commander has finally answered this question for me. He indicated that Revenue Canada would consider any difference between the going rates in Victoria and a PMQ as a taxable benefit and it would appear on our T-4s. Further, Treasury Board does not believe that the Canadian Forces should be in the business of providing housing.

Given the fact that any change to the PMQ system would be going against what Revenue Canada and the Treasury Board want, I believe we should consider a different tax. Very many PMQ residents have been campaigning for reduced rents, or at least for the rents not to be increased. I don't believe this is going to happen.

The simplest, most cost-effective solution is to sell all the PMQs across the country. This must be done in conjunction with providing an acceptable, geographical cost of living. This allowance should be tied to the consumer price index for the area in which a member resides for each month of the year.

Further, Revenue Canada will insist the allowance is taxable; therefore that should be taken into consideration.

I should point out that Mr. Allen Roy, a land use consultant that the base has hired in the past, has stated publicly that the PMQs in Belmont and Work Point are so far below today's standards that the B.C. government would not consider the housing acceptable for welfare recipients.

• 0135

In conclusion, it's my personal opinion that the federal government has not honoured the social contract between themselves and the military. I understand the need for fiscal restraint. I do not understand why the lower and middle classes are the ones to suffer. At what point will this stop? Or do we continue to sow the seeds of social injustice and beg for a revolution, whether it be large or small? Remember that these folks are the people who contribute to your feelings of safety. Is it too much to ask that their feelings of safety be addressed?

I'm willing to volunteer my time or experience if that is required. I'd also like to answer some of the questions that were asked earlier.

You wanted to know what we can do as a group to bring ideas to the government. I thought that's what we were doing here. Maybe I'm misunderstanding. You're the ones who understand this system; you tell us what you need us to do and we'll do it.

You also asked what can be done on the short term, I believe, to relieve the financial pressures of members. Obviously a raise is the easy answer. In the short term, accommodation assistance allowance should be increased while this system is revisited. It is not appropriate the way it is set up now. Trust me, cost of living has not gone down in Victoria by $32 a month in the last year; it just hasn't.

I would also suggest that you hold PMQ rates at the level they are while this system is re-evaluated. Again, it's not functional. There is no reason why a PO living in Halifax is taking home twice as much as my husband is because he happens to live on the base.

A small one but again of benefit: allow the mess dues to be tax deductible. Nowhere else on civvy street is someone required to join a group and not be able to take that off their income tax.

You asked how we can convince the Parliament and the public to spend money on national defence. I honestly don't know the answer to that question. Maybe we need a few more natural disasters.

Master Seaman William Sparling (Individual Presentation): Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen of the committee, I am Master Seaman William Sparling. I have been enrolled in the Canadian Forces since 1981.

Just to give you some background, you might say this is a family business for me. My family has served the crown unbroken for over 500 years. You might say I have a historical perspective of things.

Mr. Pratt, you asked what can be done to educate the Canadian people and the members of Parliament. Better you should ask what must be done. We are right now in a state of flux. The Canadian Forces are suffering from a lack of political leadership, not only from within our own ranks, but from the political level by the leaders of our nation.

DND comprises two components: the Canadian Forces members in uniform, and the civilian component, which is to support the military members and is run by the bureaucrats. Purely military decisions in respect of operations manning and equipment are being handled by the bean counters. Nowhere else in the world do you see such a situation.

The function of the military is to support the civilian government. We do that by providing a credible threat of force without our borders, meaning to other nations, in normal times. That means that we defend this country at home and abroad. In abnormal times we provide that force within our nation: witness Oka; witness other instances such as the FLQ crisis, which still haunts us today. Only the properly constituted civil government can call us out. The government tells us our mission, tells us how much force we are allowed to use, and then stands aside while we do so. We remain responsible to the civilian government and we carry out that mission.

• 0140

You have seen the results of missions gone wrong in Somalia and in Bosnia, Korea, and other places. But only recently have you seen the entire rank and file held responsible for the actions of a few.

With respect to Mrs. Wheeler—I think she may have left, and I don't blame her—I put on the widow's suit and followed my family's tradition. The widow's suit provides a complete liability to me and all of us who wear that uniform. The day may come—I hope to hell it doesn't, but it may come—when I am required and expected to stand by and possibly give my life. Other people, male and female, will face that choice as well. Others have, be it peacetime or wartime. I don't think it unreasonable that the Canadian people and our own government support us.

Admiral, you quoted from Kipling's “Tommy”. I'd like to leave you with the last words of that line of that poem.

This poem was written in the 1800s. It describes the situation in Britain at that time, when the Redcoats, as they were known, were derided by their own people. This is a situation we almost face today—almost, but not quite.

The last line of that poem referred to the lying of the politicians who controlled their destiny, not only over economic matters but sending men out to die for nothing.

The gist of it is don't lie to Tommy. He sees. He knows. He's not stupid. He knows exactly what he's going out to die for, and it is most certainly not people behind committee tables. That flag represents so much, not only to those of us in uniform but to those of us we stand before.

Now let's move on to other areas.

Economics: You've heard it all. Members of the Canadian Forces are hurting badly. Their families are hurting. We expect to make sacrifices. We do not expect our families to make those sacrifices while we're away. Enough said on that.

Equipment: You've heard it. We're hurting, but we can make do while you get us the equipment we need.

Morale: Now there's a very bad point. We're really hurting there. Our people feel wholly unappreciated, not just economically but emotionally. Why should a man give up ten months of the year away from his family to come home and be spit on by his neighbours? Why should he go and bail out somebody in another part of the country who has suffered a natural disaster when a month down the road his efforts are forgotten, or worse, derided?

We can address the problems we have, and we are addressing them. It's being addressed not only at the senior levels but at the junior levels. Once again, everybody's pulling together. We're shaking the lead out and we're getting it together. But we do need some support from the political side of the house, and that doesn't mean crucifying us every time a soldier happens to wander into a bar when he's off duty. Should he be punished for that? Perhaps. But he'll be punished through the system, properly. He doesn't need it paraded through the press, shouted in the House of Parliament. And his family most certainly doesn't need to see his face on the evening news saying how evil he is when all he wanted was a beer.

• 0145

As for the rest of us, we all have duties to perform. Some are harder than others. I personally think the hardest duty of all is that of the military spouse. We go out; we're busy. We know what we're there to do. Our spouses and families don't know day to day what we're doing. They don't know if we're coming home. Try to get answers from the system if all you've received is a message that says “Your spouse has been injured”. My wife went through that when I broke my leg. At sea, two days from the nearest port, a message got home. Somebody who knew my wife called her and said, “Bill's been injured; don't have any other details; won't know until he gets into San Diego”. That's not that big a deal. I wasn't seriously hurt. My wife understands that at sea things can happen. But what about the family of somebody who's in the high Arctic, in Bosnia, Rwanda, Somalia, places like that? There is so much that our spouses have to put up with that we don't.

I promised I wasn't going to get angry. You'll find that a lot of us have very strong feelings. We wouldn't be human if we didn't. We have strong opinions.

It was once said to me that the only people who really know how to run the country properly are driving a taxi, cutting hair, and in the military. I don't know how true it is, but we sure have our opinions, and we do have a habit of voicing them—sometimes in a politically incorrect manner, but we do voice them. Just once it would be nice if somebody up there listened to us.

The last thing I'll say, and if anybody has any questions I'll be happy to answer them... During the Punic wars, about 3,000 years ago, Roman mothers used to frighten the children with the cry “Hannibal is at the gates”. As you recall, Hannibal was the general who led the Carthaginian army over the Alps, a tremendous military feat. He so terrified the Romans that until the end of their empire, that was the cry used to frighten the children.

Ladies and gentlemen, Hannibal is at our gates.

If we want to maintain a credible military that will be taken seriously in the world, not just as a show of force, but politically, economically, and socially, we have to address our problems, our shortcomings, and they must be dealt with.

Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you.

Ms. Jennefer Jenks (Individual Presentation): Chair and members, I'm a military wife and I'd like to tell you some points about my life. I'm a mother of two children. I have a three-year-old and a four-year-old. My husband is currently posted to sea, so he leaves sometimes for up to seven months out of the year. I do not have any family in this country. I left a nursing career behind to be a mother, to raise my daughters to be good citizens. We don't have a father at home. I don't want to farm my children out to a babysitter in the hope that they'll grow up okay, so I've stayed at home with them.

Some of the sacrifices we have had to make... We had to sell our car for seven months. I walked in the winter, through ice, and got groceries in a wagon, carried my eight-month-old on my back, carried my two-and-a-half-year-old in my arms, and tied bags of groceries to my pack.

My husband is a leading seaman. I live in a PMQ and we pay $695 a month. It's quite expensive. We don't always have enough money. We live pay day to pay day. I try to do the best I possibly can to afford a lifestyle that is at least okay.

Some things that have happened to me... My daughter was in the hospital for two days at the first of this week and my husband's ship pulled out of port and sat in front of Royal Roads. An officer of the day told me that because my daughter, even though she was on IV meds and IV antibiotics and vomiting blood...it was not important to call him on the cell phone and have him released to come and see my daughter in the hospital. So I had to do that alone: call a friend for my three-year-old, ask them if they could come, please, and take her to stay the night.

• 0150

I've gone through certain things like this for the five and a half or six years I've been a military wife, and it is a struggle. A lot of money goes towards phone bills, just with our trying to keep our relationship going on.

In the last three years there have been three divorces in front of my house. The neighbours in military PMQs have divorced; three couples in three years. That's one a year. I'm trying to keep my family together by staying at home and providing a good, solid foundation, such that when my husband comes home I can have at least a bit of a marriage.

Thank you for listening to me.

The Chairman: Next.

Corporal Karl Rayment (Individual Presentation): Members of the committee, my name is Corporal Rayment. I've been in the Canadian Forces for 13 years and I'm currently serving aboard HMCS Protecteur.

Mr. Pratt, you asked a question earlier. You said you're only a committee; how can you get all 300 members of the House of Commons to understand what we're going through? Well, I will invite every member of this committee or any member of the House of Commons who wants to to come live with me for a month and work at my job at my pay. You are welcome to stay with me and see what I put up with and what my wife puts up with.

We receive a clothing upkeep allowance in the Canadian Forces of $17 a month for a male. That's enough to buy three pairs of socks. I'm sorry, but if I have to go out and get a tunic the Canadian Forces forces me to dry-clean because they want me to look special on parade, I have to spend almost $70 on that. That's eight months of clothing upkeep allowance.

I'm living with a wife and two children in a PMQ they just put new windows in. If I sit on my couch I get a stiff neck from the wind blowing through the windows. There's no insulation.

I go to the Canadian Forces Housing Agency and I ask them to carpet my house. “Well, we'll come and carpet your downstairs, sir, but your upstairs bedrooms—I'm sorry, we can't carpet those; we don't have enough money.” I have to go to bed wearing sweatpants under three blankets because my heater can't heat my whole house. This is unacceptable.

My wife was working in Ottawa before we came here. She came out here. She can't find a job. Any job she can find when she gets here...all her money goes to child care. That's unacceptable too. Something has to be set up for military wives such that we can leave our children in care or even get subsidy for our child care, so we can afford to live out here.

I can afford to buy a house in Halifax right now. My parents have been looking at housing. I can buy a three-bedroom house in Halifax for $78,000 on an acre of land. Here that would be $250,000. I don't have that kind of money.

When I left Ottawa, my PMQ rent was $500 a month, including heat and hydro and a parking spot. I'm paying close to $700 here and they are talking about raising my rent by $200 a month. I can't afford that. If that happens I'm going to have to go on welfare.

Instead of taking money away from the military every time they come up with a budget, maybe it's time the government shut down the borders, gave jobs to the people in this country, and made those collecting welfare and able to work go out and pick up garbage for their money. Don't let them sit at home and wait for that welfare cheque so they can go and play bingo and buy alcohol.

I have one more point. When I went to Haiti with the Canadian Armed Forces, this was the state the Canadian Armed Forces were in. We took vehicles to Haiti that they were going to send to the scrapyard. The only reason we did that was that the Canadian Forces didn't want to spend the money to send them to the scrapyard. We shipped them to Haiti and we ran them into the ground. We didn't take vehicles that were even up to the standards of some of the Haitian vehicles; and some of the Haitian vehicles were in really rotten shape.

It's time we went out and spent money on proper equipment. While I was in Haiti, we went downtown with weapons in this hand and we weren't even allowed to carry our bullets on our rifles. We had to carry them in our pockets. The only time we could load our rifles was if we were ordered to, even if somebody was pointing a rifle at us, whether it was cocked or not—and we didn't know that. They issued us five bullets. What are five bullets going to do?

• 0155

I'm sorry. This is my life. I don't want to have a widow at home with two kids—not with what the Canadian Forces are paying me.

Thank you.

Petty Officer Cooper (Individual Presentation): My name is Petty Officer Cooper, second class. I've been in the navy for 16 years.

My point is that everybody is talking about discrimination; how would you like to be treated with regional discrimination? If you live somewhere where your home is $200,000 and somewhere else where your home is $100,000, you lose 10%. I lose $20,000 out here, whereas for the same house in Halifax you lose $10,000. If they lose $10,001, they get all their money back. If I lose $15,000, $16,000, $17,000, I still see nothing, because I've got to be over that 10% line. It's not a dollar figure. But we both get paid the same wage and we're supposed to live on the same pay.

Another thing: somebody mentioned leave and service flights. After I joined, I spent nine and a half years out here trying to get my wife and my kids brought through school in a proper home. I never had enough money to travel or even think about going across the country to visit my folks in Newfoundland.

If you ask for a service flight, they say, sorry, come back later when you have enough points. When you're a chief and you can afford to go and knock on their door and ask how many points you have, you can travel across the country. As a young ordinary seaman, leading seaman, master seaman, P2, P1, warrant and all this, you have to travel up through all these ranks before you can get to your end goal of going home. By that time you might as well just retire, because you haven't got enough money even to enjoy your life back there when you're on leave as you struggle up through the years.

I hope this committee can pass the word on to Ottawa, not just be another committee that's going to lead into another committee and to another committee. You hear a lot that just goes nowhere. We're hoping you can take our word, and we might even hold you to your word the next time around.

Thank you.

Major Marian Miszkiel (Individual Presentation): Mr. Chair, ladies and gentlemen, I am Major Marian Miszkiel, a military engineer. I have served in a regiment, I have served as a field engineer on an airbase, and I serve the navy.

We in the military give the penultimate sacrifice when we go to war, in the chaos of war. However, we work in a highly industrialized environment. We have considerable disparity from the civilian sector in regard to a workers' compensation plan.

Currently, the Pension Act precludes payment of any worker's compensation to anyone injured in a non-special duty area. Everyone who is injured in Haiti, everyone who is injured in Bosnia, everyone who is deployed in the Persian Gulf on Her Majesty's ship—if they are injured in an industrial or a war type of accident, they can continue to serve and they will be paid for their pain and suffering or economic loss, for the loss of quality of life to themselves and their families.

For the stoker who is in port, the engineer who is in a sewer or somebody in clothing stores, if you have an industrial accident you have to wait until you retire. This is according to subsection 21(4) of the Canada Pension Act.

Her Majesty will take care of you in a hospital. She will put you on a medical patients holding list. She will bring you back on light duties, back to your peers. Then she will pay you back to your normal salary.

If you are a stoker and you have burned your leg and you are scarred, you can continue your duties. But for that scarring, that pain, that suffering, you will not be compensated as a civilian equivalent under workers' compensation until you retire—5, 10, 15, 25 years from now.

• 0200

That is section 21(4). It needs to be repealed or amended for compensation in a non-special duty area.

Thank you.

Leading Seaman Lise Curley (Individual Presentation): My name is Leading Seaman Lise Curley. I'm kind of nervous. With all due respect to everyone, I don't have all the right answers and I'm not going to say all the right words, but here goes.

I was told that this was going to be my last posting. I've just been told I have a three-year extension; it's called a continuous engagement. I wasn't aware that it was going to be like that, so what I thought was my last posting is not going to be my last. I'll end up going on a ship. It creates a bit of a problem because I've almost done 20 years and I was going to retire next year. I was going to plan for a civilian career.

Oh boy, this is hard. Give me a minute, please.

[Editor's Note: Applause from the audience]

Leading Seaman Lise Curley: I just wanted to say thank you to the military for giving me that bonus three years. However, as a single parent I have no other family but the military. If I end up going to sea, as I have always dreamed of ever since I was a little girl, it's going to create quite a problem for my daughter. I would like to know who is going to provide her with child care, who is going to take care of her, who is going to take care of her education? Who is going to take care of the legal aspects that I've been dealing with for the last five years with regard to her father? He has barely given us any support. We've had to fight for maintenance. They had to take his wages away so we could get some money to help us out. It's been very hard emotionally and physically on me. I can just imagine what it's going to do to me if I go to sea.

You can't imagine what it's like to have a girl's dream come true about going to sea and to have it taken away from you. What I'm getting at is that I've always wanted to go to sea and I won't be able to, because I don't want to give up being a mom. I'm getting all mixed up here. I want to do what's right. I want to fill that position. You know, you want to be...oh, this is so hard.

I guess the end result is that the military has given me a choice: take your release or go on a ship. I don't think that's fair; that's what I'm getting at. As I said, the military has been my family. I had a really hard childhood and I thought the military would give me a family, and it's been that. But so many changes have come up in the last little while. Problems arise, but you guys don't have any solutions for us.

I'm just going to read what I have down here. I figure if you have rights for gays and lesbians, there should be rights for...single parents are just as important. I have nothing against gays and lesbians, because I have a gay brother. I did not want to become a single parent, but I accept it, just as you should admit that we do exist. I don't want to be pitied or belittled, but I want to be accepted. That's what I'm getting at.

• 0205

Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Leading Seaman Desroches (Individual Presentation): I would like to address the board about moral issues. Of course, pay is a big issue, as you've heard tonight. The other thing I would like to mention is the effect of the downsizing of the military.

The way it has effected the moral and the troops...by downsizing, you have doubled the amount of work for each member. Some of the trades have had to combine their trades into one. Most of you people don't realize that, yes, I choose to wear a uniform and I choose to serve my country, like other people, but when I work a day at sea, the average day is 12 to 16 hours. When you do it for six to eight months, that's a lot of hours. We don't get overtime pay for this.

This is the distress added to the people, and it has a great effect on their morale.

Verbal abuse, discrimination, and harassment are other things people have to learn to deal with, how to address these things with their supervisors. When it is the supervisor giving you this situation, well, a person feels he has no resources to defend himself. Therefore, they would rather close their eyes, take the punishment, and just walk away from it. That is one thing affecting the people. The option a single person has is to say, well, to hell with it, here's my release. But if people have a family to support, that's an added stress. That's a problem we're facing.

There is a lack of good leadership. I'm not saying we have bad leaders all the way across. That's not true. There are good people out there, but the few who are doing the wrong thing have a bad effect on the people who are serving you. This country needs help, and you are in a position to give us the help we need.

Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Chief Petty Officer Doug McLeod (Individual Presentation): Mr. Chair and members of the committee, you were asking for possible solutions. I'm not going to belabour the obvious. Pay is one of the things, especially at the junior rates, affecting both the morale and in some cases the capability of our people.

It's kind of significant that you're the standing committee on national defence matters. We actually bring people in at the same educational level to do the same jobs the coast guard does for oilers, or that B.C. Ferry Corporation does for oilers. The difference is...

If I can take you to sea for a second, when we bring an ordinary seaman on board, he is in this new environment. We slam an ordinary-seaman-under-training package at him. In addition to that we slam a trades training package at him, because he has to start that so he can start on his career. Then, because we're a one man, one job navy, we put him to work, because he has a viable job that he has to fulfil on that ship.

When you throw his trades training, his ordinary-seaman-under-training package, and his normal job at him, to make it a little bit worse for him, we do these things called jackstays and all kinds of different seamanship evolutions when we're at sea.

We senior people have a lot of work too, so the junior person, again, sometimes as part of his training package and sometimes because he's a junior guy, is up in the middle of the night yarding lines while we're alongside another ship.

What brings all this to mind is that the same guy doing the same job over in the coast guard is working half the hours, but he has laws under the Canadian Labour Code that protect him. Our ordinary seamen don't.

If you're looking for impetus, that's one way you may be able to get at it. You can turn around and say, wait a second, here are people who, if they were to walk off the war ship onto another federal government ship in the coast guard, would be protected and wouldn't be destitute. He wouldn't be in the welfare line-up. As a matter of fact, if we paid him the same as his coast guard opposite, he'd be making $52,000 a year, once we factored in the overtime. That's one thing you might be able to get out of it.

• 0210

I'm sorry. I didn't introduce myself. I'm Doug McLeod. I'm a chief petty officer, and I've been in the navy far too long.

One of the other things I think you got a bit of is that there's a level of frustration. The level of frustration is driven by a variety of factors, not the least of which is what some people refer to as the politicization of the forces.

One of the problems Canada is in right now is what one of our best historians, David Bercuson, says, that Canada doesn't know what it has a military for. It has no idea what the military is for. When you ask, well, do you need the submarines for sovereignty, that's like asking this crowd who is the leader of the Liberal Party.

What is really driven home is the lack of education we have; and I think that is going to be your biggest obstacle. You have to take this information back to the government, back to caucus, back to your other members, and you have to say we know so little about what the problems are, on a fundamental level, that we have broken faith with people who have historically been part of this country's...not only inception; a lot of students of history have said, hey, we got our birthright on Vimy Ridge.

The knowledge isn't there; and if the knowledge isn't there, it's hard to sell somebody on submarines. “Why do you need a helicopter?” Well, we need a helicopter for some very specific reasons. But until that information gets to government, first of all, and then government has the courage to stand up and say, people, we're not going to cancel this program because it's politically expedient to do so, and what we're going to do, as Admiral Thomas said, is stand up and do what is right, and we'll tell the Canadian public they need it because of this; and we'll build the case... That's the only way you're going to lose some of the frustration.

We've discussed a tremendous amount about the junior ranks. I would actually like to put a point in for the commanders and above. I wouldn't want their job any more. There was a time when if you were the captain of the ship you were the master of all you surveyed and away you went. Now they are politicians. I wouldn't do their job for anything.

Unless we can go back to the fundamentals of what a military is for, tell that to the Canadian public and make them understand it, then rather than kill a generation of people, let's just call it quits and say, look, we don't need a military. If you're not prepared to understand and support the concept—the real concept, not the political one—of a military, then let's call it quits, because too many times we've learned that going in unprepared or ill prepared or ill equipped or with a less than well-motivated force hasn't worked out for us.

Thank you very much.

The Chairman: Ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of the whole committee, I would like to thank each and every one of you for your presentations, your comments, your suggestions.

On a final note, I would like to ask if any member of the committee would like to say a few words. David.

Mr. David Pratt: Thank you, Mr. Chair. A lot of comments tonight were directed at me, and I would like a bit of an opportunity to respond.

When I asked the question earlier about how we sell this to the public, I think I got the answer tonight, and that was education. I think we have to do a lot better a job of educating the public on what the military does.

Over the course of the last couple of days we've had an opportunity to see you folks do your duty. When I say “you folks”, I mean members and spouses as well, because clearly everybody is in this together, and you're pulling together as a lot of families would probably be incapable of doing in the same sort of circumstances.

Mr. Chair, when I came in here tonight I had a bit of a concern that we were going to get a sanitized version of events. I can tell you, I don't have that concern any more. I can tell you I've been to a lot of public meetings over the years—I used to be in municipal politics—and I've never seen a group of people come with such a clear, unequivocal message about a problem.

• 0215

You've enunciated the problems very well: everything from pay and housing to overtasking, the fact of people leaving the service because of frustration.

We have a duty to do. We've seen you do your duty over the last few days, from Yellowknife to HMCS Vancouver here today, and we've got a responsibility and a duty to do as well in terms of educating our colleagues. I wouldn't want to create any unfounded expectations, but I simply hope that we'll be able to do our duty as well as you clearly do yours. I say this because you've got an important job out there.

I've always viewed the military as a bit of an insurance policy. If we let the premiums slip, I think we're going to live to regret it. I wouldn't want to see that happen, for a lot of reasons.

So personally I would like to say a genuine thank you for the information. This evening has been a tremendous education for me, and for that I thank you.

The Chairman: Before I adjourn the meeting, I would just like to mention to you that I believe Captain Marshall, if he's around, has a small slide show.

Captain David Marshall (Base Commander, CFB Esquimalt): It's not so much a slide show as a little bit of levity to end the evening. It's semi-serious, however.

At one point the question was put, “Who are the advocates?” Mr. Hanger, I think on board Vancouver today you put that question.

You've heard some of the advocates, starting with Admiral Thomas and including a good number of the people who support us when we're at sea. They are the advocates, and now we're looking to you to be our advocates.

There is one other, however, who probably has far more national standing than anyone else in this room.

[Editor's Note: Technical Difficulty]

The Chairman: The meeting is adjourned. We will be reconvening tomorrow at 8.15 a.m. Good night.