Help Our Veterans

Despite the bitter cold––minus 25 with the windchill––more than 50 people gathered outside the Veterans Affairs Canada office in Brandon today to witness the closure of the office and the loss of face-to-face services to veterans. 

Veterans and their families have spoken out about why they need the face-to-face services these offices provide. These closures mean the loss of 90 front line workers including twenty-five Case Managers who work with high-risk veterans, and twenty-one Client Service Agents who have the expertise to help veterans access the programs and benefits for which they qualify. The offices also had administrative staff, local managers, pension officers, nurses and occupational therapists. None of these people are dispensable.

Veterans from Brandon and surrounding areas will gather outside the Veterans Affairs Canada office in Brandon this afternoon at 2:00 p.m. to witness the closure of the office and the loss of their face-to-face services.

Veterans from the Saskatoon area have joined forces with the union representing Veterans Affairs front-line workers to speak out against the closure of the Veterans Affairs office in their community.

These numbers come from information contained in the September 2013 Veterans Affairs Senior Departmental Report and from a survey of Union of Veterans Affairs Employees local presidents in December 2013

Those are strong words to come from anyone, much less decorated former members of the Canadian military. But a delegation of veterans from across Canada could no longer mince words on Wednesday, after being insulted by Veterans’ Affairs Minister Julian Fantino.

In just two weeks, veterans in Northern Saskatchewan will be left without the face-to-face services they deserve when the federal government closes the Saskatoon Veterans Affairs Canada (VAC) office, along with seven others across the country: Charlottetown, Corner Brook, Sydney, Thunder Bay, Windsor, Brandon and Kelowna. The Prince George office closed last year.

Our answers to what the government is saying about these closures here.

Veterans and the workers who serve them want Minister Julian Fantino to stop misleading veterans about what they will be able to access at Service Canada if Veterans Affairs office closures go forward next year.

An attempt by Veterans Affairs Minister Julian Fantino to quell growing outrage over VAC office closures appears to have backfired, leaving veterans even more determined to stop the closures.