The Department of Veterans Affairs (DVA), also referred to as Veterans Affairs Canada (VAC), is the department within the government of Canada with responsibility for pensions/benefits and services for war veterans, retired personnel of the Canadian Forces and Royal Canadian Mounted Police, their families, as well as some civilians.
A war veteran's eligibility for certain benefits may depend on his/her "overseas" status, defined by Veterans' Affairs as having served at least two miles offshore from Canada. In the Second World War (1939–45) Canada did not yet include Newfoundland, which became a Canadian province only in 1949. Thus WWI or WWII veterans who served in Newfoundland (with Royal Newfoundland Regiment and Newfoundland Royal Naval Reserve) are considered by Veterans Affairs to be "overseas veterans" (and be referred to the British Service Personnel and Veterans Agency).
An important division of Veterans Affairs is called "Canada Remembers". This is responsible for all war commemoration activities, such as Remembrance Day, and coordinates and funds various "pilgrimages" for Canadian war veterans to foreign battlefields and international ceremonies (e.g. the 50th anniversary of the Liberation of the Netherlands in early 1995, the 60th anniversary of D Day on June 6, 2004, etc.)
The year 2005 was declared Year of the Veteran in Canada, to teach, remember, thank, honour and celebrate. The image of a poppy overlapping a gold maple leaf became a special symbol during the campaign, on posters, pamphlets, bookmarks and documents. In 2007, the Veterans' Bill of Rights stated that Veterans Affairs Canada must show veterans respect.
The Minister of Veterans Affairs is Steven Blaney.
Read more about Veterans Affairs Canada: Current Veterans Affairs Structure, Veterans Affairs Privacy Issues, VAC Stakeholder Committee Members, Veterans Advocacy Issues, Veterans Affairs Canada Discrimincation
Famous quotes containing the words veterans, affairs and/or canada:
“[Veterans] feel disappointed, not about the 1914-1918 war but about this war. They liked that war, it was a nice war, a real war a regular war, a commenced war and an ended war. It was a war, and veterans like a war to be a war. They do.”
—Gertrude Stein (1874–1946)
“As an example of just how useless these philosophers are for any practice in life there is Socrates himself, the one and only wise man, according to the Delphic Oracle. Whenever he tried to do anything in public he had to break off amid general laughter. While he was philosophizing about clouds and ideas, measuring a flea’s foot and marveling at a midge’s humming, he learned nothing about the affairs of ordinary life.”
—Desiderius Erasmus (c. 1466–1536)
“What makes the United States government, on the whole, more tolerable—I mean for us lucky white men—is the fact that there is so much less of government with us.... But in Canada you are reminded of the government every day. It parades itself before you. It is not content to be the servant, but will be the master; and every day it goes out to the Plains of Abraham or to the Champs de Mars and exhibits itself and toots.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)