Greater Moncton MP Ginette Petitpas-Taylor is highlighting changes and new additions to services helping veterans and their families.
One change is a new, simplified Family Caregiver Relief Benefit.
“For someone who is taking care of a veteran, the family member will be receiving a $1,000 per month tax free allowance to help them with their needs,” says Petitpas-Taylor.
Another one of the new programs is a Veterans’ Education and Training Benefit.
“If a veteran has served 6 years in the military and is honourably discharged then from there he could possibly be eligible for $40,000 to provide him with the opportunity to receive training at the university level, or college level or even a private college,” says Petitpas-Taylor.
That’s not all as veterans with at least 12 years of service will be eligible for a total of $80,000 for post military education.
They also expanded the Veteran Family Program across all 32 Military Family Resource Centres (MFRCs).
“Those services were mostly offered to veterans themselves, or serving men and women in uniform,” says Petitpas-Taylor. “Now we’ve expanded the eligibility to that program as well so that family members will also have access to those services.”
Petitpas-Taylor also pointed out the federal government under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau opened the 9 Veterans’ Affairs offices closed by the previous government, and they even added an extra office in Surrey, British-Columbia.
