VETERAN FIGHTS BACK

A South Shore Veteran says he's not the only one the federal government left out in the cold.


Last Saturday, Craig Leonard and a dozen protesters stood in a torrential downpour outside M-P Gerald Keddy's Bridgewater office to demand better benefits for wounded soldiers .

The MP for South Shore-St.Margarets had promised to face their concerns on the picket line that day but never showed.

Leonard says the government has neglected veterans affairs and forgotten its soldiers.

"The thousand dollars a month, taxable, ends at age sixty five, the seventy-five percent long-term disability ends at age sixty five, Service and Canada Pensions disability pensions are reduced at age sixty-five. So what then? Are veterans to go to the food banks, are they to go on the streets?" says Leonard.

Leonard was one of thousands nationwide who protested the Harper Governments New Veterans Charter last weekend.