The federal government is stepping up efforts to repair military graves belonging to Canadian veterans who were buried or had grave markers erected by the government.

The 2018 federal budget, released Tuesday, earmarks $24.4 million over five years to address a backlog of 45,000 graves requiring maintenance.

In 2017, Veterans Affairs Canada (VAC) found with lack of funds it would take more than 17 years to follow through on these repairs.

Starting this year, the money will be used for cleaning, restoring or replacing headstones, and fixing foundation issues, but won’t apply to graves of more than 110,000 Canadians buried overseas during the First and Second World Wars.

Currently, there are 200,000 graves in Canada for veterans who were low income or whose death was related to their military service.