It was 300 recommendations to fix the new Veterans Charter.
We were told that this was going to be a living charter. I don't know who the doctor is who is going to give CPR to this charter, if it is living; we've had one change in ten years. You may say it's not ten years, but even if you come out with a bill tomorrow, it is still going to take a year and a half to implement, just as Bill C-55 did, That's one change in ten years—for a living document.
Why is the veteran community so upset? It's because we're sitting here and we have to do study after study, when the studies have already been done. You've spent millions of dollars having veterans come to sit in these committee meetings and talk about the problems in the new Veterans Charter. You've spent millions of dollars going through the problems within the veteran community and discussing how we can support the veteran better. You spent millions of dollars, but we're still not providing support for families or for the wife of an injured veteran when she has to quite her job to look after her husband.
A veteran is losing, even if he gets the earnings loss benefit; he gets a 25% pay deduction, after being injured. I'd like to know which member of Parliament here would take a 25% pay cut, along with all the bureaucrats and all the government employees. They were injured in the line of duty and have to take a 25% pay cut while they go through treatment, rehabilitation, and so on.
I've been through the new Veterans Charter from the start to the end of it. I'm now totally and permanently impaired, so I've gone through the whole charter. I can attest to it. Why should an injured veteran take a 25% pay cut and then his wife have to take a 100% cut while she looks after him?
We need to start listening to these recommendations from veterans organizations such as the stakeholder committee, the Legion-hosted veteran consultation group, and so on.
I support the three priorities that have been said over and over again by the Legion, by the National Council of Veterans Associations, and by the other stakeholders. I support the three priorities that the Veterans Ombudsman has brought forward over and over again.
I think it's time to make a change. We need it done quickly this time.
Recently, when I was told that I was going to come to Ottawa and speak before you....
Actually, before I go on with that, there is one thing that I forgot to mention; Sean just pointed this out.
The other thing is that in 1972, a sergeant who retired from the military got a pension when he turned 60, and it was indexed. He got a pension of about $1000 a month. A sergeant who retired yesterday with the same amount of time and same rank will get $3000 a month. If there is a cost of living or CPI increase every year, why is there such a difference between the sergeant who got out in 1972 and the sergeant who gets out in 2012? Can you tell me why?
The reason is that there were top-ups in the early 1980s and 1990s that topped up the National Defence salaries and left the veterans behind. Increases for the veterans have been under 2% per year. That's why they're falling behind. That's why they can't even afford to go into extended living, because even that costs more with Chartwell Retirement Residences.
We need to increase the amount of money that they get from even their own superannuation, and with the injured veterans we need to ensure that there's normal career progression, because they should not be penalized because they were injured in the line of duty.
As I was saying, I polled the 7,400 members of Veterans of Canada, and the immediate response was that the fact is that everybody is stalled at the gate before they even start the new Veterans Charter. A year and a half ago you had the study on VRAB, but it's time to fix the problem. The solutions that were put forward have not changed a single thing.
This is the entry into the new Veterans Charter, so I have a solution to the problem. I've passed out a handout. The solution is a new way to process and approve injury claims for veterans.
In embarking on the road less travelled, Veterans of Canada has canvassed its more than 7,400 members. The majority of our members want to see a better and fairer system put in place that reduces time and wait periods, a system that is proven and that gives the benefit of the doubt, as the Veterans Ombudsman stated previously.
Over the past several years there have been requests to have more veterans employed within the Government of Canada, even to the point that we have now put forward a bill that I feel is very good—I've been pushing for this for years—which provides for priority hiring for veterans.
Let's now offer some other jobs. Let's start the Bureau of Pensions Advocates up again so that we can hire veterans as claims processors. Making the initial claim is a stumbling block for veterans. They fill out the paperwork, but they never have the right documents, and then it is kicked back and we have a problem, because then they have to go through appeals.
If we went back to the pre-1996 Bureau of Pensions Advocates system and hired some claims processors to be with the Bureau of Pensions Advocates, we could have a checklist that indicates that the medical documents from National Defence are attached, the medical documents from Veterans Affairs are attached, and the medical documents from the civilian doctor are attached. This is an opportunity to have a proper claim submitted so that it can be properly adjudicated, and without haste.
The next thing is to get rid of VRAB and get rid of the current system of adjudicating and bring in an evidence-based system. Right now, with National Defence there is a medical review board, and it has been that way for years. It actually works.
Why not just mirror that National Defence board with Veterans Affairs? Hire ex-doctors and ex-nurses, ex-doctors' assistants, 6A and 6B medical people who served in the military—giving more jobs to veterans within the system—but have them adjudicate, because they're the people who treated us. They know the injuries we've had, they see the records, and they understand the x-rays—they were the ones who were doing this.
The only time they would actually see the claim is if someone had been out of the military for a while. The ones coming over from the military have already been adjudicated by the medical review board, so send it to the Veterans Affairs medical officer and he can sign off on it and just pass it to whoever puts numbers to it from the table of disabilities. This is a simple system.
Next, if they happened to turn down a claim, then the appeal process is this. In the U.S. they've started veterans' courts. And yes, they are for criminal cases, but we can have a veterans' court in each province, and either a retired or a sitting judge could sit in each province. On the appeal, your BPA lawyer sits with you and a Veterans Affairs lawyer sits on the other side and argues the benefit of the doubt, just as in a criminal case, beyond the shadow of a doubt.
This is a fair system, allowing for a judge who has spent his whole career on the bench to weigh the evidence presented and then make a decision. This is an evidence-based system that I am proposing.
Lastly, we now have some research that has been done in Kingston, and there is research that has been done all around the world, on veterans' injuries and problems. If that research team happens to find new information or evidence that shows that some of the claims they had turned down are actually legitimate, then we can have a database—this is the age of technology—so that instead of going through the whole process again, the medical doctor in charge of the Veterans Affairs medical review board will just ask them to take all the similar cases out and approve them because new medical evidence has been shown.
This is a very simple system that I'm putting forward. I think this would make the flow to the new Veterans Charter much quicker instead of having people wait four or five months for the first adjudication. Then it goes to the first appeal for another four, five, or six months. Some of these cases go on for six, eight, ten, or twelve years. Recently I was shown one from 1998. We need to speed this up based on medical evidence. That's the way to go. The consensus in the veteran community is that it would be a better process.
I thank you for letting me come and attend today. I hope I provided some solutions instead of just saying this is bad and that is bad. I hope I have provided you with some thought and some solutions, and I hope we can move forward helping those who are seriously in need of help.
I thank you.