Veterans Affairs committee  Whatever I said was brilliant, and I can never repeat it again. Anyway, sir, it's great to see you again. I think that folks would be very proud to see what the public servants have done amidst this pandemic. The Monday after I spoke to all of you, we had 973 employees who were able to connect as we went to our remote workstations, and very quickly we've reacted to bring folks on, as I mentioned in my opening remarks.

Veterans Affairs committee  I'll just say that in addition to the outreach to the numerous veteran stakeholders, my associate and I had 25 town halls with our employees, and communicating with them directly, again in a crisis, kind of feels like an operational deployment. You cannot communicate enough, so we reach out to them.

Veterans Affairs committee  We've been really fortunate that for the numbers we're trying to hire, we've had about 1,600 applications for just over 300 roles in the department. We're trying to keep our team as happy as possible to reduce attrition. Steven and his team have been extraordinary in now engaging just over 300.

Veterans Affairs committee  Absolutely. I'll ask Steven to get into a little more fidelity here. We are benchmarking with our American and Australian counterparts in terms of those best practices in order to have measurable results across the board. Steven, go ahead.

Veterans Affairs committee  Thank you very much for the question, and welcome to the committee, sir. The one thing we do not control is the applications coming in the front door: neither the volume nor the nature of the injuries or illnesses being claimed.

Veterans Affairs committee  Again, I really appreciate government's support to enable us to hire additional staff, on top of the staff we were able to resource through budget 2018, in order to improve our effectiveness across the board. What I have right now, and what we are working toward, is what government stated back in June.

Veterans Affairs committee  I just want to make sure I get this right: We have veterans who put in multiple claims, so it's 23,000 claims, not 23,000 people. The number of veterans who put in a single claim is very small.

Veterans Affairs committee  I can mention that we're also working very closely with the Canadian Armed Forces and the RCMP, so that before their members become veterans, we are addressing their needs, their claims, and all of their unique medical requirements. Before they become veterans and enter into civil society, it's about closing that virtual seam, closing the gap between our institutions.

Veterans Affairs committee  We share the goal, sir, to eliminate the backlog as soon as possible. We share that goal with you. Again, we appreciate your support in that regard.

Veterans Affairs committee  Thanks very much, sir. As Steven mentioned, the number of files of applications we have in the department is in the 40,000 range, and that includes files that we received yesterday. It includes the files that we received last week. The number of those files that were in excess of 16 weeks at the beginning of this pandemic, when I spoke to the committee on March 10, was about 23,000, if my memory serves correctly, and we can confirm that.

Veterans Affairs committee  Madam, thank you so much for the question and, again, thank you for your support to veterans in the Ottawa community and across the country. I really appreciate it. When I appeared in front of the committee on March 10, I was asked for the plan. The plan had been in process for quite some time.

Veterans Affairs committee  Thanks very much for that question, sir. Welcome to the committee. I'm thrilled to be able to work with you. I'll ask Steven to give an updated data point on this. One of the questions and challenges we have is that, out of compassion, we generally accept all the claims coming in the door, even if there is information missing.

Veterans Affairs committee  Thanks very much. We had a meeting with the Royal Canadian Legion yesterday and did hear of a case in which Steven's team put out a decision in 10 weeks. It's great. I just have to make sure that we try to get everybody to 16 weeks. I would like to reassure you that over this seven and a half months since we last spoke—and before that time—we have moved diligently to operationalize the plan that we handed to you.

Veterans Affairs committee  I will also add that, again, based upon the support we received from government, we have started to hire additional staff who are now in training. Steven's team across the department has expedited and improved the quality of the training so that we can turn these folks into decision-makers.

Veterans Affairs committee  Sir, again, at this point in time, what we've been able to do is operationalize the plan that we've handed out to the committee members, and perhaps in the next go-round, Steven can answer how we have been able to make some progress, even before the additional staff are trained.