I'd like to respond to your comments. The modernization task force and the development of a new Veterans Charter was supported in principle, as we've stated. However, it was an exclusive, restrictive, narrowly focused, non-transparent development that did not give appropriate time for full discussion within the veterans' community and did not reflect the stated concerns of veterans and Senate and Commons committees and subcommittees. The veterans supported the new Veterans Charter with the understanding that regular reviews would be part of the process and that changes would be implemented.
The department has not adopted any of the 200-plus recommendations made by politicians of this committee, the special needs advisory group, the Royal Canadian Legion plus other veterans groups, the DND ombudsman, and the VA ombudsman. VAC repeatedly ignores input from external sources, even those it created to advise the department, because the people who wrote the new Veterans Charter consider it perfect and will not change it.
For example, this committee created a report concerning the VA ombudsman that was unanimously supported by everybody on this committee. That report was rejected by the department.
What we have here is not a temporary problem. You can go back 60 years since the Pension Act was revised after World War II and you'll see that a series of shortcomings can be laid at the feet of that department. There are World War II veterans who are still not getting benefits.
A senior bureaucrat in the department stated to the Senate committee in 2006 that 275,000 World War II veterans and dependants were not receiving the benefits they needed to do the things that enabled them to stay in their own home. That's the veterans independence program. This committee was told in 2006 that it would take as much as $500 million to give that program to all those veterans.
It comes down to the fact that it costs too much money to implement all the programs that existed prior to the new Veterans Charter. Within the department, the new Veterans Charter was considered a good replacement because it would cost less money. I hope you understand that. This is a legacy of shortcomings over more than 60 years within a single government department.