Thank you very much for this question.
As I said, two years ago we had an independent assessment done of the department's capacity to have relevant programs to meet the current and future needs of veterans. That assessment was done two years ago. The assessment demonstrated, frankly, that we needed to simplify our way of doing business, and that's the basis on which the transformation of the department has been taking place. That's where we have a five-year plan with deliverables every year to digitalize paper, as the minister said. We are a paper intensive industry because, for a veteran to access benefits and services, these have to be related to his or her military service. So we must have access to the service records that are within the Department of National Defence. We have to go to Library and Archives. We need to become more electronic in this phase of our business.
Overall in our service delivery we have already cut the number of weeks that a veteran has to wait for a decision on a disability pension or disability award. We have reduced by half the time it takes to assess a file for a rehabilitation plan. We have already made some significant improvements in service delivery. As I said before, much more will come by investment in technology, simplifying our policies that have been accumulated over many years, and questioning every piece of work we are doing as to whether or not it adds value to the end result of providing the veterans with the care and services they need. To that extent the staff at Veterans Affairs are involved and are part and parcel of the improvements we are making.
The transformation is based on simplifying our policies and business processes, overhauling our service delivery through the use of technology, and aligning the demographics of the staff in the department to where the veterans live and where they need to have the services. All of that should improve, piece by piece, inch by inch, the services we are providing to veterans.