What is working? What's working at VRAB is that there are some good, appropriately chosen people as adjudicators, and there are some good staff members there. But I would say that at this time it's a struggle for them to ensure they make the right decisions following the rules. It's a struggle.
I would say that what's working is not as important as what's not working, for the simple reason that people shouldn't have to fight with staff to support their decisions. I think it's important that we look at....
There's a process redesign coming at the board. The members aren't on board with it. They don't even know all the details or what's going on. They say that veterans organizations have been consulted; however, the process of redesign is going to make matters worse, if we don't fix the interference in the independence.
What the process of redesign will do is put every statement of case before the hearing in the hands of our legal unit and quality assurance analysts. They will pretty much predetermine a decision and give their opinion to the members before the hearing, so that the members are going in with a rather biased approach.