Veterans Affairs Committee on June 10th, 2013

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Good evening, committee members.

We're past 6:30, so we're going to get started. Mr. Stoffer's here, so we're good.

I want to welcome our guests from Australia. I hope you can hear us okay.

[Shane Carmody, Deputy President, Repatriation Commission, Department of Veterans' Affairs Australia]

Thank you, Chair, we can.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Perfect.

Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), we are resuming our comparative analysis of the services and benefits offered to veterans by Canada and its allies.

I think you were probably made aware of that.

I understand this evening that we have Judith Daniel, Shane Carmody, and Neil Bayles.

Thank you very much for joining us. I'm sure that all jurisdictions take a look at how their services are functioning and where they can make improvements, or how they compare and so on. We really appreciate that and we're glad that we could hook up tonight.

We're not quite sure how much longer we have for this study and how long we're going to be here as the session more or less winds down, but the fact that we have a full complement tonight is a good sign.

We will ask you to make your opening comments. I understand that we have you for about an hour. Is that correct?

[Shane Carmody]

That's correct, yes.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Thank you for that.

We will then go to questions from the committee members within the time we have.

Again, thank you for joining us. Are you all speaking, and in any particular order?

[Shane Carmody]

Chair, I will start.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Perfect.

Mr. Carmody, if you would, please.

[Shane Carmody]

Thank you, Chair.

It's always a pleasure to speak to our Canadian colleagues. We have here in Australia an excellent relationship with Veterans Affairs Canada.

I thought that providing some background about us might help. We currently provide support to about 320,000 veterans. We provide a wide range of services to those veterans, and we hope to spend an hour covering some of those for you today.

I have two of my division heads within the organization here with me. On my right is Mr. Bayles, who is the head of our rehabilitation and support division, which looks after the rehabilitation, compensation, and income support side of the Department of Veterans' Affairs. We spend more than $6 billion Australian a year in this division.

On my left is Ms. Judy Daniel, who is the division head of our health and community services division, which looks after much of the health care side of our organization. In that organization, too, we spend almost $6 billion a year.

These are the two experts running the two largest parts of our business, so I thought what I would do, given the time available, is to leave it to them to briefly introduce themselves, and then go straight to questions.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Thank you.

[Neil Bayles, Acting First Assistant Secretary, Rehabilitation and Support Division, Department of Veterans' Affairs Australia]

My name is Neil Bayles and I am acting first assistant secretary, rehabilitation and support.

My division looks after three main programs: compensation, income support and rehabilitation. Income support is a form of a pension that's paid to veterans and their partners, very similar to a social security pension. It's a significant component of the $6 billion that is spent in my division. It's about $3 billion per annum.

Compensation benefits are essentially compensation for injury, disease, or death related to service in the military. We pay two main types of compensation: payment to the veteran for injury or disease related to service, and we also provide compensation to widows and other dependants where the member's death is related to service.

The third type of main payment that we make is for rehabilitation. We have a number of rehabilitation programs that aim to restore veterans who have been injured or have a disease related to service. We have several components of that rehabilitation to try to get the veteran back to some level of functioning in the world through medical, social, and vocational rehabilitation.

I think that'll do for me for the moment.

[Shane Carmody]

Judy.

[Judith Daniel, First Assistant Secretary, Health and Community Services Division, Department of Veterans' Affairs Australia]

Thank you.

I'm Judy Daniel, first assistant secretary, health and community services division. In the Australian context we are probably the largest single purchaser of health services in Australia. We purchase the full range of health services for our veteran and war-widowed clients from the mainstream health system.

There's one exception to that. In Australia we have a counselling service that is run separately but as part of the department, the veterans counselling service. We have contracts with a wide range of providers and also with state and territorial governments in Australia that are responsible for delivery of parts of the health care.

For the significant areas of medical and pharmaceutical services, our purchasing arrangements shadow the systems and medicare arrangements that exist for the whole of the Australian population. But in other areas, such as community nursing, home care, aids and appliances, and transport, we contract with providers.

The other area of the department's activity that is in my division is our research program, where we work very closely with our partners through the SIF arrangements. Within the research area we're currently looking at some strategic refocusing of our research program.

I'll stop there, but I'll be happy to answer further questions.

[Shane Carmody]

Chair, we'll pass it over to you at this point now that you and the members have an idea of which side of the house to direct your questions to. We'll be delighted to answer any questions you might have.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Thank you very much.

We have three separate entities here—the government, the official opposition, and the third party, the Liberal Party. Each will be asking questions.

We're going to start with the official opposition.

Mr. Chicoine, for five minutes, please.

[Sylvain Chicoine, NDP, Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would like to thank the witnesses from Australia for agreeing to testify about the services they offer to veterans.

In your opening statement, you spoke of incapacity benefits. I also read a few things on your website, and I would like to ask you a few questions about that.

If I understand correctly, when one is an active member of what you call the Australian Defence Force, this benefit covers the difference between a full salary and what is currently being earned. For example, if someone was working full-time, and their disability allowed them to only work part-time, this benefit would cover the difference. On the other hand, if one is a veteran, and that veteran is paid the entire difference, up to 45 weeks, that goes down to 75% afterwards.

What is your reasoning behind this calculation?

[Neil Bayles]

Thank you for the question.

The benefit that you are referring to is what we call incapacity payments. It's made under two of our acts. We have a very complex legislative framework with the three pieces of legislation that we administer. Under two of those three acts we have a payment called incapacity payments. It's only one of a range of benefits available in the name of compensation for injury or disease.

It is a payment made where an ADF member is unable to work as a result of their injury or disease, and it is payable at 100% of their pre-injury salary and allowances, and then it steps down to 75% of their pre-injury salary and allowances after 45 weeks in payment. The step-down is to reflect the fact that there needs to be encouragement to them to undertake rehabilitation. If we paid 100% of their pre-injury salary, there would be no incentive to get back to work.

It is mainly as an incentive, but it also partly reflects the fact that a person who is not working does not have certain costs of going to work, so it's a step down to 75% after 45 weeks.

[Sylvain Chicoine, NDP, Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC]

Very well. Thank you for the answer.

Why do you set it to exactly 45 weeks? Is there a reason to explain that choice?

[Neil Bayles]

I guess the 45 weeks gives some time for a veteran to go through some rehabilitation while they continue to receive the 100%. It probably has no real science behind it, but is something that we inherited from a workers' compensation scheme for Australian public servants, and it is steeped in history. It is currently being reviewed and may change. The government may be interested in some other recommendations before it, to perhaps have a more graduated step down so that it's not such a sudden step from 100% to 75%.

[Sylvain Chicoine, NDP, Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC]

Thank you for your answer.

For veterans, there is also a bank that is the equivalent of 45 times normal working hours. If I understood correctly, every time a disability prevents someone from working, an hour is deducted from that bank. Could you explain this system further?

[Neil Bayles]

Yes. This is a little complex where individuals might have a capacity to earn, and who can receive more than the 75% of their incapacity payments. It is quite a complex set-up. If I could perhaps provide you with some detail of that, it is designed to encourage veterans to continue to rehabilitate and to get back to full-time work. There are some steps if somebody is capable of working half time. We provide a bit of an incentive in there by paying a bit more than 75% so that we encourage them to get back to full-time work. It is a graduated system.

I can provide some detail to you separately from the calculations that are made, but essentially, it's designed to provide an incentive for an individual veteran to continue to rehabilitate and get back to full-time work.

[The Chair, Conservative, Greg Kerr]

Thank you very much.

We now go to the government. We have Ms. Adams, for five minutes, please.

[Eve Adams, Conservative, Mississauga—Brampton South, ON]

Thanks very much.

Thank you for joining us all the way from Australia this evening.

Our committee last year had an opportunity to meet one of your younger veterans who was receiving some peer-support counselling out in British Columbia for some operational stress injuries he was enduring. You must be very proud of this young man. He certainly reflected very well upon Australia. He seemed a very courageous young man.

In addition to the peer-supported counselling that we offer and all sorts of other community opportunities for mental health assistance, our government, through the Department of Veterans Affairs, operates 17 OSI clinics. Each of these clinics is staffed with a team of clinicians, psychiatrists, psychologists, and mental health workers.

Does Australia operate a similar model?

[Judith Daniel]

Thank you.

Perhaps I could make a couple of comments. We run our own counselling service, the Veterans and Veterans Families Counselling Service. That is not a full medical service, but it is a counselling service that offers, obviously, counselling and a range of group programs.

Outside of that, we purchase services within the Australian health system—medical and psychiatric hospital services—and we also fund a range of specific post-traumatic stress programs in around nine hospitals around Australia.

We have a specific counselling service, then arrangements for other health services. We're also doing quite a lot in terms of self-help in the online space in Australia at the moment.

The VVCS is in 15 locations around Australia but also has contract arrangements for counsellors in other parts of the country, because like Canada, Australia is geographically vast and dispersed.

[Eve Adams, Conservative, Mississauga—Brampton South, ON]

Could you expand a little bit about the services that you're providing online?

[Judith Daniel]

At the moment our services are largely information services. We recently launched a PTSD phone app, which is proving to have quite a reasonable uptake. But we have a fairly extensive website with a range of support tools available. We're not at the moment in the space of interactive online services.