Those would include delays in receiving certain services. Receiving “no” as an answer is a big complaint. I want to be clear, “no” is often the right answer. We have to remember that. If there's a committee that knows it well, it's this ACVA committee, after the review and everything you've done for Veterans Affairs. I do thank you for that, because it has helped me. It has to be linked to service. When Mélanie was talking about disability benefits and people not being happy with us, it's true. However, our act is linked to services. So when I get a lot of complaints of “You said no”, well, you know....
I get complaints about timeliness; we talked about that yesterday. The OAG highlighted it in their report that we can be more timely. We've agreed with that at the department. We're working to improve that.
The wait time to see a case manager is a problem in some locations of the country. I mentioned that yesterday also. The average across the country is 1 to 34. Some case managers are managing 50 to 55 veterans.
Now, let's understand that the complexity and the intensity of that work is different. For some veterans it's one phone call a month: “How are you doing on your vocational rehab? Is everything okay?” That's an easy call. However, for a veteran who is struggling with mental illness, or an addiction, or maybe homelessness, it's not quite the same effort. That is a high-intensity effort.
We do try to balance the workload. That said, 50 is too high. We're trying to work at that.
Then there's the one that I don't hear that much about but I'm sure you hear a lot, and that's the pension issue. I hear it because I read all the clippings and everything else, but they don't come to me about that. The ones I get, because I'm the service guy, is more that it takes too long to see a case manager or that I gave a “no” decision.
Those are the two major ones I would get, to be very honest.