Evidence of meeting #74 for Veterans Affairs in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was military.
A recording is available from Parliament.
11:40 a.m.
Liberal
Emmanuella Lambropoulos Liberal Saint-Laurent, QC
Thank you for that.
Now I'd like to ask Ms. Spinks a question.
I'm assuming you're in a miliary family. Is that correct?
11:40 a.m.
Liberal
Emmanuella Lambropoulos Liberal Saint-Laurent, QC
No? Okay, never mind.
I was going to ask you more. Maybe you know a lot about people who are.
What services have the people you know received if they're not directly in the military—if they are members of the family—and how can we improve these services?
11:40 a.m.
Chief Executive Officer, Vanier Institute of the Family
What we're hearing from military families—and we do have a significant military veteran family initiative under way—is that many of them are reluctant to access services delivered by DND or VAC because they don't want to get labelled or, as somebody described it, lost in the vortex. They'll try to avoid it. Sometimes, therefore, they'll end up inadvertently disqualifying themselves from getting it.
Family members go externally to family physicians, to community services, to all kinds of service supports, and there is no awareness or understanding of the military. Sometimes you'll get contradictory information between one spouse and the other, with one who's gone into VAC. That can be really challenging. Family members don't have access to the same kinds of information or supports that the military member has. That can sometimes cause confusion.
Just to pick up on what Mark was saying, families have shared with us that when you are identified as ill or injured or medically released, everybody is treated the same. Yet there is nothing the same about any two injuries or any two illnesses. Some are episodic. Some are long term and get better over time. Some are permanent and will be the same way all the time as Mark described. Some are chronic; they're just there and will be there forever. Some are progressive and will get worse over time.
So the need to provide evidence as to your medical condition varies depending on how you're ill or injured. We just don't have really good mechanisms yet to distinguish. It's just sort of one lump category.
11:40 a.m.
NDP
Gord Johns NDP Courtenay—Alberni, BC
Thank you all for your important testimony and the important work that you're doing. We're very grateful for your service.
Mark, thank you for coming and sharing your story. Clearly it's deeply disturbing that the government has failed you so miserably.
What is VAC saying when you bring this to them, about why they are asking you the same questions? What is the response?
11:40 a.m.
As an Individual
I have had several different case managers in the Calgary area. I feel like I am a high-needs case. I feel like my case managers are probably overworked or overloaded with cases. They have a lot of members who they're dealing with who may not have as complex a file as mine. I think I tend to get lost sometimes in that file, where the omission of a signature can lead to a cessation of my benefits within days. Even though I'm doing everything by the letter that I require for my vocational rehab services, I'm constantly quoted legislation or “You have to do this”, “There are time frames”, “You have to carry on doing this”, and “Well, this was missed.” The fact is that the onus is so heavily put on the veteran. I am the one who has to essentially guide my way through the system. I'm not feeling a lot of help from my case manager. I'm almost feeling that my case manager is my adversary and that I constantly have to have parts that are part of the programming bookmarked on my phone. That way if I have an argument with my case manager, I can go to it and look at it so I know exactly what I'm entitled to.
The fact is that I go and I say, “Hey, am I entitled to this? Can I get this? Can I get that?” It's never me showing up and having a case manager say, “Hello, Mark. Here's the list of services you're eligible for.” That has never been the case for me. Often I have to find out what the services are, and then I have to scrap as hard as I can to get those. It's a grind. It feels to me like a lot of veterans get dissuaded. They get disheartened by dealing with the system, and they eventually give up and then disappear off of everybody's radar. That's why I feel like there are probably a lot of individuals falling through the cracks.
11:45 a.m.
NDP
Gord Johns NDP Courtenay—Alberni, BC
What recommendations do you have, Mark, moving forward, for yourself, for other reservists this may happen to, for service members? Maybe you can shed some light on that.
11:45 a.m.
As an Individual
I think that case management needs to change. I think complex cases probably need a little bit more focus. I feel like there needs to be a culture shift at Veterans Affairs to have the support there in place, rather than “I am going to deny your benefits. Something is missing.” The restrictions there are so set in stone. The fact that my omission of a signature, or what have you, can render all my financial services void and essentially leave me out in the cold is too stringent and too restrictive, and it leads to a lot of problems. The distress I went through from receiving that letter was quite high, and I made every phone call I could in western Canada. I interrupted meetings, but I didn't care because that was the level I had to go through to ensure the continuation of my benefits. I feel like, yes, there needs to be a culture change for sure.
11:45 a.m.
NDP
Gord Johns NDP Courtenay—Alberni, BC
Thank you. Thank you for sharing. Hopefully your testimony will lead to some changes.
11:45 a.m.
NDP
Gord Johns NDP Courtenay—Alberni, BC
My next question is for Mr. Thorne.
Mr. Thorne, thank you for the work that you're doing for veterans across Canada, your tremendous work.
Of the four types of programs you offer veterans—connection, communication, self-maintenance, and career-related programs—are there any that have been more successful than others?
11:45 a.m.
Executive Director, National Operations, Veterans Transition Network
I think that perhaps you may be confusing Veterans Transition Network with another transition-based organization, perhaps Transition to Communities.
11:45 a.m.
Executive Director, National Operations, Veterans Transition Network
We offer one program, the veterans transition program. Within that, we have a variety of different focal points, but we don't have distinct programs. They're all contained within one program.
11:45 a.m.
NDP
Gord Johns NDP Courtenay—Alberni, BC
Maybe you can just expand on how we can better support your organization, how the federal government can better support you in terms of funding. You talked about how two-thirds of your funding is coming from the community. Maybe you could expand on that.
11:45 a.m.
Executive Director, National Operations, Veterans Transition Network
Yes, absolutely.
When the organization was incorporated and we wrote our five-year strategic plan, which we just came to the end of last year and we're now entering our next strategic plan, one of the main missions was that the organization would always draw funding from Canadians, from corporations, from the charitable sector, essentially because a part of our mission statement was that it is not just the government's responsibility, but also Canada's responsibility to care for these individuals because they have served us. That's certainly something we're going to continue to do.
It's great that the funding from Veterans Affairs Canada is accessible. It's been a huge part of helping us grow across Canada, but a lot of our difficulties in dealing with Veterans Affairs as a service provider are very similar to what Mark has spoken about in terms of the accessibility.
We know that the support is there. In my previous work I've had contact with many fantastic case managers who are well intentioned and want to do well for their clients, but they are hamstrung by a very bureaucratic system that requires a lengthy process to generate a pre-authorization for someone to attend our program.
Two weeks ago a veteran called who wanted to attend our program. It was starting in two weeks. He approached his case manager and essentially the case manager told him there was no time to generate a pre-authorization within two weeks, so he couldn't go. The veteran became quite distressed. We called him back and told him that regardless of what happened, we were going to put him in the program whether it was on Veterans Affairs' dime or on our dime from the money we raise from the public.
About 50%, maybe fewer, of the veterans who have a claim with Veterans Affairs that would extend to cover our program do not get an approval in time for their attendance to be funded. That's been a big difficulty for us.
Whenever Veterans Affairs' funding may be available for a veteran to take our program, we do our best to get that funding because that means more of the community funding that we raise will go to more programs and to more individuals who have not approached Veterans Affairs, which again is about two-thirds of our force clients.
In terms of assisting our organization if anything can be done to make that approval process easier so we can turn more of these potentially funded clients into funded clients, that would be enormous in helping us expand our reach and provide more of the funding from the community to those who haven't been to Veterans Affairs, because there is a lot of need there. When we don't get these approvals turned around, that limits our ability to help veterans.
11:50 a.m.
Liberal
Darrell Samson Liberal Sackville—Preston—Chezzetcook, NS
Thank you.
Thank you, all, for your presentations.
Of course our committee is focused on identifying the real issues in the transition, and we have to get it 100% right.
Mark, I want to thank you for your service. I know that many people thank you, but sincerely, hearing your story personally is extremely important, and I appreciate your being able to come here to share that story with us today. It's extremely important, and we're hopeful this will lead to more success.
I'll ask you specific questions and maybe you can help us.
You have a certain amount of time. If you were taking a decision as far as time, what is the time? Should there be a time there, and to what extent?
11:50 a.m.
As an Individual
I hate to set a time in stone. When the veteran is ready to make that transition to vocational rehab, I think that needs to be the biggest factor. Because if you are not ready to go to school, you're not going to succeed. It's a whole different world out there. The military is much like school, but it is a much more rigid, different, and difficult school. It sets you up very well to be a student because the military has a set of protocols in place to ensure that you will learn and that you will take your education seriously, however, to get through those steps.
I remember it was quite difficult to transition to my initial phase in school. I had this wild and crazy experience in my young adult years that people around me did not have, so I feel there needs to be a decision. Whatever that time frame is, it needs to be lengthened, and it needs to be when the veteran is ready.
Who makes that determination? I don't want to say the veterans themselves, but I don't know how you would go about doing that.
11:50 a.m.
Liberal
Darrell Samson Liberal Sackville—Preston—Chezzetcook, NS
But if you think of that, send us your opinion because if you're taking a decision I'd like to know what you think.
11:50 a.m.
As an Individual
There should be no caveat on time. As soon as a guy is ready to hit the ground running and get into vocational training—if it's right away or if, say, it's a year or two down the road, or further—then that's when he should be able to access that program. It should be available for his lifetime and not just for the window outside of leaving.
11:50 a.m.
Liberal
Darrell Samson Liberal Sackville—Preston—Chezzetcook, NS
I have a lot of difficulty understanding the many times that you have to repeat the same information. What is wrong with our tracking system? In this day and age, we should be stars at that and yet we don't know anything about specific cases and all the ins and outs around that for years and years....
11:50 a.m.
As an Individual
I think it's just that when it comes to benefits, every time there's a new benefit you're forced to reapply from square one, as if your injury has not existed. For example, let's say I need something new. I have to start at square one again and say, well, this is my long laundry list of injuries, yes, it happened in a special duty area, it happened overseas, yes, this happened....
That has been particularly onerous. There was one point when every six months I had to provide an update on my position, which included, yes, a doctor's note saying my legs were missing. I've been assured that will no longer be the case for the remainder of my vocational rehab services, but I have the feeling that I'll probably get a notice saying that I have to see my doctor to prove again that my feet are missing.
