Veterans Affairs Committee on Oct. 27th, 2020

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

I call this meeting to order.

Welcome to meeting number two of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Veterans Affairs. Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2) and the motion adopted by the committee just moments ago, the committee is commencing its study of the backlog of disability benefit claims at the Department of Veterans Affairs.

Today's meeting is taking place in a hybrid format pursuant to the House order of September 23, 2020. The proceedings will be made available via the House of Commons website. The webcast will always show the person speaking rather than the entirety of the committee.

To ensure an orderly meeting, I would like to outline a few rules to follow.

Members and witnesses may speak in the official language of their choice. Interpretation services are available for this meeting. You have the choice at the bottom of your screen of either “Floor”, “English” or “French”.

To the members participating in person: proceed as you usually would when the whole committee is meeting in person in a committee room. Keep in mind the directives from the Board of Internal Economy regarding masking and health protocols. I don't think we have anybody in the room today.

Before speaking, please wait until I recognize you by name. If you are on the video conference, please click the microphone icon to unmute yourself.

I will give a reminder that all comments by members and witnesses should be addressed through the chair. When you are not speaking, your mike should be on mute.

With regard to the speaking list, the committee clerk and I will do the best we can to maintain that, but if you do wish to put up your hand, please do so. Through the Zoom channel, we will keep an eye on that as well.

Now it's my pleasure to welcome back the witnesses to this committee. We have General (Retired) Walter Natynczyk, deputy minister at Veterans Affairs Canada, and Steven Harris, assistant deputy minister at Veterans Affairs Canada for service delivery.

Witnesses, you will have five minutes for your opening remarks, and then we will get right into questions. The first questioner we have is MP Brassard.

General, the next five minutes are all yours, sir.

[General, Retired) Walter Natynczyk (Deputy Minister, Department of Veterans Affairs]

Thanks very much.

Mr. Chair, ladies and gentlemen, it is a pleasure to be back with you again. I recall that it was on March 10 that I attended this meeting. I went back to Charlottetown for the retirement of Michel Doiron, who retired that Friday, March 13, and so the pandemic began.

We are certainly living in interesting times. Canada's veterans and the organizations that serve them face extraordinary challenges in the face of this global pandemic. In what is now seven and a half months of this crisis, Veterans Affairs Canada continues to learn and to adapt to support the needs of our veterans and their families.

We began making adjustments as soon as the pandemic was declared last spring, creating a working group with our veteran stakeholders and making adjustments to how we can enable veteran well-being during this crisis. In addition, we shifted to having our employees work remotely from sanctuary, while ensuring that they could deliver services and programs by digital and virtual means. We invested in additional networking resources and established remote working procedures.

We learned how to use tools just like this, and learned new ways of working. Using these tools, we continue to connect directly with our veterans and their families, with veterans' associations and with stakeholders, hosting numerous gatherings of our veterans and stakeholders. Our folks continue to reach out to thousands of veterans who are case-managed, frail or potentially vulnerable due to the nature of their injuries, their illnesses or their circumstances to determine how we may assist them during this crisis. We have striven to ensure that our veterans and their families continue receiving the services and benefits they need for their well-being.

Since the start of the pandemic, we have continued to process and approve applications and to ensure that funds are dispensed through the disability and financial benefits programs. We have also adapted our benefits and services to align with public health protocols. For example, we've extended telehealth coverage to include not only mental health but physiotherapy, occupational therapy and other treatments. In addition, the cost of personal protective equipment needed for our veterans to receive treatment is being reimbursed.

With regard to the wait times—I know we're going to focus on that here today—we continue to advance in accordance with the plan we shared with members of the committee to honour our objective to achieve the service standard and clear the backlog.

In this 75th year after the end of World War II, we have also continued to recognize the service and sacrifices of those who served our nation, and we have moved to a virtual, remote event and launched new commemorative videos and podcasts delivered by digital media.

In conclusion, Veterans Affairs Canada continues to learn and to adapt in this new operational environment, and we will strive to enable the well-being of our veterans and families with care, compassion and respect.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

Thank you, General.

Up first, as I said, is MP Brassard, for six minutes.

The next six minutes are all yours, sir.

[John Brassard, Conservative, Barrie—Innisfil, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, General. It's good to see you again back at the committee. I always appreciated the candour of our discussions in the past.

Steve, it's good to see your again. I know we spoke last week, and it's great to have you in front of the committee as anticipated.

I want to start by focusing on the Parliamentary Budget Officer's report.

The situation within Veterans Affairs and the increase in the backlogged cases didn't happen as a result of COVID. We saw a trend even before COVID hit that indicated an increase in these cases. Within the Parliamentary Budget Officer's report, he spoke specifically about how a lot of these backlogs could be reduced and, in some cases, even eliminated.

Based on his report, can you indicate to me whether you're in agreement with his assessment or not?

[Gen (Ret'd) Walter Natynczyk]

Sir, thank you very much for the question, and it's great to see you again as well.

I would say that we agree with the report and that we need to have additional staff horsepower to assist us here over the next while as we continue innovating, changing our processes and using all of the digital technology we can, while at the same time ensuring that we can exercise the whole aspect of giving the benefit of the doubt and also of ensuring compassion for the needs of our veterans.

[John Brassard, Conservative, Barrie—Innisfil, ON]

I want to focus on benefit of the doubt for a moment, because that becomes a very interesting part of this claims process.

We have had veterans who, in many cases, have been severely impacted as a result of COVID, with an inability, for example, to provide doctors' notes. We're hearing about recent cases of that, and we heard that department officials were warned back in March—and the minister himself was warned back in March—that this could be a possibility.

In the context of giving the benefit of the doubt, how has the department reacted to those benefit claims, given the circumstances in which veterans and their families are now finding themselves?

[Gen (Ret'd) Walter Natynczyk]

This is the real value of our outreach to the stakeholder groups, especially the COVID-19 working group, through which we had the co-chairs of all of the advisory committees come together. This is an aspect they have told us about throughout.

We have adjusted the kinds of documentation veterans do require. Again, through legislation and regulation, we will support veterans in need who have suffered an injury as a result of service. We've adapted a number of our document requirements in this regard.

I'll ask Steven Harris to amplify on this issue.

[Steven Harris, Assistant Deputy Minister, Service Delivery, Department of Veterans Affairs]

Thank you, Deputy.

We've continued to do a number of things over this period of time. Of course, there are a number of files with us already, which we continue to work on and process as additional veterans may come forward and look to apply during this period of time as well.

Veterans can continue to apply to the program. Even if they're not able to get in to see a doctor at this point in time, that documentation can follow. There is a requirement to validate the service that's related to the disability, illness or injury that's being claimed. There's also a requirement to assess the impact of that illness or injury on individuals.

In cases of palliative or urgent needs, we have been able to make some exceptions and make things move a little bit more quickly. In other cases, people can continue to submit applications and have additional documentation follow as they are able to get to a health provider or a physician, to be able to make some of those adjustments as well.

For the longer term, we are looking at additional adjustments to make the process even easier for individuals.

[John Brassard, Conservative, Barrie—Innisfil, ON]

I want to focus next on efficiency and the effectiveness.

General, you referenced the fact that because of COVID, many workplaces have had to adjust. Can you tell me how many employees of VAC are actually still physically working in the buildings and how many are not and are actually working at home? How does VAC measure the effectiveness and the efficiency of the employees to deal with veterans and their families for adjudication and case claims?

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

You have about one minute, sir.

[Gen (Ret'd) Walter Natynczyk]

At this point in time we are following the guidance of the Treasury Board, which is the employer. Our employees are encouraged to remain working remotely during this period of time and to abide by the public health guidance.

In Veterans Affairs we kept all of our buildings accessible. While we are continuing to put in physical barriers and follow all of the protocols, we have set a maximum of 10% occupancy on location as these adjustments are occurring. Once we have those conditions in place in accordance with occupational health and safety, we will increase accessibility.

Keep in mind that people who have critical and essential functions have been going to work right from the outset. We could provide you a picture in time, in terms of the number of people in the offices, but it is minimal. It is under 100, and we have a department of over 3,500 employees.

However, what was interesting was to see how quickly we were able to use this digital access across the board so that we have well above 95% of our department fully operational and working. We've been comparing what a normal year looked like in the past, vis-à-vis sick leave and other leaves, to this year with sick leave and special leave. We've actually seen a reduction in sick leave, whereas some folks who are managing the family at home—the kids and all those kinds of things—have had to take the special leave, but I'll tell you that they are so committed that we have even had employees who took this leave because they have pre-school kids at home, no day care and those kinds of things, and they still are being productive across the board.

I'll ask Steven to talk to efficiency and productivity.

[Steven Harris]

In 30 seconds, what I'd add is that the disability program is one of those in which we are able to very easily measure output in terms of the kinds of decisions and the amounts of payments that are going out the door to our veteran clients.

With the adaptation at the onset, there were some early changes that we needed to make in terms of ensuring that everybody was set up to work remotely. I would be pleased to indicate at this point that we are producing at a rate, at this moment, that is equivalent to where we were before. We need to do more and do better—that's what is outlined in the wait-times initiative as well—but we're matching our output at this point to where we were pre-pandemic.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

Thank you very much.

I'm sorry, guys; I have to get better at the muting and unmuting thing. I was trying to cut off Mr. Natynczyk and wasn't very good at it when I was on mute. Maybe I'll do better this time.

Mr. Casey, you're up next.

[Sean Casey, Liberal, Charlottetown, PE]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

It's nice to see you, General and Mr. Harris.

Mr. Harris, I understand you're the new Doiron. Is that right? That's not what they call you, though. I know that.

[Steven Harris]

Not in front of me.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Sean Casey, Liberal, Charlottetown, PE]

Are you based in the national headquarters?

[Steven Harris]

I'm based here in Charlottetown, yes.

[Sean Casey, Liberal, Charlottetown, PE]

I want to start with some testimony that came before the committee on March 12 from the president of the Union of Veterans Affairs Employees, Virginia Vaillancourt.

Just to set the context, I understand that the workforce at Veteran Affairs Canada has no fewer than five unions representing it.

I wonder if you could break down for me the representation of the employees who are directly involved in the backlog and clearing the backlog, just so that we can get an appreciation of which union represents which group of employees.

[Gen (Ret'd) Walter Natynczyk]

Thank you very much, sir. It's great to see you again.

The adjudication process involves membership from several unions. The vast majority of our employees at Veterans Affairs come from the Public Service Alliance of Canada, and in Veterans Affairs they are referred to as the Union of Veteran Affairs Employees, and that's who Virginia Vaillancourt represents.

That is the majority of our employees, and for the most part, they are performing functions in adjudication such as administrative decision-making. That is to say that a veteran might present with a straightforward injury such as musculoskeletal, ankle, knee, hip, or back, or hearing and tinnitus. It's a straightforward situation; there's a table of disabilities, and they're able to make decisions.

At the same time, there are many veterans who present with more complex injuries, and therefore the case would have to be considered by a medical professional. Medical professionals are covered by a different union, and I believe that is the Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada, and the acronym is PIPSC. There are also payments made to veterans, and that is the union that represents the financial officers. There is another union that has occupational therapists and another union with lawyers from the legal profession.

This is a multi-faceted team that comes together to make the decisions in terms of adjudication. With regard to the UVAE, they are prominent members of that pan-professional team.

I'll go back to you, sir.

[Sean Casey, Liberal, Charlottetown, PE]

Thank you.

If I understand correctly, the more complex cases are represented by PIPSC and not UVAE. Would it be fair to say that the bulk of the backlog is in these more complex cases, as opposed to the fairly routine ones for which a chart is used, as you described?

[Gen (Ret'd) Walter Natynczyk]

I'll ask Steven to chime in here, but to achieve better efficiency, as laid out in the plan, we have put together veteran benefit teams that match administrative decision-makers and medical professionals into teams, so you're dealing with both unions in this regard.

The other aspect is that very rarely does a veteran have a single condition that might be simple. It might be simple, but then there'll be internal medicine, so that enhances the complexity.

[Steven Harris]

Just to build on that point, the reality is there's a mixture of these kinds of disability files and disability decisions that are waiting in the volume of pending applications we have. Some of them are much more complex and require reference to a health professional, likely a nurse, but they may also be referred to a doctor for further consultation as well in the case of multiple disabilities or complex files.

As identified through the wait-times initiatives, we've looked to build and continue to build additional tools that take these decisions out of the medical world and make sure they can be made at the first level of review and decision-making so that they do not need to be referred to the medical world for additional looks or reviews.

There are a mixture of these kinds of files that exist across our top five conditions that—

[Sean Casey, Liberal, Charlottetown, PE]

Thank you, Mr. Harris. I've got to get in one more question before we—

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

Make it a very short question, Sean.