Veterans Affairs Committee on Nov. 12th, 2020

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Thank you, Chair.

I want to thank all of the witnesses today. I would like to make a special acknowledgement to Mr. Scott. You have come in front of the committee and shared very personal information; I really respect that. I respect your bravery and I thank you so much for your service.

I'm going to start with Mr. Giroux. First of all, thank you so much for taking up my request to do this report. I found it very enlightening. I am concerned, though, to hear several VAC executives and ministerial staff say that the backlog report doesn't account for changes the department is making.

Section 4 of the report specifically addresses changes in productivity within the department. Could you speak a little bit to that? Please help me understand how what I saw as such a helpful report to help us get to where we need to get, to honour our veterans, is somehow becoming something that is not helpful to the ministry.

[Yves Giroux]

The report we drafted and provided to you and to parliamentarians takes into consideration improvements that were mentioned, such as digitization of files. It takes into consideration what we were told by Veterans Affairs were improvements that they made. It's a bit surprising for me, personally, to hear that there are further improvements the department is undertaking, which will further reduce the backlog, without my office and me having been informed of that while we were drafting the report.

Nonetheless, we know that bringing in new staff, as the report suggests as a way forward, would probably decrease productivity. If you bring new hires into a system as complex as the veterans benefits system, it takes a while for employees to become fully familiar with the process. Even if it is true, and I have no reason to doubt it is true, that Veterans Affairs is implementing further changes to increase the productivity of its staff, bringing in new staff would probably decrease productivity.

That is why we have made the assumption in our report that productivity of employees overall would gradually improve over two years if the department were to implement either of the two scenarios that we mention in the report. Productivity would increase gradually over two years and reach its highest level, which was recorded recently, in 2015-16, after two years, once employees are up to speed.

That, I think, is probably a fairly generous assumption to begin with. If there are further enhancements to the processes that the department has put in place, I am very happy to hear that, because it will benefit veterans who are waiting for applications to be processed. However, I was not given any evidence of that when my team and I were drafting the report.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Thank you. That is extremely helpful for me.

When I look at the report.... The other thing you addressed so well was the idea of service standards. I think what you just told us is very informed of how long it's going to take. Ms. Weatherbie also talked about the fact that it takes a while to train people, and you can't base those high-trained folks...and how fast they can move through the system.

Then we heard Mr. Scott's story as well. What we see, and the workers have been saying it for a long time, is that they are doing their best to keep up, but the service standards are falling because they don't have the appropriate number of people. It depends on which department or which community they are in. There are so many variables.

Can you talk for a minute about those service standards and how long it will take to get to that level of service standards, so we don't see veterans like Mr. Scott falling through the cracks?

[Yves Giroux]

Thank you for the question.

The VAC service standards are that 80% of applications are to be processed within 16 weeks. What we are seeing now is that these service standards are not met and only 37% of applications are processed within these timelines.

Under the two scenarios we have looked at.... In the first scenario, the service standards would be met by February or March 2023, so that's two and a half years from now. In the second scenario, where the backlog would be totally eliminated within 12 months, service standards would be met after 12 months. Depending on when the implementation starts, that would probably be sometime in 2022, 12 months after the changes under scenario two are implemented.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Thank you so much.

Mr. Scott, my last question in this round goes to you.

First of all, I deeply apologize for the experience you've had to live through. We see the service standards. I don't want to blame the workers. I think the workers are doing the best they can, and they have not gotten the support they require, which means the impact is felt by veterans.

Can you talk a little about the timelines of how long you've been waiting? You talked about being dropped off again and again by your case manager. Can you speak a little bit about what that feels like?

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

We're almost at time, but I will allow for a quick response, please.

[Charles Scott]

Thank you, ma'am. That's a very good question.

I have been waiting for at least two years for the career impact supplement. I currently have two claims in the backlog, for post-concussion syndrome and traumatic brain injury, which is attributed to mefloquine toxicity. That could take years. They are giving me 60 days to get a neurology examination. That doesn't really work, especially when we have COVID. Trying to find a neurologist takes a long time.

I hope that answered the question on the time that I had.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

Thank you very much, sir.

MP Carrie, I believe you have five minutes.

[Colin Carrie, Conservative, Oshawa, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank all the excellent witnesses today.

I want to start and get right into it with Mr. Scott. You said that the service delivery system is “broken”. I think Mr. Walbourne said the system isn't fixable. Madam Weatherbie, when she talked about the plan that's on the table, mentioned that it is an “inadequate” plan. She stated that it's like “addressing an amputation with a band-aid”. That statement right there gave me a huge visual of how bad this is.

My colleague asked you a bit about the pre-approval process. If I understand correctly, you said it might be good for a pilot project. From your experience, do you see any downside to having a pre-approval process at all?

[Charles Scott]

Thank you for the question, sir.

A downside to a quicker approval process—

[Colin Carrie, Conservative, Oshawa, ON]

It's pre-approval.

[Charles Scott]

I believe that is going to be a personal question. Would that assist me? It may, potentially. It could also increase the backlog. There are a lot of veterans right now who have abandoned their applications because they are just unable to navigate through the processes and, unfortunately, the bureaucracy.

Perhaps it may assist. I haven't really had anything that was streamlined, so it's difficult for me to answer that question completely.

[Colin Carrie, Conservative, Oshawa, ON]

Okay. I appreciate that.

Maybe I could go to Mr. Giroux with the same question I asked Mr. Scott.

Mr. Scott said some veterans have abandoned the process because it's taking so long for them. First, do you have any idea of what the rejection rate would be for applications?

Also, do you see any positives, advantages or disadvantages, to this pre-approval rate? It seems the government can do this type of thing. My colleague mentioned the CERB and how easy it was. Basically, it was just click and send. The government was able to get the funds out to Canadians very quickly, even after CRA mentioned that perhaps some people weren't even qualified for them.

Could you please comment on the pros and cons of pre-approval? Also, what would be the acceptance rate for these claims for veterans, if you do have those numbers?

[Yves Giroux]

Unfortunately, I don't have the numbers for the rejection rates off the top of my head. The department for sure has that information, I hope. Maybe I can get it for you after the meeting.

With respect to the pros and cons of pre-approvals, the pros are quite obvious to everybody who is listening in today. It is faster approvals, so it's decisions and money flowing into the hands of the applicants much faster. The cons, unfortunately, are a lack of certainty to a certain extent, with people not knowing whether there would be an audit on their case after the fact. From the government's perspective, there would probably be difficulty in recovering amounts that could be overpaid in cases of applications that are not founded or that are not eligible.

These are the main pros and cons that I would see. If I had half an hour, I could probably come up with a longer list of pros and cons, but off the top of my head, these are the main elements that come to mind.

[Colin Carrie, Conservative, Oshawa, ON]

I think everyone around the table would like to come up with solutions. That's why I was very impressed with the witnesses here today.

Perhaps we could dig down on that a little more. If we had a pre-approval process, like some of the veterans organizations have suggested, and it had a verification aspect to it after the fact, would that help as far as pre-approval goes? Would you see a necessity, for example, for full-time equivalents? Would we have to increase those, or could it be handled within the system?

[Yves Giroux]

Based on my experience at the CRA, you can devote the same number of resources to an audit-based system where you approve everything automatically or you take the application at face value and then you audit. It depends on the strength and the coverage of the audits that you want to undertake. You can do that with fewer resources if you're willing to take a bit more risk, or you can use the same resources if you want to minimize the risk of overpayment. There are multiple models when it comes to pre-approvals and then audits after the fact. It depends on the coverage rate that the government is comfortable with or wants to undertake.

When it comes to pre-approvals there's a variety of models, from very few resources devoted to audits, to virtually the same levels if you really want to overlook or audit as many applications as possible. I think it would be more reasonable to have fewer resources to be fair to the process.

I'll stop it there because I see Mr. Chair with his hand up.

[Colin Carrie, Conservative, Oshawa, ON]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

We'll now move over to MP Fillmore, please, for five minutes.

[Andy Fillmore, Liberal, Halifax, NS]

Thank you very much, Chair. I appreciate that.

Warm thanks to all of the witnesses for coming and joining us today.

I want to ask a question about understanding the processing delays. I'd like to hear from the witnesses on a question that I put to the deputy minister at our last meeting. VAC service standards indicate that in normal circumstances, as we talked about today, 80% of the decisions should be made in the first 16 weeks. It would appear that we're kind of left to wonder what constitutes normal circumstances, given that, according to the deputy minister, the very first backlog appeared back in the 1920s, it seems.

In any case, we've heard a lot about how more staff and better streamlined decision-making are important, but we have to understand also the specific reason that a claim might not meet that standard beyond the bureaucratic staffing issue that may exist. There are three things I'd like to ask you about. Could you describe what you feel normal circumstances would be under the VAC standard? What's the reality in terms of why fewer people than 80% were moved through the processing? What steps do you think VAC could be taking to better serve those veterans who have a claim that would take longer than the average—that 20% or, as the case may be, larger than 20%, that go beyond normal circumstances?

Can you help us out there? I ask the question to each of the witnesses and to whoever would like to dive into it.

[Simon Coakeley]

Perhaps I could start. When I was the chief pensions advocate at Veterans Affairs back in the nineties, we were dealing with backlogs back then, so it doesn't surprise me that we were dealing with backlogs in the twenties as well.

Basically, if you want to talk about a normal claim that could be decided reasonably quickly, you would be talking about a claim where you had “adequate” evidence of a disability—I put adequate in quotes, because to a certain extent adequate is in the eye of the beholder—that you were able to link back to military service or, in the case of the RCMP, RCMP service. The challenge with that is getting the documents together. The evidence of the disability is getting a doctor's opinion. Mr. Scott talked about his requirement to get a neurological assessment, which is very difficult at the best of times and is even worse now. There's the level of proof the system needs in order to accept that the medical diagnosis is acceptable, whether it needs to be from a specialist or from a family doctor, and then the link back to what your service was.

I think some of that can be done somewhat presumptively. It's not surprising that people with military service have hearing problems, because they've been exposed to loud noises over the course of their career. It's not surprising that people who jump out of airplanes or tanks may have knee problems. Some of the other areas are a little more complicated, but there is work that could be done there. The problem is even, in my own experience, making sure you have a normal file. You need all of that information. You need the flow of information from the Canadian Armed Forces into Veterans Affairs. You need the flow of information from the doctors.

You could also look, I would say, to what goes on in other countries and to what goes on in the workers’ compensation world. There are certain things where we know, if a person is exposed to this, then that is the natural result. It's not rocket science.

[Andy Fillmore, Liberal, Halifax, NS]

If anyone else would like to answer, please go ahead.

Mr. Scott.

[Charles Scott]

Thank you, sir. I'll give a short answer.

In terms of what's happening now in a lot of situations, I can use me as an example. With the change in legislation on April 1, a lot of the authority was removed from the regional level and placed in centralized units, such as the diminished earning capacity unit out of Winnipeg. They are completely removed from their veteran clients. There's no context. My case manager operates very much on a secluded island with no email or phone number to contact outside of the veterans service team. That really prevents and blocks communication interdepartmentally.

As well, the appeals process is far too gruelling for veterans and their families to go through. It needs to be streamlined.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

Thank you very much.

We go now to MP Desilets for two and a half minutes.

[Luc Desilets, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

This is a very informative discussion and not necessarily because it seems to coincide with our position. My sense is that we are making progress when it comes to the automatic approval of disability claims.

I have a question for Mr. Coakeley, but I want to say something first.

By putting up with a backlog like this, we end up accepting the unacceptable. You can argue that it goes back to 1834, but that does not make it any more acceptable. The figures we are seeing today bring to mind the pandemic and the number of COVID-19 cases. No one is surprised anymore to hear that Quebec's daily case count stands at a thousand. Why am I comparing the two? Because a backlog of 40,000 claims is not okay. If the current model isn't working, it's time to consider doing things differently. When your approach to a problem doesn't help, you change the approach. That was a brief comment to preface my question.

Mr. Coakeley, as you mentioned, research is an important part of identifying systemic problems. It can lead to better practices and policies. That is certainly an area we need to focus on to reduce this backlog—which, may I add, is totally unacceptable.

You talked about the need to close research gaps. We disregard the scientific dimension and research carried out by countries comparable to ours. Could you please elaborate on that?

[Simon Coakeley]

Thank you, Mr. Desilets.

Research gaps definitely exist, as they do in other fields. Canada isn't the biggest country in the world, so the pool we have to draw on for research can be very small in some areas. Even though Canada clearly has research gaps, that does not mean our counterparts in the United States, England, Australia and New Zealand do not have relevant experience we can leverage. I gave the example of our Five Eyes partners because we work together on so many initiatives.

I also want to stress the importance of carrying out targeted research. I mentioned women veterans, who suffer from different illnesses. Military service has different repercussions on women. There is little research on the repercussions of military service on women and other groups. The Department of Veterans Affairs needs to have access to quality data.