Evidence of meeting #13 for Veterans Affairs in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was question.
A recording is available from Parliament.
2:40 p.m.
NDP
Rachel Blaney NDP North Island—Powell River, BC
I have only a few seconds left.
Is there a bonus paid to the provider that is there to show that veterans get off the services sooner?
2:40 p.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Service Delivery Branch, Department of Veterans Affairs
No, there is no bonus. There's a bit of a mix in terms of what you're asking, in terms of rehabilitation service contracts with some specialists who help above and beyond the rehabilitation and the discussions that happen with the case manager.
2:40 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Emmanuel Dubourg
Thank you, Ms. Blaney. Your speaking time is up.
Members of the committee, Mr. Ledwell had to leave at the same time as the minister. However, he stayed until the start of the second part of this meeting to answer a few questions. He now has to leave the meeting.
I would therefore like to thank him on behalf of the committee members and myself.
Mr. Paul Ledwell, deputy minister of Veterans Affairs, thank you for being with us this afternoon.
We're going to continue the meeting with three witnesses, Mr. Harris, Ms. Meunier and Ms. Lantz. We are in good hands.
Ms. Roberts, you now have the floor for five minutes.
2:45 p.m.
Conservative
Anna Roberts Conservative King—Vaughan, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I have a question. I'm trying to understand this. It was stated there are 3,600 employees. We have 11,000 backlogs. Each case takes—and maybe I'm misunderstanding this, so help me, please—45 weeks from start to finish. Is that correct?
2:45 p.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Service Delivery Branch, Department of Veterans Affairs
For the first applications that came in last year, the average turnaround time was 38 weeks.
2:45 p.m.
Conservative
Anna Roberts Conservative King—Vaughan, ON
If we take 11,000 backlogs and divide.... Let me take a step back. There are 3,600 employees. How many of those employees are caseworkers?
2:45 p.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Service Delivery Branch, Department of Veterans Affairs
Of the 3,600 employees, there are 476 caseworkers. The caseworkers don't work on the disability adjudication claims, though.
2:45 p.m.
Conservative
Anna Roberts Conservative King—Vaughan, ON
If we have 476 caseworkers, and we have 11,000 cases in the backlog, we are not going to get through this, in my estimation. Is that correct?
2:45 p.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Service Delivery Branch, Department of Veterans Affairs
Again, you're somewhat mixing two different elements.
We have about 15,000 veterans who are undergoing a rehabilitation program. They're served by case managers. They're served by the 476 case managers. Of the 11,000 files that are in backlog, we have a separate unit that is responsible for disability adjudication. It consists of any number of folks who work on the intake of those applications, the review and processing of those applications and the payment of those applications. It's not the caseworkers who work on those particular files.
2:45 p.m.
Conservative
Anna Roberts Conservative King—Vaughan, ON
If it takes 38 weeks to come up with a decision to help our veterans, would you say that's a reasonable amount of time?
2:45 p.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Service Delivery Branch, Department of Veterans Affairs
According to our service standard, it's clearly not a reasonable amount of time. That's why the government has invested additional resources to be able to help us process those in the backlog, reduce the backlog, which we've been able to do by about 50% over the course of the last 18 months or so, to get it to a state where we'll be in a position to meet our service standard of 16 weeks for a disability adjudication decision 80% of the time.
2:45 p.m.
Conservative
2:45 p.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Service Delivery Branch, Department of Veterans Affairs
That is our published service standard, yes.
2:45 p.m.
Conservative
Anna Roberts Conservative King—Vaughan, ON
How many individuals are we going to need over and above what we currently have to get to that standard?
2:45 p.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Service Delivery Branch, Department of Veterans Affairs
The minister and the deputy spoke about this in the first hour, with the additional hiring. The $140 million that we were speaking about earlier is to hire additional disability adjudication processing staff. Over the course of the next two years and the past two years, we will have hired overall another 518 people above our existing complement to be able to help us reduce the wait times and reduce the files that are pending beyond our service standard. With the 518 folks whom we've been able to add for another two years, I'm confident that we are going to continue to reduce the backlog and have many more of those files adjudicated within the 16-week service standard.
2:45 p.m.
Conservative
Anna Roberts Conservative King—Vaughan, ON
I'm sorry for pounding on this. I come from a business world where FTEs are very important, because we plan for it and we budget for it. Therefore, I need to understand this because it's a little confusing. We have 518 new employees on top of the 476 new employees to help with the backlog. Am I understanding that?
2:45 p.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Service Delivery Branch, Department of Veterans Affairs
Not quite. The 518 employees are on top of the existing disability adjudication staff. I don't have the number of existing disability adjudication staff in front of me. One of my colleagues might be able to help me. It's 518 additional staff to disability adjudication. The 476 case managers that you're referring to is a separate line of business. Everybody works toward the benefit and the well-being of the veteran, but it's a bit of a separate business item.
2:45 p.m.
Conservative
Anna Roberts Conservative King—Vaughan, ON
How long, with your estimation of the FTEs, will it take to ensure that this backlog is finally dealt with?
2:45 p.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Service Delivery Branch, Department of Veterans Affairs
We are projecting that we'll be down to about 5,000 files beyond our 16-week service standard at the end of this fiscal year. What we'd like to be able to do is make sure that we can maintain the 16-week service standard 80% of the time, which is the service standard, for at least a year to declare that we've actually accomplished what we've set out to do, which is get back to meeting our service standard and reducing wait times for veterans who've applied. Within a year we'll be down under 5,000.
It will never be zero beyond the 16-week service standard because it is a 16-week service standard 80% of the time. Sometimes files take longer because of a need to get additional medical information. They're incomplete and a process must be put in place that helps support those individuals.
2:50 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Emmanuel Dubourg
That's right.
Thank you, Ms. Roberts.
Mr. Miao, the floor is now yours for five minutes.
2:50 p.m.
Liberal
Wilson Miao Liberal Richmond Centre, BC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to the witnesses attending today's meeting.
I'd like to ask a question regarding the offices. Over the last two years, I understand offices across the nation serving our veterans have been closed due to the pandemic. Is there a current timeline on when these offices will be reopened to serve our veterans?
2:50 p.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Service Delivery Branch, Department of Veterans Affairs
I can take that question to start and then maybe my colleague, Sara Lantz, would like to join in.
Obviously, the offices have been closed as a result of the COVID pandemic for the safety of veterans and for the safety of Veterans Affairs employees. What I would offer is that even before the pandemic, the vast majority of our interactions with veterans were done virtually, via the phone, via our online service My VAC Account and others. While we have offices across the country, not everybody needed to come into the office and not everybody wanted to come into the office, so we had a very extensive virtual network even before this. We've been able to enhance that over the course of the last little while.
Specifically to your question, we are starting the reoccupancy of our offices across the country at lower-level amounts to start, making sure we're in keeping with the local health provisions and things of that nature. We'll have people back in the offices this month and next and then expand with additional capacity and resource in the offices in the months of July and August, and start up with by-appointment visits from veterans during that time frame as well. Sometime in July and August, the offices will take appointments from veterans to come in and see them.
2:50 p.m.
Liberal
Wilson Miao Liberal Richmond Centre, BC
Do you feel that reopening these offices will help with the backlog and allow VAC to serve our veterans and meet the 80% of the 16-week service standard?
2:50 p.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Service Delivery Branch, Department of Veterans Affairs
I don't know that opening the offices specifically has an impact on the ability of the department to meet the backlog. What it does allow us to do is provide another opportunity to provide in-person service to veterans to be able to meet them. We've been doing that virtually through things like Zoom and MS Teams to be able to assess their needs and speak with them and address any concerns that they have, but it's always good for our case managers and our front-line staff to be able to see veterans in person and talk to them. They can bring in concerns that they have as well, so it's another service channel that provides improved service.