Thank you very much, Chair.
Welcome, Minister. I appreciate your being here and answering our questions.
You've mentioned the importance to you of doing better with efficiencies to improve things—in other words, to do better. So I have three things that I just would like to mention for you to consider.
I have been on this committee since I became a member in 2015. I think I am the matron of the community now. I have a lot of good friends who are veterans, and they talk to us. Again, this is where we really need to go to get our information for how to do better.
I would say that what veterans are saying is that they should not have to go through the effort of re-proving their injuries and conditions over and over and over again just because VAC changes policies and procedures. There has to be a way, once they have shared the information and their case managers have their information.... It is there, so any benefit of the doubt and any information they have given should be once and for all. That is how they feel.
I see you indicated that you disagreed with the report's finding on the new contract for the administration of Veteran Affairs Canada rehabilitation program, where we found there was a lack of communication in consulting with veterans. I can assure you that it is not a good take on that situation and that a lot was missed. Our veterans in this circumstance, after facing backlogs and then suddenly having this change of third party services, think it was a mistake. That is just my perspective from their perspective.
Also my understanding is that, regarding the backlog, when a veteran's file is missing documents and the department has to go back to the veteran, that takes their case out of that backlog number. I would check that out because it's not accurate. It's not right. At that point, Veterans Affairs should be bending over backwards to help them to get those papers in.
Third, we do have a case here today, and I would like you to answer this question. Because of their not wanting to go through all of this again for that third party dynamic and because the case manager already has all of the files that my friend here has, he was threatened and is in a situation where he is no longer receiving his funding because he has not followed through with expectations, when his feeling is that his documents are there and available to VAC.
Do you feel that is right?