Yes, thank you.
I'd say it's based on my understanding of how VAC works, and as I've said before, I don't have any direct personal contact with VAC. However, it does seem to me, based on what our council has heard from the women veterans who were involved in the Merlo Davidson settlement and who also had occasion to seek assistance from VAC and use services and obtain benefits, that the frontline workers often create more of a barrier than provide assistance.
They're supposed to be there to open the door to these people—to say, “Yes, we have programs and services to help you,” instead of looking at an application and denying it right off the bat because it doesn't—now I'm supposing something here—meet everything on somebody's checklist.
It does seem to me that the front line of VAC—especially for people who have suffered some trauma, especially in light of PTSD, which seems to be more common now than it ever has been—is now there to screen out rather than to assist in providing those resources to veterans that the Pension Act says VAC was created to provide.
Perhaps Nina can speak to this as well.