Veterans Affairs Committee on Dec. 7th, 2023

[Sean Casey, Liberal, Charlottetown, PE]

One of the most difficult challenges for anyone who's involved with a complicated claim with Veterans Affairs Canada is to draw the link to military service. We heard a heart-wrenching story here a couple of days ago from someone who was absolutely convinced that the difficulties that she had around childbirth were tied to her military service, but it wasn't accepted—I guess is what I'll say—at Veterans Affairs.

The folks at Veteran Affairs, I'm going to come to you on this too.

As a lawyer, I can tell you that the challenge that she's facing is establishing a causal link. This program doesn't answer that.

[Linda Rizzo Michelin]

No. That's correct.

[Sean Casey, Liberal, Charlottetown, PE]

Okay.

I want to go to the folks at Veterans Affairs. It's probably Dr. Courchesne.

I come back to that case. That's a representative case. We hear it all the time, that veterans have a challenge with tying things to their military service. They also have an excellent service available to them in the bureau of pensions advocates. For those who practice at the private bar, you can go out and hire a doctor to do an independent medical examination and to offer an opinion on causation.

Is that something that can be funded by someone who's presenting their case to VRAB or trying to get a pension claim through Veterans Affairs?

That's the challenge for people like this veteran who was before us this week.

[Dr. Cyd Courchesne]

I'm going to give the caveat that I'm not an expert in the bureau of pensions advocates. My understanding is that, if someone put a claim that was denied and they sought the help of the Bureau of Pensions Advocates to go and represent in front of the Veterans Review and Appeal Board, those costs are covered by BPA as well as seeking the independent medical examination.

[Sean Casey, Liberal, Charlottetown, PE]

Maybe, Ms. Meunier, you can help us with this too.

Do the costs that are covered include the cost of an expert witness or outside independent medical opinions?

[Amy Meunier]

I can't be certain on what BPA does. It's at arm's length from the department. I think Cyd is correct—

[Sean Casey, Liberal, Charlottetown, PE]

Thank you.

[Amy Meunier]

—that they do cover the costs of medical experts.

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

Thank you, Mr. Casey.

We have time for a third round of questions.

Just before, I would like to ask Colonel Rowe some questions.

You are the director of casualty support management.

My question has three parts. First of all, I'd like to know how many there are in your department. What background do the people have to have to be in casualty support management? Finally, to whom do you report things that you receive from veterans?

[Col Peter Rowe]

My directorate of casualty support administration consists of five programs and approximately 25 staff. We're there to lay out the strategic policies that support services to ill and injured members and their families.

Those services are provided across the country at transition centres by support staff services personnel. That all comes under the umbrella of the Canadian Armed Forces transition group.

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

Thank you so much, Colonel.

Now, for five minutes, I invite Terry Dowdall to lead the third round.

[Terry Dowdall, Conservative, Simcoe—Grey, ON]

Thank you very much, Chair.

I want to thank each individual for being here today and for your testimony.

I want to thank you, as well, for your roles. I'm sure you hear a lot of stories and a lot of things that affect you.

I know it was brought up earlier by my colleague, the report that came up from StatsCan. When you analyze that, it's up 3.5%, and there are fewer people reporting and who want to come forward. To me, it speaks to why they wouldn't want to come forward.

We've had a lot of testimony to that in this committee, quite frankly. Your organization seems like it's been called the biggest insurance company, or it's hard to deal with like an insurance company. If you had Google reviews, they would be terrible, quite frankly, for the organization as a whole. When that report comes out, who is seeing that report? Is there any plan coming forward from the department to look into that a little further right away?

The other thing is that I was on the national defence committee before, and at the time, we had the sexual misconduct study. Since then, it actually seems worse. We had a young reservist who was here saying it was still going on, pretty much. She's out of it now, but currently, those attitudes are carrying on. From that study, from what you see, what has been implemented by the department, knowing that we did a long study at that time too?

What did you get out of that and implement into the department that is making a change today?

[Linda Rizzo Michelin]

From the sexual misconduct support and resource centre, I can tell you, from our organization—again, remembering we are independent from the Department of National Defence and the CAF part of it—we will be looking at the details and analyzing that ourselves to help us in terms of our support programs and how we can improve on those pieces.

In terms of the details within the Department of National Defence, that would be the chief professional conduct and culture group that will be, and has been, spearheading that in terms of the culture change within the organization.

I won't speak to the implementation there. That is really within that purview, because that is directly within the chain of command in the CAF. I can tell you broadly that I know the organization is looking to examine and review the report in detail and to use that as one of the tools to inform what is changing and what needs to continue to change.

[Terry Dowdall, Conservative, Simcoe—Grey, ON]

To follow up, is there an urgency to the organization...? To feed into what you do, it doesn't seem to be improving. I'm wondering if they see the urgency and the frustration that we're seeing from individuals who are coming forward.

[Linda Rizzo Michelin]

I think it is being addressed within the organization. Again, from our part, from SMSRC, we use that information to help us support, to improve our programs and to look at what other services we'll need to offer as part of what we see within that report. Again, it would be another area to get more specifics on what has happened and what will continue to happen.

[Terry Dowdall, Conservative, Simcoe—Grey, ON]

One other thing that seems to be common in this study and a lot of the studies that deal with veterans is the confusion, the lack of information and the lack of connection between National Defence and Veterans Affairs. When the veterans leave, there are so many different companies and so many organizations.

Could we simplify the process somehow to make it simpler? A lot of them are suffering from PTSD and are frustrated with paperwork. The amount of.... It's confusing even for me when my staff and I have to get hold of somebody.

[Shoba Ranganathan]

We can't necessarily speak to the processes, but this is one of the reasons we have our response and support coordination program to help navigate these individuals through some of these complex processes. Certainly, we do try to take the opportunity to provide feedback when there are some challenges that we repeatedly face. Again, these are only a very small segment—

[Terry Dowdall, Conservative, Simcoe—Grey, ON]

Are you having success with some of those challenges? When you bring forward that this is a problem, because we hear a lot that it seems to be the same for a long period of time, are you getting any action?

[Shoba Ranganathan]

I'm not sure I can speak specifically about that. What I can say is that we're at least aware of some of the challenges and communicating that, which is a good first step.

I think you know things take time to change. It's not as easy as just redrafting a policy.

[Terry Dowdall, Conservative, Simcoe—Grey, ON]

That sounded like a politician's answer more than a regular answer to me.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Terry Dowdall, Conservative, Simcoe—Grey, ON]

I'm sorry about that.

[Shoba Ranganathan]

That's okay.

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

Thank you, Mr. Dowdall.

[Bryan May, Liberal, Cambridge, ON]

Mr. Chair, can I get permission to continue with the bells ringing? Can I ask for 10 or 15 minutes, until we get to our usual 5:30 closing time?