Veterans Affairs Committee on March 25th, 2026

[The Chair, Liberal, Marie-France Lalonde]

I call this meeting to order.

Welcome to meeting No. 27 of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Veterans Affairs.

Before I begin, on behalf of the entire committee, I would just like to take a moment to point out that, earlier this week, we learned that the human remains discovered in Loos‑en‑Gohelle, France, are those of Private Albert Henry Detmold.

At the age of 33, on August 15, 1917, he was killed in action while digging a trench on the first day of the Battle of Hill 70 . Despite the efforts of his comrades amid mustard gas attacks, he was never recovered.

Discovered in August 2020 during an excavation, his remains were not formally identified until December 2025.

More than 100 years after his passing, the identification of Private Detmold highlights the importance of reuniting fallen soldiers with their family, military unit and country.

I thought it was important today that we start by remembering the sacrifice of Canadians who still have not been identified and family who are still grieving.

I just wanted to share this, lest we forget.

Thank you very much.

Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2) and the motion adopted by the committee on November 25, 2025, the committee is meeting on its study of the follow-up to the contract for rehabilitation services awarded to Partners in Canadian Veterans Rehabilitation Services, or PCVRS.

Today's meeting is taking place in a hybrid format, pursuant to the Standing Orders. Before we continue, I would ask that all in-person participants consult the guidelines written on the cards on the table. The measures they refer to are in place to help prevent audio and feedback incidents and to protect the health and safety of all participants, including the interpreters.

You will also notice a QR code on the card, which links to a short awareness video.

To ensure an orderly meeting, I would like to outline a few rules for witnesses and members.

Before speaking, please wait until I recognize you by name.

For those in the room, you can use the earpiece and select the desired channel for interpretation.

A reminder that all comments by members should be addressed through the Chair.

For members in the room, if you wish to speak, please raise your hand. The clerk and I will manage the speaking order as best we can, and we appreciate your patience and understanding in this regard.

I would now like to welcome our witnesses for the first hour of the meeting.

From the Office of the Veterans Ombudsman, we welcome retired colonel Nishika Jardine, veterans ombud, and Mr. Duane Schippers, deputy veterans ombud.

We will begin with the ombud's presentation and then move on to a series of questions from committee members.

Colonel Jardine, you have the floor for five minutes.

[Colonel, Retired) Nishika Jardine (Veterans Ombud, Office of the Veterans Ombudsman]

Good afternoon, Madam Chair and members of the committee.

Thank you for inviting us to share our observations on the contract for rehabilitation services awarded to Partners in Canadian Veterans Rehabilitation Services.

Since the implementation of the contract in November 2022, we have received 100 complaints about PCVRS, which is less than 2% of the overall complaints we received during this time period. Most of these, we referred directly back to the department, as VAC must be given the opportunity to correct an issue first. Where we did investigate, we found unfairness in six cases. Five were resolved based on our intervention, and one was resolved by the department before we could approach it. Importantly, these six validated complaints did not point to any underlying systemic issues; rather, they were specific to individual circumstances.

I have been keeping a close eye on the complaints we receive about PCVRS for any pattern that would indicate a systemic unfairness in the way rehabilitation services are being provided by the contractor. This said, I can tell you that I have heard numerous informal complaints about PCVRS, both from veterans and mental health treatment providers. Veterans primarily complain about communication issues or delays that lead to confusion about next steps, timelines and program requirements, or the poor communication skills of some PCVRS staff. They have also spoken to me about the volume of assessments they are asked to undertake. It can take hours to fill out the survey questionnaires, or it is retriggering them, as they are being asked to retell the story of their trauma to multiple different assessors even though the information is readily available in their file. For example, some survivors of the LGBT purge have complained to us about the manner in which they were approached and how it triggered the especially traumatic feelings of being interrogated by the Canadian Forces.

However, for us to undertake a systemic review, we rely primarily on evidence we gather from formal complaints that point to a potential barrier to equitable access to the programs and the benefits provided in legislation for our veterans and their families. I have encouraged and continue to encourage veterans to submit formal complaints to our office when they feel they are being treated unfairly.

I would add, we know that the department's audit and evaluation division recently completed an evaluation of the rehabilitation program, which benefited from access to veterans' files, something our office has been blocked from for the past few years. That said, I look forward to seeing how the department addresses the audit and evaluation division recommendations, some of which are focused on ensuring that the program targets veterans who are suitable candidates for rehabilitation and to consider alternate supports for those veterans who are not.

Over the past three years, I have grown concerned about what I have been seeing and hearing with respect to the rehabilitation program writ large. We have many questions around the construct of the program and the manner in which it is delivered. For example, are veterans who have no realistic prospects of returning to the workforce enrolled in the rehabilitation program primarily to secure the income replacement benefit? Are rehabilitation outcomes improving? Are veterans getting better? Are more veterans returning to work? Is the PCVRS contract saving taxpayer dollars over and above what VAC was paying for the delivery of rehabilitation services prior to the implementation of the contract, and are veterans getting better service?

We will continue to monitor the complaints we receive related to PCVRS and the rehabilitation program and will address them on an individual basis. We will certainly launch a systemic review if we identify evidence of trends that could indicate a systemic problem with the administration of the rehabilitation program. To date, this has not been the case.

Ultimately, our common goal must be to ensure that programs are designed and administered to best serve our veterans to successfully transition from military to civilian life.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Marie-France Lalonde]

Thank you very much, Colonel.

I will now start our first round of questions of six minutes.

We will go to Mr. Richards.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Airdrie—Cochrane, AB]

Thank you.

I appreciate your opening remarks. You mentioned off the top that you've had about 100 complaints about PCVRS, which is about 2% of the total complaints you had in your office over that period of time. I think what I am hearing from you is not that there aren't systemic issues but that there are not enough complaints to indicate systemic issues. Is that a fair characterization?

[Col (Ret'd) Nishika Jardine]

No. Madam Chair, I would ask you not to interpret it that way.

What I am saying is that among those hundred complaints, the six in which we found unfairness did not indicate a systemic problem so that we could say there was a common thread running through them. I don't need more than one complaint to indicate that there may be a systemic issue, and some of our reviews have been based on just one complaint or one observation.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Airdrie—Cochrane, AB]

That's fair.

I have two streams of follow-up on that. I'll start on the one side and then come back to the other.

The first is that we heard a number of times on Monday—I'm sure you watched—from VAC officials, PCVRS and associated officials. They quoted a survey of participants in the program saying that, of those who had finished the program, 74% said they had an improved quality of life.

It turns out that there were about 732 surveyed out of over 23,000 participants, which was less than 3% of the veterans involved in the program. Would you say this is enough to indicate that the program has been a success, or is it not enough of a sample size? What are your thoughts on that?

[Col (Ret'd) Nishika Jardine]

Thank you for the question.

I'm not the one to ask about the survey, because we were not part of it, and we didn't participate in or see it.

However, in terms of satisfaction, are you asking if veterans are satisfied with the program?

As I said in my statement, I have met many veterans across the country, and the ones who are happy with the program don't come up to me. They don't come and say they're delighted. They just don't.

What we hear—obviously, as the ombud, I'm here to hear the complaints—is many who informally say to me they're unhappy, for whatever reasons they raise. Therefore, I am unable to speak to the survey. I can only tell you what I've heard informally.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Airdrie—Cochrane, AB]

That's fine.

Let me go down the other stream of thought that I had. You mentioned the things you hear informally, and granted, I would agree it's probably no different for us. We hear from the veterans who are not happy with the situation. That's not unfair. What we hear from those veterans certainly seem to me to be systemic types of issues.

You mentioned the reassessments that are constantly being done. I would call this a systemic issue. We also hear about the fact that there is already this big bureaucracy at VAC they have to deal with, and now there is a second, overlapping bureaucracy, and they can't figure it out. In fact, I think even the two bureaucracies sometimes have trouble figuring out who's responsible for what, so how is a veteran supposed to know? This seems like a systemic issue as well.

The third one that we hear is quite often more from service providers, and it's also from veterans, about the fact that they can't work with the service provider they choose because they're not enrolled in the program. We've heard over and over that they can just go ahead and enrol, but that's certainly not the experience that we're hearing from the service providers.

I wonder if you have any thoughts about that. Would you consider those systemic issues as well? Do you have any recommendations for what could be done to improve this?

[Col (Ret'd) Nishika Jardine]

When we are looking for a systemic problem, it's in terms of fairness. There is a program in place, veterans have access to this program and there isn't anything we've perceived in the complaints we've received and looked at that indicates an unfairness in access.

We hear about the assessments. To me, for a service provider to understand what they can deliver to the veteran and how they should design a program of services to help the veteran, there needs to be an assessment. The amount of assessment and all of that is.... How do I say that the amount of assessment they're doing is incorrect? There have been only three formal complaints to us about the assessment itself that we could say were unfair.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Airdrie—Cochrane, AB]

Related to this, we've seen an announcement of a bunch of cuts at the bureau of pensions advocates. I think the concern we have is that 89% of the time veterans get a better result than what they got to begin with. This ties in to these assessments. I'm curious about what your thoughts are around those cuts at BPA and the wait times this that will mean for veterans. Are you concerned about these things and what can be done about them?

[The Chair, Liberal, Marie-France Lalonde]

I'm very sorry. That will be for the second round.

On this, I will allow Mrs. Hirtle to speak for six minutes.

[Alana Hirtle, Liberal, Cumberland—Colchester, NS]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Good afternoon, Colonel Jardine and Colonel Schippers. It's nice to see you back with us again.

Colonel Jardine, can I clarify how long you've served as Canada's veterans ombud?

[Col (Ret'd) Nishika Jardine]

I completed an initial five-year mandate and was reappointed for another three years in November 2025.

[Alana Hirtle, Liberal, Cumberland—Colchester, NS]

Wonderful. Can I confirm that there has been an Office of the Veterans Ombud in Canada since 2007?

[Col (Ret'd) Nishika Jardine]

Yes.

[Alana Hirtle, Liberal, Cumberland—Colchester, NS]

It has been nearly two decades.

[Col (Ret'd) Nishika Jardine]

Yes.

[Alana Hirtle, Liberal, Cumberland—Colchester, NS]

Then this office isn't new, and you're not new to the role.

[Col (Ret'd) Nishika Jardine]

I believe I'm getting close to saying I understand what I'm doing.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Alana Hirtle, Liberal, Cumberland—Colchester, NS]

I wasn't going to ask it that way, but thank you. Would it be fair to say that you are there, your team is there, to hear from veterans and raise their concerns to the minister when, in your opinion, something is wrong—or going well, I suppose?

[Col (Ret'd) Nishika Jardine]

Our focus is on fairness. I will confess to you that it can be frustrating, because I see and hear the frustration out there. However, our focus is on fairness. In order for me to be credible.... To sit here, explain and share what I'm doing on behalf of the veteran community, I have to be credible. Therefore, I stay within the guidelines and the mandate provided to me, which is that if I make a recommendation to the minister, it should be based on evidence, and it is there to resolve an unfairness that may create a barrier for veterans to access the benefits and services that have been put in place.

[Alana Hirtle, Liberal, Cumberland—Colchester, NS]

Excellent.

May I confirm that you have been following the implementation of the Veterans Affairs Canada rehabilitation services and vocational assistance program, or RSVP, since its inception?

[Col (Ret'd) Nishika Jardine]

Yes.

[Alana Hirtle, Liberal, Cumberland—Colchester, NS]

Can I confirm that the program was intended to address concerns such as regional and access disparities, language-based options and a host of other veteran-outcome-centred concerns that might have been present for veterans in past iterations of rehabilitation services offered by VAC? That was a really long sentence. Would you like me to repeat it, or are you good?