Veterans Affairs Committee on June 1st, 2026

[Joel Peddle]

Absolutely. As you're aware, you basically have a VAC case manager, and you have an RSS with PCVRS once you're involved with both of them. Now you have a triangle, but the two parties really don't interact with each other that much. If you're getting a lot of negative feedback and problems from PCVRS, you can go to your case manager to say that you need help because the person is basically threatening you all the time, and you can ask what you're supposed to do. The VAC case manager can very rarely do anything other than say they'll go talk to them. You're left out of it.

All you can do, really, is complain to your case manager. There's no plus box, email or anywhere you can lodge a formal complaint, which is pretty strange considering how many different ways the Canadian government has for us to lodge complaints on almost any other aspect of a public service.

[Cathay Wagantall, Conservative, Yorkton—Melville, SK]

That's very helpful. Thank you.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Blake Richards]

Thank you.

That's the end of that particular round.

[Cathay Wagantall, Conservative, Yorkton—Melville, SK]

Excuse me, Chair. Did you say seven minutes?

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Blake Richards]

No, it's five minutes.

[Cathay Wagantall, Conservative, Yorkton—Melville, SK]

I heard “seven”. I'm so sorry to hear that.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Blake Richards]

It was a good try.

[Cathay Wagantall, Conservative, Yorkton—Melville, SK]

No, seriously.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Blake Richards]

It's something that I would probably do myself in your chair.

It's established practice that in the second round we do five minutes.

[Cathay Wagantall, Conservative, Yorkton—Melville, SK]

I thought you were being very generous.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Blake Richards]

We will now go for the next five minutes to Madam Royer.

[Zoe Royer, Liberal, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank Master Corporals Forcier and Peddle, the veterans who are here in the gallery today, and all of the men and women who have served our country for their extraordinary service. My husband served 22 years, and he's a veteran, so I have a glimpse into this world. I know that there is nothing more powerful than the lived experience of a veteran and their transition.

I want to focus my questions on three points. What is working? Where can we improve? What should the next contract look like?

I'm going to begin my questioning. I'd like to get to all three of you, but I'd like to begin with Mr. Slingerland.

Mr. Slingerland, I know that you've had this contract since this year, but from a rehabilitation perspective, what indications tell us that a veterans rehabilitation program is succeeding? What should Parliament be looking at beyond wait times and service volumes?

[Aaron Slingerland]

That's a great question and I think better served to the veterans on this panel; however, from my perspective as a hospital public servant, we have very objective health outcome expectations from the Ministry of Health, our board and the community expectations for who we serve.

The expectations we should have of a rehabilitation program for veterans are that there are codesigned outcome measures from the funder and the participant that the provider is held accountable to achieve. The example for TOH and our small role in this journey for the worker is that we are tasked with applying a comprehensive, high-quality mental health assessment on the front end of the journey for many workers. We will make sure that we continue to do that.

To your question, the overall outcome should be that veterans are accessing timely, high-quality care that is measured objectively from a performance perspective.

[Zoe Royer, Liberal, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you.

Master Corporal Forcier, you've had an extraordinary journey. You've shared that, and I want to recognize it.

Where do you see the greatest opportunities for improvement? I know you've talked about the co-creation of the program in concert with veterans and the importance of the individual plans, but can you talk a bit more about what this might look like in practice?

[Natalie Forcier]

I had an incredibly supportive RSS since the inception. I started with PCVRS in 2023. In March of this year, she quit and basically told me that she was not able to do her case management job the way she wanted to. I had somebody who protected me from all the rules, supported me through my rehab and kept me going in a supportive way, and knowing that she left PCVRS because she was expected to change how she was doing things really affected even just my understanding and appreciation of the program itself.

I do feel that there are great people who could support, and having the veteran be part of what this program looks like could also be very helpful, so that it's veterans helping veterans. There's an innate trust among us, whether we serve together, deploy together or have never deployed or served together at all. There are veterans leading this rehab support program.

[Zoe Royer, Liberal, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Peddle, very quickly—we have only about 30 seconds—trust is fragile and precious. What would be some of the building blocks that we could implement that would restore trust with veterans who are in this program?

[Joel Peddle]

I really think it circles back to what I touched on. The veterans and their advocates should be asked and listened to. That level of trust would be great, because I know that, if you establish a health care team for yourself and you're happy with them, they really do all the work for you with PCVRS, so you're not handling that load yourself.

I don't think it should be expected that a veteran with mental health issues, who may not be in the best place, deal with all this extra admin, constant reassessments and questioning if you're as injured as you say you are, despite all the evidence to the contrary.

[Zoe Royer, Liberal, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you very much.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Blake Richards]

Ms. Gaudreau for two and a half minutes.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Thank you, Chair.

I'll continue the discussion with you, Mr. Peddle.

You have so much relevant information. If you want to send us a summary—anonymously, of course—it can also contribute to our study. Your compliance is much appreciated.

This leads me to ask a more specific question. Thanks to you, some people are managing to get into the program and to overcome constraints.

What would you say are the three administrative rules or practices that cause the most distress or frustration for veterans?

[Joel Peddle]

I believe the biggest are.... Really, it's just the language that's being used by PCVRS, because there's no other word for it than threats. As I said, you're threatening people's financial stability. These threats can come from something as simple as a mental health issue that causes sleep apnea.

One veteran I know can basically get to sleep only from 1 a.m. to 6 a.m., so he's not able to function until the middle of the day. They're scheduling him for 8 a.m. appointments, despite his clear issues, and then reprimanding him.

I really think.... I'm sorry. I'm wasting your time trying to recall the question.

The main thing, I think, with them is just things like that. It's the language they're using and the fact that they're not allowing for veterans to adjust their lives. Heaven forbid your kid gets sick and you have to miss an appointment. These things should be just naturally accepted if you were going to a doctor's office. Your doctor wouldn't get mad at you for life getting in the way. You would just reschedule, but when you reschedule with PCVRS, there's always this fear that you're going to be punished for what you're doing.

As for your other statement about submitting a synopsis, this is what I do for a living in retirement. If you need anything from me, I will gladly support it.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

I would ask you to respond to my next question with a yes or no, because my time is almost up.

From what I understand, first, we should seek to restore veterans' power to take action, rather than trying to control what happens to them.

Do you agree?

[Joel Peddle]

Absolutely, yes.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

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

All right. We have two more rounds of questions before this hour is complete.

The next round of questioning goes to the Conservative opposition.

Mr. McCauley, go ahead for five minutes.