Thank you.
I served in the Canadian Army for 20 years, deployed as a peacekeeper to Bosnia and deployed into combat in Afghanistan. I came home with PTSD and was medically released in 2019. I suffered from hypervigilance, a common symptom of PTSD, meaning that I was unable to let go of the extreme vigilance that kept me alive in combat.
During the decade that followed my return, I was angry, filled with anxiety, experiencing panic attacks and suicidal. Thanks to the efforts of my mental health team in the CAF and my VAC case manager, who arranged programs and connected me to a great psychologist, I was able to overcome my injury and start improving. That was until I enrolled as a participant in the rehabilitation program and was so disrespected and mistreated that it reinjured me and I became suicidal again.
You know my story already. Not only was I a witness at the last ACVA study for the rehabilitation program, not only has my brief been published as part of the study since April, but my story is the same as those of so many other veterans who have told you the same thing.
When I returned home, I used my experiences to help my fellow veterans, and for the last 16 years I have been a peer helper in the veteran community. Of little surprise, one really big recurring problem that keeps coming up is the rehabilitation program. I hear veterans lamenting that their RSSs won't return their calls or they don't understand the military or veterans, that they were told to switch providers, that they were denied the education program of their choice, that they were referred to clinics that retraumatized them during invasive and repetitive assessments and that there was a general lack of humanity.
You've heard this story too, because the same thing has been reported time and time again in the news. It's the same with so many other veterans who've sent briefs to the committee and reached out to MPs. The fact is that despite the dishonesty from the department and the contractor, veterans are complaining through official channels.
This dossier of complaints, discussed at length by VAC, was obtained through ATIP. The contractor bragged about their survey results, but it's already been pointed out in previous meetings that 732 surveyed out of 23,000 enrolments is a pathetic sample size, so even 100% satisfaction would be meaningless. Since their numbers actually indicate a 2% approval, this actually lines up with a social media analysis that I conducted for my brief, and I am very happy to answer questions about that.
Another piece of disinformation I would like to address is the assertion that veterans have a choice. It is presented to veterans as a choice, but it is a Sophie's choice: You either choose to participate on their terms or you are kicked off the entire rehabilitation program, which includes income replacement and other benefits, so it's not a real choice. It's a threat.
They also told you that they support our rehabilitation and vocational goals. They don't. You have already heard testimony that they force people through a meat-grinder towards a quick and cheap solution. Not only this, but they also artificially limit our career and income potential by forcing us into vocational programs and then into career paths based on our rank and salary at the time of our release. For many like me, this was early into my expected career.
“Sergeant” was not the last rank I thought I'd ever hold, but because that's the rank I was released at, that is the salary level they deemed would be good enough for the rest of my life. My injury didn't limit my career advancement nearly as much as the rehabilitation contract did, not to mention that many people view the military as their first career, where advancement isn't the goal—experience is. Absolutely brilliant people who will one day end up as executives serve in the junior ranks. If their injury occurs early in their career, they'll forever be limited to that part of their life.
Finally, they told you they offer rehabilitation services to survivors, but discussions with survivor advocates tell a much different story: They don't.
I beg the committee to see and accept the pattern displayed here. Those with a profit or power motive are telling you that it is a good, effective and supportive program while the veterans, families, case managers and service providers are telling you the truth. Veterans are dying because of this contract, and that's not an exaggeration.
Sadly, given the failure that was the soil turning for the Afghanistan monument and their refusal to meaningfully engage with veterans and the issues we care about, we are expecting that regardless of testimony and this committee's report, the government will ignore us to serve big business. We are all tired of hollow promises, and we are smart enough to see through them. If VAC actually cared, they wouldn't try so hard not to hear us when we speak.
Thank you.