Mr. Speaker, my hon. friend and colleague and I sit together at the veterans affairs committee, meeting veterans and hearing from them. He often hears from veterans who have been waiting too long; waiting too long for their benefits and for someone to answer the phone. He knows full well that the backlog is growing. He has heard testimony at committee.
Therefore, I hope my colleague will support this motion today so we can fix this problem once and for all. This could be a really good day for veterans, as we can fix a long-growing problem. However, I will talk about some things my friend also spoke about, such as standards.
Only 43% of the time does the department meet its target of deciding on a veteran's disability benefits within 16 weeks, and with the career transition program, it only meets its target 31% of the time. The backlog is growing. We learned that it was 29,000 last November and that it had grown 50%. We learned in June that it had grown another 10%.
Here is an opportunity to use money that has not been spent but was approved by the House to hire people back that the Conservatives let go and promised to hire back. They promised to fix this problem. It is getting worse and there was money approved by Parliament that is not being spent that could fix this problem. Here is an opportunity to do that.