Veterans Affairs committee  The Veterans Review and Appeal Board and VAC don't work together, per se, to say what their policies are, because we have to sit in judgment of their policies. I assume they have a process internally that looks at our decisions over time. I've had the advantage of meeting regularly with the deputy minister to talk about cases.

Veterans Affairs committee  There are a couple of things with regard to our increase. One is that we have a lot of hearing loss and tinnitus cases. That's why we've done that. There are the cases of the backlog, but there are two effects of the backlog on the board. One is that when you bust the backlog, some of those flow down.

Veterans Affairs committee  I can tell you that about 16% of our files are for women. Part of what we are dealing with is a historical disadvantage that women have faced. If we look back and take responsibility, we see that women were denied at a higher rate. They were withheld. They got partial entitlement at a higher rate.

Veterans Affairs committee  You could do a probability study to say that, in certain types of cases, certain factors apply. The ones we see the most are hearing loss and tinnitus. I've spoken to this committee before about how I believe this creates the greatest route to do some process that would be shorter on the front end.

Veterans Affairs committee  Well, we're quite proud of our culture. We've worked on it. We believe that we have an emerging culture. We believe that we're establishing an organization where people want to come and work because we can offer our mantra: We want you to be successful in your professional life and your personal life, whatever that looks like to you.

Veterans Affairs committee  The majority of our cases are reviews, and that's a panel of two people. That's the majority. Our appeals have been dropping significantly over the last three years for a lot of reasons, but the majority of our work is with two people. I should say that post-COVID one of the advantages for veterans is they have the choice, so we are seeing a lot more virtual hearings.

Veterans Affairs committee  I can't say that I see egregious.... We see mistakes. Sometimes they're obvious mistakes. Sometimes people just miss it—the criteria for this or that. I can't speak personally, and I don't think Jacques could either, to something like seeing some concerted effort. I see mistakes.

Veterans Affairs committee  As I said before, I don't think the veterans who come before us distinguish. As I've told my staff, they don't say, “VAC did a very bad job. VRAC did a great job. The BPA did a great job.” They are upset with the RCMP. They are upset with the military. They are upset with VAC. They are upset with us.

Veterans Affairs committee  There's not a huge distinction between genders. Right now, there's about a two-week delay for women, and I can't tell you why. They come in the same and they're processed the same, so I can't explain that to you. It may be the nature of the cases. I don't know.

Veterans Affairs committee  Yes, two weeks. In the context of francophone veterans, that's a little different. I'll ask Jacques, who spends most of his time trying to fix that. We've seen a slip back from last year on that, but I'll let Jacques speak to it.

Veterans Affairs committee  Certainly, we hear frustrations from veterans, but I can only point to.... We do 10% or less of VAC decisions. The assumption is there's a larger number of people who are either satisfied with that decision or who pursue on to.... We do 10%, and we see our decisions fall into a couple of categories.

Veterans Affairs committee  Thanks for the invitation to again appear before you. Appearing with me today, as usual, is my colleague the deputy chair, retired Lieutenant-Colonel Jacques Bouchard. Jacques and I come to our work from uniform service. What motivates us daily in our work is having served with those who have suffered.

Veterans Affairs committee  Obviously, when you ask an adjudicator if anything should be pre-approved, of course they think that's not...but it's not a question of everything. This system is not built on every injury being compensable. An injury occurring on vacation isn't necessarily related to service. I do think we are emerging.

Veterans Affairs committee  Thank you.

Veterans Affairs committee  I guess I say two things. We as a board would see this issue of getting appropriate specialists as not necessarily a COVID problem. Many of the provincial health systems are overwhelmed, and once somebody is released, do they have a family doctor? Now VAC is working to try to work through our problems.