:
Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee.
First of all, Gary Walbourne is the director general of operations and also the deputy ombudsman. He accompanies me any place where there are going to be some hard questions.
Voices: Oh, oh!
Mr. Guy Parent: It's a pleasure to be here today to contribute to the important work that your committee does to ensure that Canada faithfully repays the debt owed to our veterans of the Canadian Forces and the RCMP. They have served with unlimited liability, and we should repay them with fairness.
Although the process of transformation in Veterans Affairs Canada began in 2009, it is only in the last few months that my office has had some visibility in the process. My special advisor regularly attends the field operations advisory committee meetings and thus keeps me informed of upcoming changes.
I would highlight two key challenges when discussing Veterans Affairs Canada transformation. The first is that many changes, although approved, have not yet been implemented. This means that neither the department nor my office is yet in a position to speak to the effects of some of these changes. The second is that activities related to the transformation agenda, particularly in the human resources domain, are taking place at the same time as changes related to the recently announced budget reduction. This overlap may make it more difficult for the department to relate effects directly back to transformation activities.
[Translation]
Overall, my office is encouraged by the proposed changes under the Transformation agenda. The importance of streamlining processes and reducing barriers of access for our veterans cannot be overstated. What is important to remember, however, is that Transformation must be focused on the end result—streamlining services and processes to meet the needs of veterans, their families and representatives. Transformation should not be an exercise focused solely on streamlining infrastructure or counting assets.
I have reviewed the transcripts of the testimonies preceding mine and with your indulgence, I would like to address the issue of Transformation in line with the five themes that Veterans Affairs Canada has identified: reducing complexity, overhauling service delivery, strengthening partnerships, sustaining the New Veterans Charter and aligning with veteran demographics.
[English]
Let me now address the transformation themes.
Reducing complexity—how do we get to a point where complexity of access to programs causes unfairness? Brigadier-General (retired) Larry Gollner, who was a member of my advisory committee, puts it this way:
...the answer lays with understanding that whenever public money and/or benefits are available for distribution an accounting system is set up. A system which grows constantly becoming increasingly complex so that eventually it reaches the optimum bureaucratic level of satisfaction. That is when more money is spent managing the system than is spent providing benefit to those the system is meant to serve.
Many veterans perceive this to be true. Transformation must therefore focus on the needs of veterans and their families rather than on the administrative needs of the department. Some of the recent changes announced by the department, such as the upfront payments now being made for grounds maintenance and housekeeping services under the veterans independence program, are good first steps, but the department's responsibility does not cease with system change. Follow-up and continuous improvement must be part of transformation.
[Translation]
My office has also done work in this area. In February 2012, we released a report concerning reasons for decisions, which provided recommendations to the department to assist with their written correspondence. In addition, the Office has developed tools such as the Benefits Navigator to help unravel the complexity surrounding programs and benefits. I understand that the Benefits Navigator is now available to all Veterans Affairs Canada staff, and I have been assured by the minister that by the end of the year, it will be publicly available to all veterans through the Veterans Affairs Canada website.
[English]
On overhauling service delivery, testimony presented to the committee thus far has focused on mechanical aspects of the department's planned changes. What is yet to be addressed is how the overall effects of these initiatives are going to change the culture within the department. These cultural changes will need to be clearly communicated, not only internally to departmental staff who are working in a changing environment but also to the veterans community. Employees and clients need to understand and appreciate the efforts being undertaken on their behalf, and staff must embrace these changes and communicate them effectively to veterans.
Veterans Affairs Canada is the agent responsible for paying the debt Canada owes to our injured veterans. It is not a social services program. I believe that the presumptive philosophy that military service affects a veteran's health and wellness should be inherent in the department's culture.
Strengthening partnerships is more than just having a department that works with the Canadian Forces and the RCMP, veterans groups, and other stakeholders. To be truly transformational, veterans must perceive that their interests are seen to be represented at all levels.
[Translation]
There remains a lack of understanding of veterans benefits and services amongst many veterans. This is a symptom of decades of reactive communications whereby veterans had to self-identify before engaging with the department. Veterans Affairs Canada must be more proactive when reaching out to veterans and must ensure that the communication tools they use meet the varied needs of their clients.
[English]
Transparency is the key to successful partnerships in a transformational environment. Providing all stakeholders with the necessary information to have informed debate strengthens the system. This is one of the key reasons the office looks forward to the benefits navigator going public. Being proactive in seeking out veterans before they have a need creates positive relationships.
I have spoken in the past about the creation of a national veteran's identification card to facilitate communication and the provision of services to veterans.
As the raison d'être of Veterans Affairs Canada is to serve veterans, meaningful transformation cannot occur without the engagement and full participation of veterans. Delivering benefits and administering programs for injured veterans requires engagement from many governments and from many government organizations and veterans groups. The department, through its transformation initiative, must strive to ensure that the efforts of many are harmonized and coordinated to simplify access and to avoid duplication.
[Translation]
I would now like to address the New Veterans Charter. That charter introduced a new concept, shifting the emphasis from benefits dependency to a transition to a civilian life where the physical, psychological and social barriers are addressed. Having viable options is the key to a successful transition.
To this date, the New Veterans Charter has not been well understood by many. The department should do more to proactively educate the veterans' community about the full spectrum of benefits available so that one can believe that there will be better options for the future than remaining in the present.
[English]
This committee had directed that the changes to the enhanced new Veterans Charter be reviewed in 2013. In that light, my team, in consultation with stakeholders, is preparing a complete review and analysis of the new Veterans Charter that will be presented to the government in due time. It does not mean that I will be waiting for that time to pursue change. The new Veterans Charter is a living document. When I see an unfair practice, such as the discrepancy with the earnings loss benefit minimum salary for reservists, I will actively pursue that change, concurrent with conducting the review.
Next is aligning with veterans demographics. The department's transformation initiative currently centres on demographic projections that indicate that the number of Veterans Affairs Canada clients is going to decrease. There are currently over 500,000 veterans who are not yet clients of Veterans Affairs Canada. The department's own life-after-service studies show that two-thirds of Canadian Forces former regular force personnel released between 1998 and 2007 are not receiving benefits. However, 54% of those report at least one physical health condition; 13% report at least one mental health condition; and many report chronic health conditions they attribute to their service. These statistics indicate that there is a potential unknown liability associated with the unmet needs of veterans who are not aware of existing programs.
We need to keep in mind that the number of veterans is but one indicator of workload. Demographics alone do not capture the full extent of future requirements. I would contend that the complexity of managing the case of a modern-day veteran who suffers from PTSD and has a family is much more intensive than that of an older, traditional veteran who suffers from the early stages of Alzheimer's or dementia. Significant case management resources are required in both cases to meet the needs of these individual veterans. Future needs are likely to be more demanding, especially when one considers that three decades of high operational tempo for the Canadian Forces have only now started to show their effects.
This is why I'm concerned that between current unmet needs and potential future needs, the assumption that the department's work intensity and client numbers are going to drop is somewhat questionable.
[Translation]
Finally, I believe that it is critical throughout the Transformation process that Veterans Affairs Canada have the means to measure whether changes are having the intended impact and what degree of success has been achieved from the perspective of both the veteran and the administrator. The tools must be in place to measure both the quantitative as well as the qualitative effects of Transformation. The department should be proactive in establishing sound mechanisms to measure effectiveness and wherever and whenever it is possible, the department needs to engage with veterans.
[English]
My office is currently engaged with the department to recommend some best practices in the area of performance measurement. For our part, the office has put in place mechanisms within our personal complaints tracking system to detect and highlight complaints related to service delivery and changes in turnaround times or access to services. We will continue to proactively monitor media reports and solicit feedback from veterans groups in order to quickly identify any areas of concern.
Let me conclude by restating the importance of having a transformation agenda that is focused on improving service to veterans, their families, and their representatives. Transformation should not be an exercise focused solely on streamlining infrastructure or assets. Transformation is about people, and the department must ensure that improving service to veterans remains at the centre of these changes.
Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for your attention. We now stand ready to answer any questions.
Good afternoon.
[Translation]
It is a pleasure to be here with you this afternoon.
[English]
It's a pleasure to be here with Mr. Parent, the veterans ombudsman, to support this committee's study on transformation at Veterans Affairs Canada.
l thank the ombudsman for his remarks. While it is true that the OVO and VAC serve very different functions, at the core both organizations exist to serve Canadian veterans and their families. We have seen in the past that the ombudsman plays an important role in serving veterans.
As the department undergoes its current process of transformation, Mr. Parent and his team will continue to provide valuable insight. l look forward to the shared work our organizations will undertake in the coming years. l will begin by providing an overview of what we have been able to accomplish since the transformation process began in 2011. By cutting red tape, we are reducing the complexity of navigating departmental processes. An example that my colleagues have discussed is the re-engineering of the treatment benefits program. Today, approximately 77% of the subsequent pre-authorization requirements have been removed. This means that veterans will not need to repeatedly contact the department to receive a pre-authorization for benefits that had been authorized on a previous occasion.
We have also begun to overhaul our model of service delivery. A prime example of this is the additional delegated authorities we've provided to our front-line staff who work directly with veterans. By reducing the number of decisions that have to be approved at regional and head offices, we have made access to rehabilitation, health, and treatment benefits faster and easier.
We have developed an excellent case management tool that allows our staff to better manage their workload. Our case managers provide a holistic case-planning approach and have been granted more decision-making authority, which increases the speed of our service delivery.
These are only some examples of the work we've done, and l'm happy to report that our efforts are already starting to show concrete results. At the national client contact network, VAC's call centre, we are experiencing decreases in client wait-times, reductions in abandoned calls, and an overall increase in the consistency of our services.
In addition to the tools that we've provided to our staff, we have also taken steps to improve our programs. Since I am presenting with the ombudsman today, I would be remiss if I did not mention our department's initiative of providing decision letters in plain language, something that Mr. Parent and his staff accurately identified as a gap in our service.
Another example of a program improvement is the change to the veterans independence program. By changing the VIP from a contribution to an upfront payment, veterans and their families will face a significant reduction in the amount of paperwork they need to fill out. This is the sort of bureaucratic red tape we've committed to removing from the system.
l'll close by discussing the veterans we serve.
We understand that this transformation is an ongoing process, driven by an historic shift in the demographics of the veteran population. In the coming years, we expect the total number of veteran clients to decrease, while the complexity of the modern-day veterans' needs and expectations will increase.
It is this shift toward modern-day veterans that has prompted us to improve the service delivery channels we offer. We want to be in a position to provide services by the Internet, by telephone, or in person. Our commitment is to provide the best quality services and benefits to veterans and their families. We will accomplish this by ensuring that we have the right people in the right places with the right skills to get the job done. Naturally, some of our offices are going to get smaller while some offices are going to get larger. Over time, our front-line staff will be positioned where the needs are greatest, which will be determined by veteran demographics.
I thank the members of the committee and the ombudsman for their time and attention, and welcome any questions that you may have.
:
Well, I think I need to first explain to you why we're doing it.
First of all, what we want to do is for very routine questions—people who may want an information kit or a brochure or something—we don't want to use the valuable time of our skilled and trained employees to handle those routine questions. So when a veteran calls the number, they basically have an option that says, “If you're a client of Veterans Affairs Canada, if you're a veteran, or if you are a family member, push one, and if you're looking for general information around veterans' issues, push two”. That goes to Service Canada.
We have a contract with Service Canada to handle those calls. We have been working with Service Canada for many years. When we've had various issues with new programs or what have you, and also to allow for surge capacity to be able to handle our calls, we've often used Service Canada in the past. So this is not new.
Service Canada has a number of government employees and a number of contract employees. I believe it was in the year 2008 that Service Canada entered into this contract with the company you refer to. These employees are trained to the standards that we set. We've actually had our managers over in the centre, making sure that the veterans are getting the service they need.
Quite simply, what we want to do is that we want to leave our staff, who are well trained in veterans issues, to handle the approximately 800,000 phone calls we receive in a year, and in so doing, have some of the more general non-client-related.... For example, Service Canada does not access the private information of a veteran. They do not have access to the database.
:
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Thank you for being here. It's always a pleasure to see all of you, and we welcome the input from the veterans ombudsman. It's very helpful in terms of what we're doing.
Mr. Parent, you have said in your brief, and I'm just going to quickly quote from it, that as of 1998 to 2007, 54% of released personnel reported physical health conditions, 13% mental health conditions, and many have chronic health conditions, and yet these individuals are not necessarily being looked after by VAC. You also said that the reality is that current needs are unmet, and you expressed concern about the department's ability to meet not just current needs but the future needs, given the fact that there are so many service personnel out there who have retired or who haven't been released, and they're not accessing the system yet.
I wonder, are you concerned about the loss of personnel in Veterans Affairs? Very clearly, we don't know, as you said, what the impact of budget reduction and staff reduction is going to be.
Secondly, do you think perhaps that veterans' homelessness, the kind of homelessness we're seeing in so many other communities, is a symptom of that unreported or unconnected group of retired or released personnel?
Finally, how does VAC get out in front of this? Clearly you've raised a red flag here. What does VAC need to do to get out in front of what seems to be a considerable and quite frightening problem that our country and our veterans are going to face?
That's a very good question. I'm going to try to hit all the answers, but certainly I think I'll start off with saying that our concern—I've expressed this, I believe, to the committee before—is with the fact that a lot of people are suffering in silence. Some of them do this because they're proud. Some of them because they don't know what's available for them. Basically, I think that point in my address speaks to that. There are a lot of people out there, and the statistics come from the study that was actually done by Veterans Affairs Canada and DND, in a life after service study.
Basically, I think that's what the important thing is.
In the past, people had to self identify, and there was no advertising done about VAC programs, so people suffered in silence, not knowing that something's happening to them. Also, as I mentioned before in front of this committee, we have people now who are serving in uniform both in the CF and the RCMP who are suffering in silence because they don't want to lose their careers. There will be unmet needs there as well that will flow over to Veterans Affairs Canada when they fully retire.
Also, in regard to your question related to homelessness, homelessness, of course, is only a factor. There are other things associated with it, like dependencies and those sorts of things. The thing is that what's important there are again the communications and the strategy at Veterans Affairs Canada. We have been pushing for a national strategy on homelessness, and I think it's an important thing to do, and we're certainly pushing Veterans Affairs Canada to come up with that.
Basically, I think that covers pretty well the aspects that you've asked about. Again, I think communication is by far one of the key elements in all of this. Veterans have to come forward and communicate with the department, but the department also has to be straightforward with the veteran community and advertise what it is that's available for them.
:
We have forecast that we will continue to see increases in the number of individuals coming in.
I want to make sure I give you the correct numbers. There is a bit of a myth out there as it relates to Afghanistan, in my view. Others may disagree, Mr. Chair. Generally speaking, about 35,000 men and women served in Afghanistan, and that would be somewhere in the vicinity of 55,000 to 56,000 deployments, I would say.
There is this myth, and maybe it's driven a little by the media, that if you served in Afghanistan there must be something wrong with you. The vast majority of men and women who've come back from Afghanistan have not been injured and are not injured. I want to give you some numbers here.
I'm going back to our December quarterly report. Of the 35,000 men and women who have served, 4,181 are clients of Veterans Affairs as a result of their service in Afghanistan. That's not to say there will not be issues of late-onset PTSD, and as my colleague Mr. Parent has noted, some may be suffering in silence, but I just want to put that in perspective. When you look at the numbers, as you project, yes, hundreds of thousands have served. But when you relate it just to the Second World War, one million Canadians served in the Second World War, and the legacy this left in terms of the needs to be met lasted over generations, I would say.
I want to give you the perspective in terms of the numbers because there is a sense out there.... Some Afghanistan veterans have said to me they're a little concerned that people look at them and ask if they're okay because they've served in Afghanistan. There is a certain stigma, and I think we have to be very careful we don't oversell that.
The other thing I think is important is that many of the cases we have are challenging, but I want to give you another statistic, just to put things in perspective. If you look at people who are seriously injured, who are at 78% or above, the numbers who are currently in the system receiving or eligible for earnings loss is about 800. When I look at Afghanistan using that same criteria, those who were seriously injured number about 450. So I'm not saying these individuals are not important. They're extremely important and certainly the more severe your disability, your illness, or your injury, the greater support you need and must get from Veterans Affairs. Everybody is injured, and most of the disability awards we pay out are for fewer than 25%. That's not to say that this isn't important.
Gentlemen, I want to thank you for coming today. We sure appreciate your input.
It's unfortunate that some people at our committee around our table seem to think that the word “streamlining” is somehow a nasty word. I think even some of my colleagues would admit that bureaucracies—I speak of departments, not the people, but the departments—the longer they've been around, the more likely they are to acquire money-losing symptoms, such as waste, duplication, and redundancy. And like a business that's entering some challenging times and has to streamline the business to make it through, every department in the government is faced with the same challenge.
I would suggest that Department of Veterans Affairs, given a number of 1.1% to streamline their budget by, was easily able to find it by eliminating waste, duplication, and redundancy. They coupled that with newer, better, and more efficient ways of offering the services. You were indeed able to get those reductions without touching one single service you are offering your clients.
Mr. Parent, you had a very good closing conclusion. You said, “Transformation is about people, and the department must ensure that improving service to veterans remains at the centre of these changes”.
Mr. Hillier, shortly after that you said, “Our commitment is to provide the best quality services and benefits to veterans and their families.”
That is complementary to what you said, Mr. Parent.
Mr. Hillier, you also said, “We will accomplish this by ensuring that we have the right people in the right places with the...skills to get the job done.” That's exactly what streamlining is all about.
I need to get you to just maybe explain this once more, so that it's very clear. When you looked at streamlining your department, you had to be keeping in mind that your mandate and your goal was to offer better quality service to everyone who needed it in Veterans Affairs. Maybe you can explain that a little bit so that we really get that message driven in.
:
Mr. Chairman, throughout the transformation process, we're looking at the initiatives we're taking through the eyes of a veteran. What is this going to do for a veteran? As I noted earlier in my testimony, if it doesn't make a difference to a veteran or his or her family, then why are we doing it? It's just bureaucracy kind of running around.
What we did was look at some business re-engineering processes. The methodology we use is called the Hammer methodology, which is well accepted for business re-engineering. It's not driven by people like me, because quite frankly, I don't know the work. It's driven by the workers, the people who work with veterans every day—case managers, doctors, nurses, and file clerks. We use that methodology, which has been very successfully used in other government departments around town and in the private sector.
What we do is lay out our business process and ask what we are putting the veteran through. How many times are we asking the veteran for the same document? How many forms are we asking a veteran to fill out? Do we need all these forms? Can we just get the information once? Can the veteran use his or her service number as opposed to some Veterans Affairs number?
When you do that, you actually find, as has been mentioned, that a lot of interesting process builds up in a system that's been around for many years. What you do is extract the duplication, the overlap, and the waste.
From my standpoint, transformation is not about reducing jobs. It's about improving services to veterans. As a result of that, there will be some job losses, because there are things people used to do at Veterans Affairs that computer systems do. In some offices, we were spending a lot of time printing off letters, signing them, and sending them out. That's not how we do business anymore. How we do business is that we send a data file to PWGSC, Public Works, and they actually mass print tens of thousands of letters for us in minutes.
Sadly, there are HR consequences. The reality is that, as we go through this period when we will be reducing 800 jobs, over 1,000 people in the department will be eligible for retirement on full pensions or reduced pensions. Through good human resources management, we think we can make this as painless as possible.
In addition to people retiring, we probably lose about 100 people in the department every year. We're looking at the efficiency, the balance. Certainly, Canadians expect veterans to be well taken care of, but they actually expect value for their tax money. We have a responsibility to our staff to treat them in a fair and humane way as we go through this process.