Veterans’ benefit backlog requires a bold and creative solution

The National Council of Veteran Associations in Canada believes that substantial progress and indeed, a potential breakthrough, is becoming attainable with our crusade to compel Veterans Affairs Canada (VAC) to take innovative and creative steps to alleviate the unacceptable backlog and turnaround times for veterans’ disability claims. The House Veterans Affairs Committee issued its highly material report “Clearing the Jam: Addressing the Backlog of Disability Benefit Claims at Veterans Affairs Canada” on Dec. 11, 2020, following many months of study and stakeholder input. NCVA presented our submission to the committee last November as part and parcel of its deliberations. In order to ameliorate this "perfect storm" impacting the veteran community, we proposed the department should embrace an approach that considers claims at face value and base them on the reasonable evidence provided by the veteran and their family, with the proviso that individual files could be monitored over time and that an "approve and verify" strategy be followed. The medical reports usually required by VAC to support these disability applications have proven almost impossible to obtain through the COVID-19 crisis, a clear reality we have argued, that must be recognized in assessing the present dilemma. What the committee found quite clearly identifies the present crisis in VAC adjudication and calls for urgent and dramatic change in departmental protocols. Most importantly, from our perspective, the report endorses our position that a form of automatic entitlement or pre-approval—together with fast-track protocols—needs to be adopted by the department to address this significant challenge. As we have strongly argued, systematic change is absolutely necessary. It is evident that the departmental measures to increase staffing and resources will not be sufficient on their own to resolve this deplorable state of affairs, as underlined by the September 2020 Parliamentary Budget Office report. Indeed, it is fully expected that the backlog will only be exacerbated as increased numbers of Canadian Armed Forces members are medically released when the pandemic concludes. The committee’s report reflects a comprehensive canvassing of a number of the salient issues surrounding the backlog/wait time problem. Our organization has focused on the following major recommendations tied to adjudicative initiatives: That Veterans Affairs Canada continue to automatically approve applications for medical conditions presumptively attributed to service in the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) or the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), provide a list of such medical conditions, and expand that list through research That VAC conduct a study on women-specific medical conditions related to service in the CAF and RCMP, and, when applicable, add them to the list of medical conditions presumptively connected to military service That the Veterans Affairs Minister amend the Veterans Well-being Regulations to allow for the automatic pre-approval of disability benefit claims, and that VAC implement a pilot project to identify the risks and advantages of automatic pre-approval of claims That VAC conduct an in-depth review of the Veterans Emergency Fund and support for veterans waiting in the backlog Veterans Affairs Minister Lawrence MacAulay recently gave a formal reply to the committee’s compelling recommendations, setting out what constitutes, in our respectful judgment, a statement of good intentions from the department’s perspective around increasing staffing, technological advances, and more. We remain convinced that a more innovative approach is required to truly address this enduring backlog and wait time crisis in VAC. In this context, we are somewhat encouraged that the department’s deputy minister and senior officials are ostensibly in the process of seeking legislative or regulatory authority to implement appropriate adjudicative changes required in accord with the committee’s conclusions and our longstanding proposals. The department has hopefully recognized that there is sound rationale for incorporating the necessary adjudicative protocol amendments as the fundamental means of alleviating this unacceptable backlog and turnaround time conundrum. NCVA will continue to press the department to expedite the implementation of the necessary changes outlined by the committee report. Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland’s 2021 budget is notable in that the government recognized veterans “are three to four times as likely to suffer from depressive or anxiety disorders,” and more than 15 times more likely to experience post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), than the general population. Veterans are entitled to financial support for mental health care through the Treatment Benefit Program, but they can wait up to two years to receive mental health care while waiting for their disability benefit application to be confirmed, she noted. The budget proposes $140-million over five years to Veterans Affairs Canada, starting in 2021-22, for a program to cover the mental health care costs of veterans with these conditions while their disability benefit application is being processed. Though this proposal does not comprehensively adopt automatic claim pre approval—our favoured approach—it provides a significant step forward in recognizing that treatment benefits should be granted immediately and not be dependent on the disability application process, which can indeed take up to two years. Thus, this provision is hopefully a springboard to expand this principle so that veterans are not left in a precarious situation for many months or even years before health care or treatment benefits are available to them. The government, through the budget, has determined that mental health care (PTSD, depressive, or anxiety disorders) should be given priority at this time. We think this approach should be applied to all physical disabilities so that veterans in serious need of health care or treatment benefits should be granted the same sense of priority. Although this stop-gap initiative has the potential to trigger much-needed treatment benefits for those veterans suffering urgent mental health issues, it still begs the larger question as to whether VAC is prepared in relation to the overall adjudication of disability benefits to fully operationalize the requisite systemic measures needed to ameliorate the pervasive administrative and bureaucratic delays currently confronting Canadian veterans and their families. As we have said throughout the backlog and wait times crisis, desperate times require bold and creative measures. Veterans deserve nothing less during these challenging times where financial and health concerns have been intensified by COVID-19! Brian Forbes is chairman of the National Council of Veteran Associations in Canada and the chairman of the War Amps’ executive committee. The Hill Times

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Veterans’ benefit backlog requires a bold and creative solution

It is self-evident that the departmental measures to increase staffing and resources will not be sufficient on their own to resolve this deplorable state of affairs.

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