Government to hire more staff to reduce backlog and workloads for veterans: Minister

OTTAWA – The federal Liberal government is promising to hire more staff to tackle the backlog of requests for help and the shortage of case managers who are leaving many disabled veterans without the help they need.

Veterans Affairs Minister Lawrence MacAulay made the pledge in an interview after The Canadian Press ran a series of articles in the run-up to Remembrance Day that examined some of the most pressing challenges facing veterans today.

These challenges included the backlog of disability claims which leaves thousands of veterans waiting months and sometimes years for treatment and financial support, and which veterans organizations have identified as the main concern of the community.

The series also looked at the overwhelming number of veterans assigned to individual case managers and how those workloads threaten to leave some of the most seriously injured through the cracks.

“We’re going to hire more,” MacAulay said. “Our party and our government have made it very clear that we are going to hire more adjudicators and case managers. Addressing this backlog is the top priority for Veterans Affairs Canada. And that’s what we’re going to do.

Yet while the minister stressed that adding staff, as the Liberals also pledged in the recent election, will be a key part of the government’s response, he did not specify how many people would be hired or when.

“I’m not going to give you an exact date on anything,” MacAulay said. “But what I’m going to do is make sure that we continue to deal with the backlog and reduce that percentage.”

The Canadian Press series also examined the lack of a promised government homeless strategy for veterans, calls for more help for families of injured veterans and the struggle some are waging for treatment. equal from Ottawa.

At the end of June, Veterans Affairs Canada had more than 40,000 unresolved disability claims from over 30,000 veterans. Veterans and their advocates have said long waits for applications to be processed add more stress and instability to injured veterans.

The Liberals have hired about 560 temporary arbitrators over the past two years and more to bring the backlog under control after years of cuts under the previous Conservative government and a wave of new requests for help more recently.

The Parliamentary Budget Officer in September 2020 indicated that the government would need to keep most of these temporary employees after their current contract expires in March 2022 for another three years to properly deal with the backlog.

Veterans Affairs officials privately warned MacAulay of the same last May, according to documents obtained through Freedom of Information, noting that these temporary workers were only really operational last January after months of recruitment and training.

These officials not only spoke about the importance of retaining these temporary employees, but also for the government to make a decision on such an extension as soon as possible.

“With the delays in expanding top staff, the risk of losing these highly skilled and trained employees is higher,” the report reads. “To date, we have lost 38 employees, 27 of whom are key decision makers. “

MacAulay declined to say whether the temporary staff would be hired or otherwise extended.

The minister was also vague about the government’s plan to tackle case managers within his department grappling with significant caseloads, although he said the government remained committed to sticking to it. his 2015 campaign pledge to only have 25 veterans for a case manager.

“Our goal is to make sure that we reduce this ratio,” he said. “Yes, 25 to one. There is only one way to do it, and that is to have more people to do the job.

Veterans Affairs says the average case manager today has about 33 veterans assigned to it, but the Union of Veterans Affairs says a survey of its members found the majority have over 35. and some have more than 50.

MacAulay’s lack of detail did not please opposition parties, who questioned the government’s commitment to veterans given the lack of detail on how it plans to address the challenges facing it. former soldiers.

Conservative Veterans Critic Alex Ruff acknowledged that the previous Harper government made mistakes in its treatment of ex-servicemen and noted some of the positive changes the Liberals have made to available benefits in recent years.

But he asked why the Liberals had failed to clear the backlog or address the shortage of case managers despite having been in power for six years – and asked what the government’s current plan was. to solve the problem.

“If you’re going to do this, what’s the plan?” ” he said. “What are the concrete details of how you’re actually going to achieve this? “

In direct response to the Canadian Press series, the Bloc Québécois veterans critic, Luc Desilets, called on the government to immediately keep its promise to reduce the ratio of veterans per case manager to 25 for one, including hiring more veterans themselves.

“Veterans Affairs Canada is failing on several fronts and that comes at a human cost,” Desilets said in a statement released in French.

“The minister must redouble his efforts, and things are urgent. The Bloc Québécois is asking VAC to deploy the necessary resources to hire more case managers.

NDP Veterans Critic Rachel Blaney noted that Parliamentary Budget Officer Yves Giroux’s report in September 2020 actually indicated that the government could have cleared the backlog in 12 months if it had. invested more money in hiring and retaining staff.

“It was very clear: if you want to end this backlog, keep those people that you hired temporarily on a permanent basis, then hire these other people to do it in a year. So I’m a little frustrated, ”said Blaney.

“I know it will cost money. But I think the majority of Canadians think that when people serve our country the way they did … we owe them the same when they return from their service.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published on November 10, 2021.