ARCHIVED - Veterans Affairs Canada

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Section I – Overview

Minister's Message

As Minister of Veterans Affairs, it is with great pride that I present our 2008-2009 Performance Report. This report outlines how we met our commitments to the men and women and their families who count on us, while treating everyone who turned to Veterans Affairs Canada with respect, dignity and fairness.

The number of our modern day Veterans continues to increase. In response, we have continued to improve the services offered under the New Veterans Charter. For example, we increased the number of Operational Stress Injury Clinics to eight by opening clinics in Ottawa and Vancouver, with two more clinics to be added in the Fall of 2009. We have also increased our presence on Canadian Forces Bases and Wings and offer transition services on-site. In partnership with DND, we are establishing Integrated Personnel Support Centres for a more coordinated approach to help Canadian Forces members, Veterans and their families make a successful transition to civilian life.

While the number of our older Veterans is declining, their need for care is growing. We continued to provide access to care, treatment and support for our Veterans, including initiatives such as the expansion of the Veterans Independence Program for survivors and a revised national long-term care strategy.

In the last year, the Department marked a number of significant milestones, including the 90^th anniversary of the end of the First World War, the 55^th anniversary of the Korean War Armistice, the 65^th anniversary of the Battle of the Atlantic and the first National Peacekeepers' Day. In addition, our government assumed ownership of the Canada Memorial (Green Park, London, England) which pays tribute to the almost one million Canadians who joined the war effort in the United Kingdom in the First and Second World Wars. In order to keep the torch of remembrance burning brightly, we increased our focus on in-Canada remembrance activities and recognition of our modern day Veterans.

We owe a great debt to our Veterans and we dedicate ourselves, on behalf of all Canadians, to making sure they receive the help and recognition they deserve. Through the commitment and dedication of our staff, the sacrifices and achievements of Canada's Veterans are recognized and honoured.

The paper copy
was signed by

The Honourable Greg Thompson, P.C., M.P.
Minister of Veterans Affairs

Chair's Message

I am pleased to present my first Performance Report as Chair of the Veterans Review and Appeal Board (VRAB). Although I began my term at the end of this reporting period, I consider it essential to look back on the progress achieved against the plans and priorities identified for 2008-09. The Board's future direction will be shaped by this progress and we will build upon it in the coming year.

The Board provides an independent appeal process to individuals who are dissatisfied with disability pension, disability award and War Veterans Allowance decisions made by the Department of Veterans Affairs. Hearings are conducted by Board Members in over 30 locations in Canada at the request of Veterans, Canadian Forces members, serving or released members of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, and their families.

Although the Board has no control over how many individuals exercise their right of appeal, we take very seriously our responsibility to ensure that those who do are well served. In 2008-09, we were able to exceed our goal of finalizing 7,000 decisions for applicants by working with the Bureau of Pensions Advocates and the Royal Canadian Legion to bring forward claims and to maximize our hearing schedule. The Board was also very successful in using technology to further streamline the process. Today, our Members and representatives across the country have access to applicants' hearing documentation electronically in "real time." We have also encouraged applicants to consider video conferencing as a convenient hearing alternative.

While applicants have access to free representation, we recognize that we also have a responsibility to reach out to them. Thanks to regular feedback from applicants through our toll-free inquiries lines and our improved Web site, the Board developed new tools to address common questions.

Of course, our primary goal is to provide fair decisions to all who apply. In 2008-09, the Board added new training opportunities to our professional development program for Members to support them in their role as specialized adjudicators.

We are a small but busy Board, one that relies on the enthusiasm and professionalism of staff and Members to deliver a quality program to applicants. We look forward to working with representative organizations, applicants and other interested parties to address the challenges that lie ahead.

The paper copy
was signed by

John D. Larlee
Chair, Veterans Review and Appeal Board

Raison d'être

Veterans Affairs exists to repay the nation's debt of gratitude toward those whose legacy is the peace and security we enjoy as Canadians. Canada's contribution to global peace and security has come at a heavy price to our Veterans. Our clientele includes traditional war Veterans from the First and Second World Wars and the Korean War, former and serving members of the Canadian Forces (CF), the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) and certain civilians as well as eligible family members (survivors and dependants).

Responsibilities

Veterans Affairs is a Portfolio consisting of: Veterans Affairs Canada (VAC, the Department); the Veterans Review and Appeal Board (VRAB, the Board); and the Office of the Veterans Ombudsman (OVO).

Veterans Affairs Canada

VAC's twofold focus is to provide client-centred services and benefits that respond to our clients' needs, and to foster the memory of Veterans.

VAC provides Disability Pensions and Special Awards to Veterans of the First and Second World Wars; the Korean War; any Veteran with service prior to April 1, 1947; Canadian Forces Veterans and members; and former and serving members of the RCMP. The New Veterans Charter (NVC) supports modern day Veterans and their families to ease their transition to civilian life through a comprehensive suite of programs which includes rehabilitation, health benefits, job placement assistance, financial support, and disability awards including death benefits. The Bureau of Pensions Advocates provides free legal advice and representation for individuals dissatisfied with decisions rendered by VAC regarding their disability benefits.

VAC's Health Care Program is designed to enhance the quality of life of clients, promote independence, and assist in keeping clients at home and in their own communities. The Department provides Veterans and other eligible clients with access to treatment benefits, health care services such as advice and information, needs assessment, advocacy and referrals. The Veterans Independence Program (VIP) is a national home care program that helps clients remain healthy and independent in their own homes or communities. VAC supports Veterans in long-term care beds, either in community facilities, in Ste. Anne's Hospital (the last remaining federal hospital administered by the Department), or in larger contract facilities where Veterans have priority access to beds.

The Department keeps alive the achievements and sacrifices made by those who served Canada in times of war, military conflict and peace and promotes an understanding of how they helped shape our country. VAC fosters the memory of Canada's war dead and Veterans through its Remembrance Programs, including the maintenance and preservation of 14 memorial sites in Europe.

Veterans Review and Appeal Board

The Veterans Review and Appeal Board (VRAB) provides two levels of redress for disability pension and disability award applications and the final level of appeal for War Veterans Allowance decisions. The Board's objective is to ensure that Canada's war Veterans, eligible Canadian Forces Veterans and members, RCMP clients, qualified civilians and their families receive the disability pensions, disability awards and other benefits to which they are entitled. The Board reports to Parliament through the Minister of Veterans Affairs and is completely independent of VAC.

Veterans Ombudsman

Our European Sites

Text Version – Photos of Monuments in Europe

1. Green Park, United Kingdom
2. Bourlon Wood, France
3. Masnières, France
4. Passchendaele, Belgium
5. Gueudecourt, France
6. Vimy, France
7. Le Quesnel, France
8. Courcelette, France
9. Hill 62, Belgium
10. Monchy-le-Preux, France
11. Dury, France
12. Courtrai, Belgium
13. St. Julien, Belgium
14. Beaumont-Hamel, France

Program Activity Architecture

Performance Summary

Contribution of Operational Priorities to Strategic Outcomes

Veterans Affairs has:

• four strategic outcomes (two for Veterans Affairs Canada, one for the Veterans Review and Appeal Board, and one for the Office of the Veterans Ombudsman);
• five Program Activities; and
• seven priorities.

Risks and Challenges

Risk Context

Veterans Affairs Canada's programs are delivered through a network of more than 40 offices throughout the country and overseas. The Veterans Review and Appeal Board holds hearings in Charlottetown and across the country and the Veterans Ombudsman has offices in Charlottetown and Ottawa. To provide these services, the Portfolio had 4,425 full and part-time employees with spending for 2008-09 of $3.35 billion.

The Portfolio's operating environment has become much more complex, due to factors such as changing client and staff demographics, the fiscal and economic environment, government priorities (improvements to management processes, transparency and accountability), and Canada's continuing involvement in international operations. This places additional pressure on operating performance as VAC, VRAB and the Veterans Ombudsman strive to serve our clients.

Corporate Risks

The major risks identified in the 2008-09 Report on Plans and Priorities have been reorganized under the following four sections which discuss the risks/challenges along with the mitigating strategies and responses for the Portfolio in 2008-09.

Risk/Challenge: Client Environment – Ability to transform to meet changing client needs and demographics

As of March 31, 2009 Veterans Affairs Canada provided benefits and services to 219,000 clients. While this was virtually unchanged from 220,000 in March 2008, VAC's client mix is changing. In 2008-09, traditional War-service Veterans declined from 37 to 34 percent of our client base, surviving family members of Veterans were unchanged at 36 percent, modern day Canadian Forces members and Veterans increased from 24 to 27 percent and Royal Canadian Mounted Police members were 3 percent of our client base.

While the number of our War-service Veterans is declining and is forecast to be only 22 percent of our client base in five years, the demand for and intensity of care required to support aging War-service Veterans and their spouses continues to rise.

The increased program demands and service delivery expectations of modern day Canadian Forces members and families are different to those of the War-service Veterans. The number of Canadian Forces members who have served in peacekeeping, peacemaking missions and other international operations has significantly increased in recent years. The change in operational tempo has resulted in more operational stress injuries and a corresponding need for higher levels of support from VAC and DND for CF members and families. In five years the number of CF clients is projected to increase from 27 percent of our client base to 37 percent.

The RCMP also continues to face many challenges, while dealing with the inherent danger, risks and stresses of policing. The number of disability pensions and associated benefits provided by VAC to RCMP members continues to increase. They are expected to make up five percent of our clients in five years.

The challenge for the "Remembrance Programming " program activity is to keep remembrance alive through engaging Canadian youth and to appropriately commemorate modern day Veterans for their service to Canada.

While these factors affect all areas of the Portfolio, the major risk is ensuring that the Portfolio's programs and services remain relevant and meet the needs of our clients. With changing client demographics, there are fewer War-service Veterans and more modern day Veterans. In addition to a changing client base, we have to be in a position to provide services to clients wherever they are located.

Given this operating environment, the challenge is to ensure that VAC can transform in a timely and effective way to meet changing client needs and expectations.

Response to the Client Environment Risk

In response to the changing needs and demographics of our modern day Veterans, the Department:

• Continued a major transformation of our programs through the implementation of the New Veterans Charter programs focussed on wellness and reintegration into civilian life.
• Implemented a mental health strategy for early and comprehensive intervention, including OSI clinics and the OSI Social Support network with support for families.
• Worked closely with DND to increase our presence on DND Bases and Wings, to harmonize our services (including transition services), and to enhance outreach for modern day Canadian Forces clients and families.
• Distributed client cases more evenly across the Bureau of Pensions Advocates network.

For our traditional war service Veterans, the Department:

• Revised our long term care strategy
• Launched a benefit grid review
• Modernized Ste. Anne's Hospital to provide Veterans with an environment adapted to their changing needs. The project will be completed in 2009-10. With its expertise in long term care and in providing specialized mental health services to traditional and modern day Veterans, Ste. Anne's Hospital continued to build partnerships while identifying options for the future.

To address the challenge of keeping remembrance alive through youth engagement and modern day Veterans commemoration, we developed strategies to more fully engage youth through an increased presence in social networking forums that they understand and use. The results of the 2008 remembrance review are being used to develop strategic and action plans to address CF remembrance issues.

To respond to the risk of loss of corporate knowledge, the Portfolio took a more focussed approach to Human Resource (HR) management with an emphasis on integrated business/HR planning, including succession plans, development and learning plans, and management information systems to keep track of outcomes and increase the ability of Managers to make informed HR decisions.

Risk/Challenge: Government Context – Ability to balance Government of Canada Expectations and changing client needs

The core economic priorities of the Government of Canada include reforming global finance, ensuring sound budgeting, securing jobs for families, expanding investment and trade, and making government more effective. The Government of Canada continued to reduce debt and taxes, focused government spending and provided additional support for struggling sectors of the economy.

In order to secure an effective public service, the Clerk of the Privy Council has four public service-wide priority areas for Public Service Renewal: planning; recruitment; employee development; and enabling infrastructure. Our Department is solidly engaged in all aspects of renewal.

Due to the associated changes in business processes and systems, the increasing needs and demands of clients introduce higher levels of risk. The changing expectations of Canadians and the need for a greater degree of visibility and accountability also presented a challenge in a service delivery culture, while we faced additional pressures related to responding to information requests from the Veterans Ombudsman and an increase in requests for departmental reviews.

The major service factors affecting the delivery of VRAB's program were the continuing change in applicant make-up, the volume and age of claims pending with representatives, increasing volumes of complex claims, new reporting requirements and requests for information from applicants and stakeholders.

In its first full year of operations, the major factors affecting the Office of the Veterans Ombudsman were the development of its organizational structure and processes while dealing with a sizeable backlog of client requests.

There is a risk that the Portfolio may be unable to effectively balance increased Government of Canada expectations and changing client needs.

Response to the Government Context Risk

The above-noted risks were mitigated by: anticipating needs; keeping staff informed and involved in evolving files; scanning our operating environment; staff development through training and coaching; and continuing to improve our service-delivery processes. Another example of mitigating the risk is the role of the Veterans Ombudsman in identifying barriers to services, support and benefits for Veterans.

VAC's priorities, policies, programs and services are aligned with the priorities of both the Government of Canada and the Clerk of the Privy Council. Specifically, through activities such as our Integrated Business and Human Resource Planning, we have advanced the Government's public service renewal initiatives and supported the economic priorities of ensuring sound budgeting and making government more effective. In 2008, we undertook a strategic review of our programs and spending, identifying areas for improvements and efficiencies while maintaining the level of services and benefits to Canada's Veterans and their families. In addition, we contributed to the Government priority of security through programs and services that support Canadian Forces members and Veterans and their families, and former and serving members of the RCMP.

The Veterans Review and Appeal Board addressed its service delivery-related risk by working with client representatives to accelerate the number of hearings for applicants and closely monitoring its pending inventory to identify and hear the oldest claims. Due to financial constraints, the Board assigned additional work within existing resources.

The Office of the Veterans Ombudsman (OVO) focussed on staff recruitment while managing its backlog of client requests in 2008-09.

Risk/Challenge: People/Knowledge Capacity

The loss of employees with corporate memory and other key employees will mean a loss of corporate knowledge, could compromise the delivery of benefits and services and could curtail our ability to respond to clients and administrative demands. The availability of sufficient IT resources beyond the next two years could impact the Department's ability to fully support business initiatives. If the HR strategies for recruitment, planning, learning and training are not carried out, it may be difficult for the Portfolio to fulfill its mandate to serve our clients and meet legislative and MAF requirements. Other factors include the ability of staff to accommodate further change and limited resource allocation flexibility.

Response to the People/Knowledge Risk

The Portfolio has developed strategies around recruitment, human resources planning, learning and training. Our responses included engaging staff, knowledge transfer, human resources monitoring, establishing pre-qualified pools, cross-training of existing staff and increased post-secondary graduate recruitment.

Risk/Challenge: Partnerships and Contractors

Partnerships and third party contracts are fundamental to our service delivery as we strive to provide services to clients closer to where they reside, drawing from a market where there are a declining number of providers.

Although the likelihood of privacy breaches by VAC or its partners/contractors with access to corporate information is low, the Department must still be prepared for this potential risk. Another type of risk is a failure to have contracts in place on time and/or not fulfilled.

Response to the Partnership Risk

The Department managed these risks by engaging information management in all major projects, exercising effective contract monitoring processes, maintaining proactive communication, and active follow-up. In particular, we worked with contractors and central agencies to manage the renovation project at Ste. Anne's Hospital. In addition, we established a task force in 2006 to work on the procurement of a new contract for health claims processing and related services (the Federal Health Care Processing System used by VAC, RCMP, and DND). The task force worked with central agencies throughout 2008-09 to complete the Request for Proposal and the Statement of Work.

Within the Portfolio, we liaise with other federal departments whose mandates link closely to our own. VAC and DND work together to provide a seamless transition for releasing CF members and their families. Through the Federal Healthcare Partnership (FHP), VAC and five federal partners collaborated to identify, promote and implement more efficient and effective health care programs, providing strategic leadership and maintaining healthcare service levels while achieving economies of scale. The Department also worked with Provincial, Territorial, and Regional Health Authorities to address our clients' needs, and communicated on a regular basis with stakeholder organizations who advocate on behalf of their members for improved health, social, home and long-term care services.

Partnerships and collaborations with other government departments, stakeholders and Veterans' organizations are also crucial to the delivery of remembrance programming. Following a program evaluation, the Partnership Contribution Program was renewed for five years with updated terms and conditions, allowing for new initiatives such as Corporate Engagement and Marketing.

Expenditure Profile

The Veterans Affairs spending trend shows actual expenditure increases through the 2008-09 year. These increases relate to several factors including: the implementation and gradual uptake of programs under the New Veterans Charter; annual price indexation adjustments for benefits paid to or on behalf of clients; increased eligibility for benefits under the Veterans Independence Program for primary care givers and low-income or disabled survivors; ex-gratia payments related to the use of Agent Orange at CFB Gagetown; additional funding provided through Budget 2007 for enhanced services to Veterans, the establishment of five additional Operational Stress Injury clinics and the establishment of the Office of the Veterans Ombudsman; and salary cost adjustments related to signed collective agreements.

The above increases were partially offset by a decline in client numbers for Disability Pensions and Allowances, War Veterans Allowances, and Treatment Benefits such as prescription drugs and special equipment.

Voted and Statutory Items Displayed in Main Estimates

Significant differences between the 2007-08 and 2008-09 reporting periods include: increased benefits payments due to the gradual uptake of programs under the New Veterans Charter; increased ex-gratia payments related to the use of Agent Orange at CFB Gagetown; increased benefit payments due to increased eligibility under the Veterans Independence Program for primary care givers and low-income or disabled survivors; increased cost for health care related to long-term care and operational stress injuries; and increased salary costs related to signed collective agreements.

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