Veterans will closely follow federal election campaign

August 30, 2021 – In these challenging times, and with an election campaign currently under way, Canadian veterans and their families will be closely monitoring all federal leaders to determine which party is prepared to make a substantial commitment to rectifying the shortfalls and inequities which continue to be found in veterans’ legislation.

The overriding concern in the veterans’ community today remains the ongoing crisis as to the intolerable backlog and wait times confronting veterans in making applications for disability pensions and health care benefits. As the National Council of Veteran Associations (NCVA) and The War Amps, which is the leading force behind NCVA, have strongly argued, systemic change is absolutely essential. It is self-evident that the departmental measures to increase staffing and digital resources will not be sufficient on their own to resolve this deplorable state of affairs as underlined by the Parliamentary Budget Officer’s report of September 2020. Indeed, it is fully expected that the backlog will only be exacerbated as increased numbers of Canadian Armed Forces members are medically released following the conclusion of the pandemic.

From NCVA’s perspective, it is incumbent upon the federal parties to enunciate bold and creative measures to accelerate the establishment of fast-tracking protocols/automatic entitlement for outstanding veterans’ claims in order to alleviate this backlog and wait time dilemma which has only been compounded by the COVID-19 crisis.