Some ‘facts’ about Canada’s veterans

Only a non-partisan public inquiry will fix this profoundly flawed department. A judicial royal commission would guide Canada to re-establish its commitment to injured military, veterans, and their families.
By SEAN BRUYEA |
Published: Monday, 10/18/2010 12:00 am EDT
Veterans and all Canadians are grappling with revelations that federal bureaucrats have repeatedly and flagrantly violated Canada’s privacy laws for the purpose of destroying the credibility of at least one and maybe many more veterans who dared exercise freedom of expression to help others.

I am that veteran. More than 850 bureaucrats, political staffers up to and including the PMO, Members of Parliament and ministers have shared, accessed or received the personal medical and financial information of an advocate who dared criticize programs for Canada’s injured soldiers and their families.

Why was this allowed to occur and what can be done to fix what is now seen as a morally rotten culture at Veterans Affairs?

This ‘privacy scandal’ has not only provoked the outrage of two million veterans and their families but all Canadians shiver in fear as the federal government holds some piece of private information on each and every one of us.

Unsettling to many veterans and Canadians is the relative silence of Parliament on the matter. True to his long-time commitment to serving and retired military members and their families, NDP MP Peter Stoffer and his party are determined ‘lone wolves’ calling for a much-needed public inquiry into Veterans Affairs and federal government privacy practices. The question is not why Stoffer and NDP Leader Jack Layton are calling for a public inquiry into a federal department all of Canada now knows is both ethically and functionally broken. Why is the rest of Parliament not demanding the same public inquiry?

I know what it is to be a lone wolf accused by bureaucrats of howling at nothing more than the moon. It is these false allegations of ‘lunacy’ which Veterans Affairs bureaucrats used to discredit me. Senior managers were appalled and angered that I had the audacity to speak publicly in opposition to the so-called “New Veterans Charter” while calling for the creation of a veterans’ ombudsman.

This is what is clearly shown in the 14,000 pages of my Privacy Act information held by Veterans Affairs, now in my possession. And there are at least 14,000 more pages of documents about me the department has been withholding for more than 16 months.

What has started to send shivers down the spines of Canadians is how the senior bureaucrats manipulated my private medical and financial information. Although 10 or more briefing notes destined for two separate Cabinet ministers were prepared in relation to events unrelated to my personal psychological condition, non-medically trained bureaucrats unilaterally decided that I required a psychiatric assessment in six of them.

Former veterans affairs minister Albina Guarnieri was briefed twice on a plan to force a psychiatric in-patient assessment to be conducted at Veterans Affairs’ only hospital, the Ste. Anne de Bellevue.

Incredibly, the results of the assessment were partially provided to the minister before the assessment was ordered. If I did not agree with the assessment, bureaucrats sought legal advice to cut off all my life-preserving treatment.

This disturbing plan precipitated the second grievous finding of the privacy commissioner’s investigation. After recommending the plan to the minister, bureaucrats sent four volumes of medical and financial information about me to Ste. Anne’s hospital, an amount the privacy commissioner rightly determined “exceeded what could be reasonable and proportional.”

While briefing notes about me were being handed to the minister in July 2005, Veterans Affairs published a telling report. Vol. 2 of the “Disability Pension Program Evaluation” concludes that “A shift to greater use of lump sum payments…would serve, over time, to regain control of an alarming future liability scenario.”

As every good crime story tells us when looking for motive to a crime, ‘follow the money.’

The New Veterans Charter as it is now known was passed as Bill C-45 in the House of Commons on May 10, 2005, for second and third readings in under a minute without a word of debate. Bill C-45 was merely a repackaging of already existing programs for injured soldiers except for one crucial difference. The previous lifelong monthly compensation for military injuries was replaced with a one time lump sum. This is what the chief bureaucrat who designed the plan, Darrah Mogan, called, a “wellness dividend” in that the lump sum plan “would pay for itself over a 15-to-20-year period.”

The only obstacle which stood in the way of saving billions of dollars was me and a handful of enlightened veterans and their families.

But, for disabled serving and retired military personnel, it isn’t just about money. It is about how that money is scrupulously withheld by insensitive middle and senior managers. Injured soldiers are often forced to beg Canada for help in a most humiliating attack on their proud worth they once felt in uniform.

Veterans and families are angry about a culture and a system that spreads condescending PR campaigns telling Canada that all veterans are happy and grateful when many veterans painfully know the opposite to be true.

The medical conditions of disabled veterans are often worsened as a result of dealing with this culture of degradation. The insensitive system inculcates a sense of worthlessness and powerlessness in veterans and their families. It saps their hope and well-being as veterans have little or no say in their future.

And Canadians are becoming increasingly frightened by the ruthless tactics of our once prestigious but far too often morally corrupt senior public service.

Yet, the bureaucrats have far more influence over veterans’ programs than veterans or any of the political parties in Parliament combined. The bureaucracy ignores the unanimous calls for the creation of a legislated ombudsman with real investigative powers. The bureaucratic monster continues to dictate to Canada the details of the New Veterans Charter while Veterans Affairs has resisted full implementation of any of the more than 300 recommendations provided by its own advisory groups for more than five years.

If Parliament cannot control the bureaucracy or make it suffer consequences when it breaks the law what Canadian power can?

This is why veterans and soldiers are angry above all else. In their willingness to sacrifice their lives for Canada at a moment’s notice to uphold Canada’s laws and values, serving military and veterans cannot comprehend why bureaucrats don’t sacrifice anything when they break these same laws and betray those same values.

Our soldiers die for Canada, at the orders of Parliament, not at the order of the bureaucracy. That is why the fix for the bureaucracy must come from Parliament. We must re-establish the lost trust and equal partnership between Canada and its veterans. There must be open debate and involvement of all Canadians to rebuild veterans’ trust. Creative ways to reach out to all veterans must be discovered and no program can ever again be implemented without the veto-empowered approval of our veterans en masse.

The privacy commissioner has correctly ordered a systemic audit of Veterans Affairs privacy practices. Her findings will be welcome in addressing privacy issues but the ethically fetid and dysfunctional culture will remain in Veterans Affairs.

Only a non-partisan public inquiry will fix this profoundly flawed department. A judicial royal commission would guide Canada to re-establish its commitment to injured military, veterans and their families. The commission can be mandated to report every three months with interim findings so that progress can begin immediately to renew long lost trust with our brave veterans.

A public inquiry is a very small price to pay to rebuild more than six decades of Canada’s betrayal of our serving and retired Canadian Forces personnel. Anything less than a royal commission will be once again hijacked by the bureaucracy, currently the most powerful force in Ottawa, or in Veterans Affairs case, Charlottetown.

The Hill Times

http://www.seanbruyea.com/2010/10/parliament-must-order-a-royal-commission-to-clean-up-veterans-affairs/

by Sean Bruyea-VICTORIA TIMES-COLONIST-September 28, 2010 p. A.12

Canadians learned last week that federal bureaucrats at Veterans Affairs Canada freely offered extensive amounts of my confidential medical and financial information to federal cabinet ministers without my permission.

And at least 850 federal employees, political staffers and politicians exchanged or accessed the most intimate details of my personal life.

Why? And what can be done to make sure it never happens to another Canadian?

I am a veteran with disabilities. I, therefore, depend upon Canada for my financial security as well as funding for my extensive medical needs for the rest of my life. I am also an advocate for the rights of injured soldiers and their families.

Internal e-mails show Veterans Affairs employees sarcastically labelled me as their “favourite client” who is “very vocal in criticisms of our efforts” and “our programs.”

It is exactly this bureaucratic sense of propriety over what are, in reality, veterans’ programs that seems to have fuelled the desire of numerous high-ranking bureaucrats to use my private and confidential information to impugn my credibility.

You see, in May 2005, I was the first of just a handful of veterans who opposed the single most important legislation to affect veterans in almost a century. The new law took away a lifetime monthly disability payment for injuries suffered by disabled soldiers and replaced it with a one-time lump sum. The law passed in the House of Commons in less than a minute without any debate.

As a recipient of the lifetime monthly payments, I could not stand by while other soldiers suffering the same injuries would receive dramatically less than what they deserve and what I still receive.

As part of my attempts to heal from post-traumatic stress disorder and other physical and psychological injuries, I also started to write. As a budding journalist, my first article was a call for a veterans’ ombudsman. That article became more important than I imagined. It served as the foundation for the 2006 Conservative election promise to create such an office.

As the recent scandal over not renewing the current ombudsman shows, the bureaucracy did not want anyone to watch over them.

The 14,000 pages of documents obtained through Privacy Act requests and held by Veterans Affairs show that my volunteer efforts to defend the rights of disabled veterans and their families angered many in the department.

However, their emotional reaction is not my concern. That these individuals worked together to circulate my personal documents to virtually every director-level bureaucrat and above, as well as to ministers, political staffers and MPs, is my concern.

That these documents served as the basis of a briefing to the minister’s chief of staff the day before he briefed the Prime Minister’s Office is outright disturbing.

We are all clients of the federal government at some level. Government departments in Ottawa hold vast amounts of our personal information, which, if misused, could jeopardize the security and well-being of individuals in Canada and relatives in their countries of origin.

But 850 federal employees thought that they had every right to widely disseminate and/or access the most sacred knowledge about me.

Is what happened to me an exception? Retired Col. Michel Drapeau, Canada’s leading expert in privacy law, knows that it is not. But my case is the most flagrant and extensive he has seen and the widespread circulation of my information should not and cannot be used “for political warfare to try to silence a critic.”

How will the government ensure what happened to me will never happen to not only another veteran but to another journalist or any other Canadian for that matter?

The privacy commissioner has been carrying out a year-long investigation into my situation. Her findings are due soon. Clear and strong recommendations will undoubtedly help but, over the past five years, Veterans Affairs has easily resisted hundreds of recommendations, most by their own advisory groups. And many federal departments have shown similar arrogance in resisting the recommendations of oversight agencies and even parliamentary committees.

For that reason, Parliament must look into this and a full public inquiry is needed. Parliament is the only institution that has the power to stand up to our federal bureaucracy.

I went to war to defend Canada’s values and rights such as freedom of expression. Why is it that the government can use my most sacred information to attack my credibility?

What happened to my private information should have every Canadian asking whether they are next. Only a full public inquiry has the power to reassure all Canadians that they never have to ask this question.

Sean Bruyea is a freelance journalist, advocate for veterans’ rights and a retired air force intelligence officer. He lives in Ottawa.

Credit: Sean Bruyea; Special to Times Colonist

Copyright Southam Publications Inc. Sep 28, 2010

http://www.seanbruyea.com/2010/09/i-didnt-go-to-war-for-this-kind-of-abuse/

By Sean Bruyea, Ottawa Citizen Special-September 25, 2010 10:28 AM

This past week, Canadians learned that federal bureaucrats at Veterans Affairs Canada freely offered up extensive amounts of my confidential medical and financial information to federal cabinet ministers without my permission. And at least 850 federal employees, political staffers and politicians exchanged and/or accessed the most intimate details of my personal life.
Why? And what can be done to make sure it never happens to another Canadian?

I am a veteran with disabilities. I, therefore, depend upon Canada for my financial security as well as funding for my extensive medical needs for the rest of my life. I am also an advocate for the rights of injured soldiers and their families.

Internal e-mails show, Veterans Affairs employees sarcastically labelled me as their “favorite client” who is “very vocal in criticisms of our efforts” and “our programs.” It is exactly this bureaucratic sense of propriety over what are, in reality, veterans’ programs which seems to have fuelled the desire of numerous high-ranking bureaucrats to use my private and confidential information to impugn my credibility.

You see, in May 2005, I was the first of just a handful of veterans who opposed the single most important legislation to affect veterans in almost a century. The new law took away a lifetime monthly disability payment for injuries suffered by disabled soldiers and replaced it with a one-time lump sum. The law passed in the House of Commons in less than a minute without any debate. As a recipient of the lifetime monthly payments, I could not in good conscience stand by while other soldiers suffering the same injuries would receive dramatically less than what they deserve and what I still receive.

As part of my attempts to heal from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and other physical and psychological injuries, I also started to write. As a budding journalist, my first article was a call for a veterans’ ombudsman. That article became more important than I imagined. It served as the foundation for the Conservative election platform of 2006, promising to create such an office.

As the recent scandal over not renewing the current ombudsman shows, the bureaucracy did not want anyone to watch over them.

What is also clear is that the 14,000 pages of documents obtained through Privacy Act requests and held by Veterans Affairs show that my volunteer efforts to defend the rights of disabled veterans and their families angered many in the federal department. However, their emotional reaction is not my concern. That these individuals worked together to knowingly circulate my personal documents to virtually every director-level bureaucrat and above, as well as to ministers, political staffers and MPs is my concern. That these documents served as the basis of a briefing to the minister’s chief of staff the day before he briefed the prime minister’s office is outright disturbing.

This also needs to be the concern of every Canadian, and especially all parliamentarians.

We are all clients of the federal government at some level. Government departments in Ottawa hold vast amounts of our personal information including recipients of the Canada Pension Plan, retirement and disability, First Nations health and welfare, or the millions of immigration records replete with information which, if misused, could not only jeopardize the security and well-being of individuals in Canada but also relatives in their countries of origin. And most every adult and all Canadian business provides Ottawa with detailed tax information including social insurance numbers.

But Veterans Affairs is an odd creature located principally in Charlottetown, P.E.I. It is the only federal department with its headquarters located outside Ottawa. This is also likely part of the reason why 850 federal employees thought that they had every right to widely disseminate and/or access the most sacred knowledge about me.

Is what happened to me an exception? Col. (Ret’d) Michel Drapeau, Canada’s leading expert in privacy law, knows that it is not. But my case is the most flagrant and extensive he has seen and the widespread circulation of my information should not and cannot be used “for political warfare to try to silence a critic.”

How will the government ensure what happened to me will never happen to not only another veteran but to another journalist or any other Canadian for that matter?

The Privacy Commissioner has been carrying out a year-long investigation into my situation. Her findings are due soon. Supportive findings as well as clear and strong recommendations will undoubtedly help, but over the past five years, Veterans Affairs has easily and successfully resisted literally hundreds of recommendations, most by their own advisory groups. And many federal departments have shown similar arrogance in resisting the recommendations of oversight agencies and even parliamentary committees.

For that reason, Parliament must look into this and opposition parties need to call for a full public inquiry. Parliament is the only institution which has the power to stand up to our federal bureaucracy.

I went to war to defend Canada’s sacred values and rights such as freedom of expression. Why is it that the government can use my most sacred information to destroy my credibility, thereby denying me that same freedom for which I and other soldiers have sacrificed so much?

What happened to my private information should have every Canadian asking whether they are next. Only a full public inquiry has the power to reassure all Canadians that they never have to ask this question.

Sean Bruyea is a freelance journalist, advocate for veterans’ rights and a retired Air Force Intelligence Officer.

© Copyright (c) The Ottawa Citizen

http://www.seanbruyea.com/2010/09/this-is-not-what-i-went-to-war-for/

by Sean Bruyea-The Toronto Star-August 26, 2010

The indisputable lightning rod for the cumulative frustration of disabled Canadian Forces veterans and their families has become the replacement of the lifetime monthly pension for military injuries with a one-time lump-sum payment.

Among the rapidly growing population of more than 680,000 serving and veteran Canadian Forces personnel, approximately 60,000 soldiers suffer lifelong disabling injuries. For more than 80 years prior to April 2006, anyone applying for compensation related to an injury occurring in military service was awarded a lifelong monthly disability pension. After that time, the monthly pension was replaced by a one-time lump sum of a maximum of $276,089.

I was the first to make public the shortfalls of the lump-sum program in May 2005. Since then, the outpouring of anger among disabled soldiers, veterans and their families has risen to a crescendo of angst and betrayal voiced in the Aug. 17 news conference held by outgoing veterans’ ombudsman Pat Stogran.

Yet this anger has been ignored in the senior bureaucracy and for many in Parliament. In spite of unanimous demands outside government to drastically revamp the lump-sum program, the parliamentary committee on veterans affairs “recommended” that the very bureaucrats fighting tooth and nail against rescinding the lump sum come back with a “plan” more acceptable to the needs of the increasing numbers of injured Canadian Forces members and veterans.

Giving the lump-sum “hen house” back to the bureaucratic “foxes” will inevitably lead to the same unacceptable situation that created the lump-sum problem in the first place. In fact, Veterans Affairs Minister Jean Pierre Blackburn indicates the bureaucracy has already decided on the plan. Recent hints from the minister are that the lump sum will be spread out over multiple payments. The justification for this? A poll conducted by the bureaucracy, which concluded that “lump-sum award is the preferred option for 69 per cent of those veterans who have received this benefit.”

How could veterans prefer a one-time payment of a maximum of $276,089 instead of up to $29,000 or more per year tax-free for life plus amounts for children and spouses? The lump sum does not make provisions for children and spouses.

The truth is that the minister’s department didn’t compare the lump sum to the previous lifelong pensions at all. Instead, the so-called survey asked, “If you had a choice, would you prefer to receive your lump-sum payment with the same dollar amount as a single payment or as payments over time?”

Double amputee Cpl. Mark Fuchko was contacted for the survey. Fuchko was struck by an IED in Afghanistan in 2008 on his second tour:

“I was extremely disappointed with the fact that (the lifelong) pensions were not mentioned in the poll . . . of course I said I would want the lump sum, because I could earn interest on it. I’m sure most vets questioned responded the same way. The government, however, is using this to support its position that vets do not want pensions.”

Neither did the survey solicit opinions on paying out annual inflationary increases to prior lump-sum recipients, something that the monthly pension justly accommodates. And the Veterans Affairs survey included less than 10 per cent of those who received the lump sum while neglecting to ask any of the more than 100,000 disabled soldiers who are receiving the monthly pensions whether they would swap their lifelong payments for a one-time lump sum.

Other like-minded nations such as the United Kingdom provide both tax-free pensions and a lump sum of up to £570,000 or $929,000 at today’s exchange rate. Like the lump sum in Canada, these are maximum amounts. The average paid out to 16,734 Canadian soldiers and veterans since 2006 has been $38,843, barely enough for a simple modification of an entire house for wheelchair accessibility.

The parliamentary committee report redeems itself in many other areas: “under the most reasonable decision that a young veteran could possibly make, the (lump-sum) disability award would represent approximately one-quarter of what would have been paid out as pension.” Independent studies with insurance companies place that fraction as low as one-fifth or one-sixth, which is an equivalent lump sum of up to $1.5 million, more in keeping with court settlements for total and complete disability.

The minister is forced to defend the untenably bad decisions made by the senior bureaucracy in providing inadequate and inaccessible programs surrounding the lump sum. He offers those collecting the lump sum a one-time amount of up to $500 in aid for financial planning. Anyone who has consulted a financial planner knows that fees typically run from 0.5 per cent to 2.5 per cent annually; the smaller the portfolio, the higher the percentage. Is it any wonder that only 1 per cent of lump-sum recipients have availed themselves of the service?

Mark Fuchko sums up the lump-sum survey appropriately: “The question on the survey about ‘payments over time vs. lump sum’ is a false representation.” This is just a small part of the “deceptive” bureaucracy against which the veterans’ ombudsman has been railing.

Like the many non-existent or unfairly administered programs neglecting our rapidly growing number of injured Canadian Forces members over the past five decades, the lump sum and its survey are disingenuous and mean-spirited. It is time that the reigns of change were taken from the bureaucracy and placed in the hands of a combined panel of parliamentarians as well as veteran and medical experts. Veterans Affairs and Treasury Board senior managers never should have been given the authority to make decisions on behalf of Canadians for the veteran population. Our brave veterans have sacrificed much for Canada and Canadians, not for bureaucrats.

Sean Bruyea is a retired Canadian Forces intelligence officer, freelance journalist and longtime advocate for the rights of disabled veterans and their families.

http://www.seanbruyea.com/2010/08/disabled-soldiers-angry-over-lump-sum-payments/

By: Sean Bruyea- Winnipeg Free Press- Posted: 24/08/2010 1:00 AM

This past week was a difficult and emotional one for disabled veterans and their families. The outgoing Veterans Ombudsman, Pat Stogran, held what will hopefully be the first of many press conferences highlighting the shortfalls with which the Canadian bureaucracy treats (and mistreats) its men and women disabled in military service.

The ombudsman will have his hands full this next three months when he promises to show Canadians how “badly” veterans and their families are being cared for by government.

As David O’Brien pointed out in his column Colonel should reload — with facts (Aug. 21), the Ombudsman will have to reload with some facts if he has any hope of both educating Canadians and making headway against an insensitive and “deceptive” bureaucracy, as Stogran it.

The first fact? What is a “veteran”?

In Canada, a veteran is anyone who served in uniform in Canada’s military. Of the remaining 170,000 Second World War veterans, about 1,700 are passing away each month. This is the fact the minister and the bureaucracy want Canadians to hear — it justifies their planned cuts to Veterans Affairs Canada, mandated to care for veterans and their families.

There also are more than 680,000 veteran and current members of the Canadian Forces who never served in the Second World War, almost 10 per cent of whom are disabled. Veterans Affairs is also mandated to care for families. With more than 7,500 new CF members last year and almost 5,300 others becoming veterans, when their families are taken into account, these numbers balance out the loss of our Second World War veterans. At current rates, in approximately six years time, the number of veterans and families will be growing at least 15,000 but maybe as high 20,000 annually.

In the light of this fact, Veterans Affairs should be hiring instead of firing employees.

What about programs for these modern veterans? After April 2006, veterans have been compensated for their military injuries with a one-time lump sum of up to $276,089. It sounds impressive until the facts rudely intrude. Only 31 out of 19,500 injured soldiers have received the full amount and the average paid out since 2006 has been just over $38,000, not enough to buy a minivan adapted for wheelchair accessibility.

Prior to 2006, military injuries were compensated with a life-long monthly payment of up to $2,400 plus amounts for spouses and children. The lump sum does not include amounts for families. Furthermore, the monthly pension is increased annually to keep pace with public service salaries.

Yes, it is true that the lump sum is accompanied by other programs which the government claims are “guided by modern principles of disability management.” That the government over the past four years has received and ignored every one of more than 300 recommendations from two of their own advisory groups, one chaired by a professor in rehabilitation, speaks clearly to the government saying one thing about its programs and the reality of how the medical, veteran and family world sees the same programs.

In the new programs, there is a special allowance for “severely disabled” veterans. There are 623 who meet this bureaucratic definition. Yet the program is so inaccessible that only one member receives the allowance.

The truth, however, is that all but two small parts of these programs are merely “duplication” or “repackaging” of already existing programs provided by the Canadian Forces or Veterans Affairs itself. The big difference is the deservedly condemned replacement of the life-long monthly payments for pain and suffering with a one-time lump sum.

And who is administering all these duplicate programs? Frontline Veterans Affairs employees are inundated, keeping track of so much unnecessary paperwork. Every “case manager” and “client service agent” has about 1,000 clients each for whom they must provide care.

Why the smokescreen by bureaucrats? As every good crime show has said, “follow the money.” Canada has twice as many veterans as Australia and yet we provide services for only one half as many clients as Australia’s Department of Veterans Affairs, whose $12 billion budget is four times as great as Canada’s.

For the bureaucracy, there is a lot at stake in denying benefits to our veterans. The fact to be learned from all of this is that what bureaucrats say may not always be true. In the Canadian world of caring for our injured soldiers, veterans and their families, availability of programs rarely translates into dignified accessibility.

Although last week was an emotional week for veterans, the truth is that each day is an emotional day for disabled veterans. In war or peacetime, missing limbs, crushed vertebrae, damaged organs, broken spirits and overburdened minds are the same tragic legacies for Canadians who suffered them in the service of their nation. That Canada fights so hard not to properly care for the needs of veterans and their families only humiliates proud military veterans all the more.

As a country which holds the democratic value of equality so dear, let us stop trying to find reasons to avoid treating all of our disabled veterans and their families with the same dignity. And let our veterans define dignity, not the bureaucracy.

Sean Bruyea is a retired Canadian Forces intelligence officer, freelance journalist and longtime advocate for the rights of disabled veterans and their families. Bruyea is not a recipient of the new veterans’ programs.

http://www.seanbruyea.com/2010/08/some-facts-about-canadas-veterans/