Bureau of Pensions Advocates

The concept of compensation of Veterans in Canada began even before Confederation for demobilized soldiers of New France, and soldiers of the American Revolutionary War, the War of 1812, and the Fenian Raids. These Veterans were given land as a way of helping them ease back into civilian life.[1]

The first disability pensions were introduced in 1866 to further compensate militiamen wounded or disabled as a result of hostile invasion of Canada during the Fenian Raids launched from the United States, as well as to the widows and orphans of those killed in battle.[2] These benefits were subsequently extended to those who took part in quelling the North West Rebellion of 1885.

The First World War, with its heavy casualties and the need to help over 400,000 returning veterans ease back into civilian life, required a greater degree of government involvement. The first initiative came in 1915. As a result of the lack of any public health system in Canada in the early 20th century, and in order to deal with the growing number of returning wounded Veterans, the Canadian government established the Military Hospitals Commission.[3] In the century following the First World War, a growing list of programs and services have been added to the resources and benefits available to Veterans.

Responsibility for veterans' issues was given to the Department of Soldiers' Civil Re-establishment.

The first right of appeal for Veterans related to their pension decisions came in the Pension Act of 1919 where, pursuant to section 18, "Two or more Commissioners shall sit for the purpose of hearing the appeals of dissatisfied applicants..."[4]

In 1922 the Royal Commission on Pensions and Re-establishment noted, "The complaint is made that it has been found necessary for applicants to procure the intervention of some third person or organization in presenting their claims. There is evidence that where the claim has been taken up intelligently and aggressively by an organization, the application which had previously failed finally succeeded ..."[5] As a result, the Commission recommended that

"(a) ... officials should give to the applicant 'correct and clear statements as to the principles upon which pensions are granted, indicate the lines along which evidence is required, and, where possible, utilize any available staff in assisting the soldier in procuring and putting into shape this information'; (b) That wide publicity be given to the appointment of the Official Soldiers' Advisor so that applicants and their friends will automatically take up cases with him direct and regard him as the most effective channel of communication."[6]

The Government of Canada's Department of Soldiers Civil Re-establishment accepted and implemented this recommendation in 1923, before the Royal Commission had even finished its work. Section 7 of the Department of Soldiers' Civil Re-establishment Act 1923 provided for the following: "The Governor in Council may... appoint... an ex-member of the forces, to be known as the Official Soldiers' Advisor, whose duties shall be generally to advise and assist ex-members of the forces in matters pertaining to re-establishment, treatment and pension..."

Responsibility for veterans' issues was moved from the Department of Soldiers' Re-Establishment to the Department of Pensions and National Health.

In 1930 the role of the Official Soldiers' Advisor was formalized as a result of the recommendation of the Special Committee on Pensions and Returned Soldiers' Problems: "...authority should be given for the organization of a Veterans' Bureau staffed with pension advocates... It will be the duty of the pension advocates to prepare on behalf of the applicant the material which should be submitted to the Tribunal in support of the application..."[7]

The Committee's report identified the rationale for the establishment of the Veterans' Bureau: "The most vital and fundamental requirement in any plan for reorganization was that adequate provision should be made for thorough preparation of every case. Witnesses... emphasized this, pointing out that no matter what judicial machinery was established, preparation of the case for consideration of that body was the crux of the whole matter."[8]

The Veterans' Bureau came into active operation on October 1, 1930.[9]

While the formal establishment of a Veterans' Bureau in 1930 helped veterans work their way through the application process, it did not solve all of the challenges faced by the Pension Commission. The Special Committee established in 1932 to investigate complaints made by veterans organizations stated that "... the Board of Pension Commissioners is seriously hampered in its work by having to consider cases, not prepared or insufficiently prepared... Up to August 31, 1931, ... more than 10 per cent had been referred back to the Tribunal for rehearing generally on the ground that the case had not been properly presented... nothing can be accomplished unless we make provision for extending and strengthening the Veterans' Bureau..."[10]

Consequently, in 1933 the role of the Veterans' Bureau's pension advocates was enhanced with the following amendment (Bill 78): "Section 10(g)(2). Pension advocates hereafter appointed shall, as far as may be practicable, be barristers or advocates of good standing at the bar of any of the provinces of Canada." The requirement that, where feasible, pension advocates be lawyers, was intended to improve the quality of cases being presented to the Pension Commission. It was not, however, meant to establish a solicitor and client relationship between the advocate and the veteran. That would come later, in 1971, after further reforms.

In the mid 1940s the responsibilities of the Veterans' Bureau to assist in the preparation of applications arising out of service in World War I were continued for veterans of World War II.[11]

By the time of World War II, five federal departments were involved in programs pertaining to veterans.[12] Responsibility for the care and re-establishment of veterans was for the first time consolidated under a single Minister in one federal Department, the newly-established Department of Veterans Affairs.[13]

In 1948, the Veterans' Bureau also began to assist RCMP members when the Department of Veterans Affairs assumed responsibility for adjudicating and assessing disability pension applications under the RCMP Pension Continuation Act.

BPA services to the RCMP expanded in 1960 with the passage of the RCMP Superannuation Act, which gave the Department of Veterans Affairs the authority to adjudicate pension-related health care benefits for the RCMP as well.

In 1968, "The Committee to Survey the Organization and Work of the Canadian Pension Commission", more commonly known as "The Woods Committee", presented its extensive report. The Woods Report and its aftermath came to constitute a high-water mark in veterans policy in Canada.[14] Headed by Saskatchewan Court of Appeal Justice Mervyn J. Woods, its recommendations enhanced and solidified the Bureau of Pensions Advocates.

Justice Mervyn J Woods, Chair of the Woods Committee

It included the following steps intended to increase the credibility and independence of the Bureau:[15]

• the re-naming of the Veterans' Bureau as the Bureau of Pensions Advocates,
• the establishment of the Bureau as a separate agency reporting directly to the Minister of Veterans Affairs,
• the requirement that all BPA advocates be lawyers and members in good standing of a Canadian provincial or territorial law society,
• that the Bureau represent the veteran regardless of the merits of the case if that be the wish of the applicant,
• that Advocates now also provide legal 'counselling services' to their Veteran clients,
• and, most importantly, the establishment of a solicitor-client relationship between the Veteran and his/her Bureau lawyer.

These recommendations and structural changes were implemented in 1971 and had a major impact on the role of the Bureau: "The role of the advocate is unique in that his responsibility is to assist the applicant for pension, and the only duty he owes to his employer (the Crown) is to do his utmost to assist this applicant. An applicant for pension has the right to expect from the advocate, without charge, the same service as an applicant would demand of his solicitor in civil legislation."[16]

Among the Woods Committee's recommendations not adopted by the government was that authority for the Bureau's existence be removed from the Pension Act and placed in separate legislation.

Prime Minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau and his Minister of Veterans Affairs throughout most of the 1970s, Daniel J. MacDonald (M.P., Cardigan), moved to decentralize the federal government by relocating the department's headquarters from Ottawa to Charlottetown, PEI. As a result, the first departmental employees to relocate arrived in Charlottetown in June 1979. In August 1983, the Bureau of Pensions Advocates' head office and its Appeal Unit moved out of the East Memorial Building in Ottawa and into temporary accommodations in Charlottetown, and then into its permanent new offices in the newly-constructed Daniel J. MacDonald Building in May 1984. The new building, housing 900 employees, was officially opened the following month. There had never before been such a move in the history of the Government of Canada, and nothing on the same scale has been attempted since.[17]

The Pension Reform initiative of 1995 took place during a difficult financial period for the Government of Canada and was intended to reduce the number of organizations involved in the veterans' benefits process, thereby streamlining the entire structure and making it more efficient.[18] With respect to the Bureau of Pensions Advocates, it led to the following changes:

• BPA's independent agency status was revoked and the Bureau became a part of the newly-restructured Department of Veterans Affairs,
• BPA's Chief Pensions Advocate would no longer be a Governor-in-Council appointment and became a full public servant, and
• BPA would no longer be involved in assisting clients with their first applications, and would focus entirely on representing clients appealing VAC pension decisions before the newly-created Veterans Review and Appeal Board.

(Occurring almost concurrently with these Pension Reform initiatives, BPA's right to appeal cases to the Federal Court of Canada was clarified by a Department of Justice legal opinion limiting it to matters of interpretation of the Pension Act on issues affecting larger numbers of veterans; BPA could no longer represent individual veterans before the Federal Court.)

In addition to assisting veterans with appeals, until 1995 lawyers from the Bureau of Pensions Advocates also prepared and submitted all first applications for disability pensions to the Canadian Pension Commission (CPC) on behalf of veterans. The CPC would then make its decision, and the Department of Veterans Affairs would make the pension payments. If a Veteran was not satisfied with the CPC's decision on first application, he/she could appeal to the Canadian Pension Commission for a review of its first application decision using a BPA lawyer. If the Veteran was still dissatisfied, he/she could launch an appeal to the Veterans Appeal Board, again with BPA legal representation.

Then, in 1995, the part of BPA's resources dedicated to helping veterans submit their first applications for benefits was moved from BPA to VAC's Veterans Services branch (later to be known as the Service Delivery branch), where newly-established Pension Officers helped veterans prepare and submit first applications to Pension Adjudicators, also within the VS branch. (In addition, the Department of Veterans Affairs went from simply paying the pensions awarded to veterans by the Canadian Pension Commission, to making the decision itself. Also, the Canadian Pension Commission, which heard first-level appeals, and the Veterans Appeal Board, which heard second-level appeals, were amalgamated into the then newly-established Veterans Review and Appeal Board, which became a quasi-judicial tribunal.)

As a result of the 1995 pension reform, the Department of Veterans Affairs became responsible for all veterans' programs, services and benefits, in addition to the payment of pensions. The Bureau of Pensions Advocates became a part of the department and was responsible solely for representing clients before the newly-established Veterans Review and Appeal Board. The solicitor-client relationship between the veteran and BPA was maintained.

In October 2000, the federal government implemented a number of initiatives to deal with the perception that the average soldier's quality of life was not all it could be. As a result, Bill C-41 allowing members of the Canadian Forces to collect a disability pension while still serving was adopted.[19] This created an entirely new category of eligible clients that significantly increased BPA's workload.

In 2007, the Bureau of Pensions Advocates was internally restructured pursuant to the Advocates Without Borders initiative. It moved from an organization of 15 separate law firms from coast to coast working in isolation, to a single national law firm with offices sharing standardized business processes, coordinating and equitably distributing client cases across the country. This major initiative helped equalize both workloads for Bureau staff, and turn-around-times for Bureau clients.

When Veterans Affairs Canada employees were sent home on March 13, 2020 as a result of the pandemic, BPA’s operations were paralyzed due to its until then heavily paper-based business process. In the weeks and months that followed, the Bureau completely transformed those processes into virtual ones, allowing employees to begin serving clients from their home offices. This was a major reshaping of how the Bureau carried out its work and, in a larger sense, how the work environment evolved in Canada.