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Veterans Affairs Canada Underpaid Benefits Class Action Overview:
- Who: Six former police and armed forces members have filed a class action lawsuit against Veterans Affairs Canada, claiming the department underpaid their disability benefits. The class members in the recently-certified lawsuit include members and former members of the Canadian Armed Forces and Royal Canadian Mounted Police and their spouses, dependents and more, who received disability benefits between 2003-2010.
- Why: In 2019, Canada’s Veterans Ombudsman announced his office had discovered an accounting error that could amount to around $165 million in underpaid benefits. The six plaintiffs then discovered additional errors in the department’s accounting, they claim.
- Where: The six plaintiffs are from Ontario and Nova Scotia, and the class members in the lawsuit come from all across Canada.
A class action lawsuit filed by six former police and armed forces members alleging that Veterans Affairs Canada underpaid their disability benefits has been certified Federal Court.
The class action lawsuit was first filed in 2019 after Canada’s Veterans Ombudsman, Guy Parent, announced that his office had discovered “an accounting indexation error by Veterans Affairs Canada (VAC)” and that “VAC estimates that this error could total around $165 million for the period (between) 2003 and 2010,” the claim reads.
The six plaintiffs — three from Ontario and three from Nova Scotia — then discovered additional errors in the department’s annual indexing calculations, they allege in the class action lawsuit.
“These additional errors include the Defendant’s failure to calculate the Wage Rate using the province or territory with the lowest combined provincial and federal Income tax rate and failure to take into account the entire class of persons who are affected by the original and additional errors,” the claim states.
In 2018, Veterans Affairs Canada issued a statement in response to the original discrepancy in the calculation of disability pension adjustment rates, and it began making corrective payments September 2019 which continue to be issued.
However, the class action lawsuit alleges that further amounts are owing to class members, due to the other alleged miscalculations.
Class members include members and former members of the Canadian Armed Forces and Royal Canadian Mounted Police and their spouses, common-law partners, dependants, survivors, orphans, or estates of all such persons who received, at any time between 2002 and the present, disability pensions, disability awards and certain other benefits administered by Veterans Affairs Canada.
It is estimated that there are upwards of 270,000 class members.
The Pension Act establishes and recognizes the obligation of the Government of Canada to provide benefits to members of the Canadian Forces, veterans, and their eligible survivors and dependants who have become disabled as a result of military service.
Have you ever had issues recovering the total amount of benefits you are entitled to? Tell us your experience in the comments section!
The veterans are represented by Gowling WLG (Canada) LLP (Toronto); Michel Drapeau Law Office (Ottawa); Murphy Battista LLP (Kelowna and Vancouver); Koskie Minsky LLP (Toronto); and McInnes Cooper (Halifax).
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5 thoughts onClass Action Alleging Veterans Affairs Canada Underpaid Disability Benefits to Vets Is Certified
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My grandfather served twice in ww2, they did not pay him a disability or pension until he was 87, he died in 2014. He held onto the certificate he had from the military that they promised to pay for the costs of his funeral and a tombstone, and they never did. He was a Black Devil, nothing but a kick in the ass, and he was saposto have decorations from what I also understand. Complete total disrespect, family grew and lived in poverty, complete nightmare and a broken heart when you serve and are treated less than nothing. They would not even give him a wreath, so I made him one, it was all I could do besides care for them in the decline.
I am angry, saddened.. I am his heir. If you could contact me, that would be great
What is going here, this is not posting?
I could go on about this for at least a week or two. I have hearing issues. Vet affair says I do as well as the doctors, but it is like talking to a wall. So it was easier to just walk away and let the gov. Give them self a raise or up their high pensions on the average people’s back. Pretty much have had it with those guys.