November 13, 2001 - 1 — Le Protecteur du citoyen

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31st Annual Rapport of the Québec Ombudsman (2000–2001)

"The Citizen Always Comes First"

Public administration: significant improvements to benefit all citizens

Québec City, November 13, 2001

The Ministère de l'Industrie et du Commerce's "Connecting Families to the Internet" program generated a large number of complaints to the Québec Ombudsman, because of a date change made less than 15 days before the end of the program. In fact, although the Department had initially announced that the deadline for registration in this program was March 31, 2001, it later announced, on March 5, 2001, that applications received after March 19 could not be processed, given that the Régie des rentes du Québec was swamped with requests for attestations. It should be remembered that only families receiving family benefits paid by the Régie from March 1, 2000 to March 31, 2001, whether or not they were connected to the Internet, were eligible for this program. The government was unable to manage the last-minute rush, and thereby deprived many families of this program. Furthermore, 5,000 more families eligible for family benefits in March 2001 could not benefit from the program because of the administrative delays. Following numerous interventions on the part of the Québec Ombudsman, the Department delayed the deadline for registration in the program by two days, until March 21, in addition to confirming that the families receiving family benefits for March retroactively, would then be eligible for the program (p. 57).
The Québec Ombudsman presented a brief to the Commission sur l'administration publique in which it outlined four important problems plaguing Student Financial Assistance (SFA): inappropriate procedures in verifying income with the Ministère du Revenu, inflexible procedures for collecting sums owing, a lack of accountability on the part of SFA when it made mistakes and lack of credible recourse available to students. Following the Quebec Ombudsman's interventions, increased co-operation between SFA and the Quebec Ombudsman was achieved in order to improve services for students and to comply with the stated purposes of An Act respecting financial assistance for education expenses, namely access for less fortunate persons to higher education and the affirmation of citizens' right to equal opportunity. Furthermore, as for administrative errors that are not reasonably detectable, the Act has been amended so that the amounts will no longer be demanded from students under such circumstances (p. 29).
In 1994, the Régie des assurances agricoles du Québec established an income stabilization insurance program for apple producers, for a period of two years. After having noted that no producer had drawn compensation from the program, the Fédération des producteurs de pommes instituted legal recourse against the Régie so that the premiums paid to the insurance fund could be refunded to the producers. An out-of-court settlement was reached: the Régie would refund premiums paid from 1994 to 1998, deducting the amounts that each producer was supposed to pay for marketing services. The producers wondered about the regularity of the terms of repayment stipulated in this agreement, which gave too much latitude to a private agency not required to make its management accountable to the public. They then called on the Quebec Ombudsman. Following the Ombudsman's intervention, the Régie and the Fédération modified their procedure to ensure improved transparency in exchanging information on producers' premiums and apple production. In this way, some 150 registered producers were able to receive their share of approximately $80,000 more than what had been initially calculated (p. 136).
Workers who provide home assistance services in the health and social services network are paid by the beneficiaries, who are thus considered to be employers. One of these workers was injured on providing assistance in the home. He then filed a claim with the CSST, which rejected it, citing that the law does not cover such workers. Through the Québec Ombudsman's intervention, the Ministère de la Santé et des Services sociaux and the CSST reached an agreement that henceforth allows some 7,600 workers who provide homecare services to benefit from the protection provided under An Act respecting industrial accidents and occupational diseases (p. 112).
The Ministère de la Santé et des Services sociaux rectified a practice that the Quebec Ombudsman had denounced in the 1999–2000 Annual Report, namely that the income of spouses of accommodated persons, from whom the spouses are legally separated but not divorced, is no longer taken into consideration in the calculation of the contribution of the adult accommodated in a network establishment. This change ends the obligation on the part of accommodated persons to prove that they have not had a relationship with their spouses for a period of at least five years. Henceforth, no contribution will be required from non-accommodated spouses (p. 87).
The representatives of a grouping of residential long-term care centres (RLTCCs) called on the Québec Ombudsman to denounce under-funding of establishments accommodating elderly persons with severe loss of autonomy. These additional budget cuts allowed them to meet only 53% of users' needs, a level clearly inferior to the provincial average established at 73%. The Québec Ombudsman pointed out to the Ministère de la Santé et des Services sociaux that these RLTCC residents should not have to endure the impacts of network reorganization and budget cuts more severely than those in other regions. As a result of this intervention, the Department added $12 million to Québec's RLTCC budget and granted a supplemental amount of $2.6 million to the region targeted by the investigation (p. 90).
Since 1997, Canadian students who are not Québec residents have paid higher tuition fees than Québec residents, but less than those required from foreign students. The Québec Ombudsman received many complaints from Canadian and foreign students about the regulations defining eligibility for resident status. Following discussions with the Québec Ombudsman, the Department harmonized the regulations for the various education levels and Student Financial Assistance. It also eased the regulations for persons who leave Québec for a maximum period of two years, and recognized resident status for students with dual Canadian and French citizenship, on the condition that they do not reside in another province upon their admission to a Québec education institution (p. 28).
Upon the death of her father, whose sole source of income was Canada Pension Plan benefits, a citizen requested the death benefit from the Régie des rentes du Québec to cover her father's burial costs. The Régie refused, claiming that the man had not adequately contributed to the plan, and directed the citizen to a Centre local d'emploi (CLE). The employment centre agent in turn rejected her request because it had not been made within the 30-day time limit stipulated by law. The Québec Ombudsman's investigation revealed that the Ministère de l'Emploi et de la Solidarité sociale, responsible for CLEs, requires all requests for death benefits to be sent first to the Régie and that if the latter rejects a request, the Department can then authorize payment of funeral costs. The delay attributed to the citizen was caused by the normal length of time it takes to obtain a response from the Régie. The Québec Ombudsman deemed that it was unreasonable for citizens to be penalized for processing delays at the Régie and it suggested to the Department to modify its procedure and to accept a request from a person who had initially addressed the Régie to obtain compensation for funeral costs. The Department accepted the Québec Ombudsman's recommendations and paid $2,500 to the citizen, in addition to modifying the procedure, which will benefit all citizens in future (p. 39).

Persisting problems

The Québec Ombudsman's 1999–2000 Annual Report outlined the compartmentalized administrative structure within the Société de l'assurance automobile du Québec. As a result, a change of address recorded with the road accidents division was not communicated to the road safety division, and vice versa. Yet, a citizen who advises the Société of his new address rightly expects that it be recorded in all his files. The Québec Ombudsman cited computer-related difficulties to explain the Société's inability to correct this situation. For its part, the government is currently studying the possibility of setting up a single government wicket to process changes of address. The Québec Ombudsman is of the opinion that the Société has not made the effort required to solve the dysfunction that exists within its organization, and will closely monitor the situation (p. 141).

Road accident victims complained to the Québec Ombudsman that the Société de l'assurance automobile du Québec refused to recognize the link between road accidents and the injuries they had sustained as a result. During the Québec Ombudsman's investigation, it was observed that the written reports for a number of decisions contained obvious flaws and that the verifications conducted by the Société before rejecting the link between an injury and an accident or even rejecting the fact of an accident, are not always complete. The Québec Ombudsman therefore suggested general corrections to the analysis process for victim requests and to the content of reports on decisions rendered. The Société agreed to pay special attention to the concerns raised by the Québec Ombudsman, but unfortunately the results are still awaited. The Quebec Ombudsman will again advise the Société of the importance of providing proper justification for its decisions (p. 143).
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