As Prime Minister Justin Trudeau attends the 100th anniversary of the Battle of Vimy Ridge Sunday, many of Canada’s injured and wounded veterans feel he has betrayed them.

They want him to fulfill his 2015 election promise to restore lifetime military disability pensions.

Trudeau was the only party leader to make this commitment.

The Liberal campaign website promised: “We will re-establish lifelong pensions as an option for our injured veterans and increase the value of the disability award.”

On the campaign trail, Trudeau promised: “If I earn the right to serve this country as your Prime Minister, no veteran will be forced to fight their own government for the support and compensation that they have earned. We will reinstate lifelong pensions and increase their value in line with the obligation we have made to those injured in the line of duty.”

But almost 18 months later, a group of Afghanistan war veterans is in court (the case is being heard in B.C.), having launched a class action lawsuit against Trudeau’s government on this very issue.

When the Liberals announced post-election they would oppose these injured veterans — reviving legal arguments made against them used by Stephen Harper's government — veterans’ lawyer, Donald Sorochan, called it a “betrayal,” given Trudeau’s promise.

“They have turned the Liberal election campaign into a lie,” Sorochan told CBC News. “I sat at tables (during the campaign) with some of the people who are now in cabinet. Those ministers have been turned into liars by the Department of Justice.”

Lifetime military disability pensions were eliminated under legislation supported and passed by all parties during Paul Martin's Liberal government in 2005 and implemented by Harper's Conservative government in 2006.

They were replaced by a lump-sum payment of up to $360,000, depending on the severity of the injury, career retraining and targeted income replacement.

Injured veterans challenging this change argue it discriminates against them because it gives them less compensation than offered by the lifetime pension plan.

Harper’s government made some improvements to the disability plan and Liberal Finance Minister Bill Morneau’s latest budget promised $725 million in improved benefits for veterans and their families over five years.

It said the government is still working on restoring the lifetime pension option for injured veterans.

But critics say it appears all the Liberals are talking about is breaking down whatever lump-sum disability payment an injured veteran gets into monthly payments.

“It’s all smoke and mirrors if they are just going to take the disability award and spread it out,” veterans’ lawyer Sorochan told The Canadian Press. “This doesn’t make the lawsuit go away ... Why was something good enough for Korean War veterans not good enough for these guys?”

The B.C. veterans’ support group Equitas, which launched the class action against Trudeau’s government, noted last week that: “In 1917, on the eve of the attack on Vimy Ridge, Prime Minister Robert Borden assured the country’s soldiers they ‘need have no fear that the government and the country would fail to show just appreciation of their service’ ... (and promised) none would have ‘just cause to reproach the government for having broken faith’ with its troops.”

A century later, many injured veterans say they are still waiting for that promise to be fulfilled.