Shayne Neumann (Blair, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

First, I want to thank the men and women who are serving on the RAAF base at Amberley in my electorate and the veteran community across Ipswich and the Somerset region for the work they do in supporting veterans and the work they do in engaging with me to achieve better outcomes for the veterans living in our community.

This is a royal commission that the coalition didn't want at all. I remember announcing Labor's position with then opposition leader Anthony Albanese and Julie-Ann Finney, when, back in 2019, we called for a royal commission into veteran suicide. I was the shadow minister for veterans' affairs and defence personnel. The government's response, of course, in all of this was an inadequate position, a national commissioner for defence and veteran suicide prevention, which they announced in early 2020. It didn't have support from the veterans community. Labor opposed it, the crossbenches opposed it and eventually, when faced with a motion in the House of Representatives, the government had to be forced, as a result of a backbench revolt from their own team—the motion having passed through the Senate—into announcing a royal commission.

That royal commission found some appalling things were happening in the department. After the election, Minister Gee announced there were $430 million in budget cuts that had not been announced by the coalition when they were last in government. He said that in his evidence to the royal commission. His words were, 'One step forward, two steps back.' He said that their policy in terms of the processing had a direct link to the mental health of veterans and suicidal ideation issues. He described the processing and the backlog of up to 50,000 people waiting to be processed as a 'national disgrace.' They were Minister Gee's words before the last budget of the coalition government.

The coalition does not have a good record at all on this issue. When the coalition was forced to announce a royal commission, Labor welcomed the appointment of former New South Wales deputy commissioner Nick Kaldas as lead commissioner, and former Queensland Supreme Court judge the Hon. James Douglas QC and mental health expert Peggy Brown as the other two commissioners. I want to thank them for their service and the work they've undertaken.

We offered to work with the government in opposition regarding terms of reference, and the government ignored the terms of reference we did. They also ignored the expert advisory group that veteran advocate Julie-Ann Finney convened. They utterly ignored that as well. We gave bipartisan support despite the fact the government ignored our entreaties in relation to it.

I was pleased to attend the opening ceremony and the hearing of the royal commission in Brisbane in November last year with three brave mothers, Julie-Anne Finney, Karen Bird and Nikki Jamieson, who tragically lost their sons and who turned that tragedy into advocacy. The royal commission is a culmination of years of tireless advocacy from these three inspirational women together with veterans communities, the RSL, Labor, advocates and crossbenchers.

Ultimately, we've come out with some interim reports with strong and enforceable recommendations, which, once implemented, I think will prevent tragic deaths from happening in the future. This is a real opportunity to fix our broken veteran support system, to identify problems and solutions, to listen to the ideas of veterans, to harmonise the legislation, and we need to make the most of it.

Unfortunately, for a long time, the rate of suicide amongst our veterans community has been significantly higher than the broader Australian community. The most recent Australian Institute of Health and Welfare monitoring report on defence and veteran suicide found that 1,600 ADF members and veterans with service after 1985 died by suicide between 1997 and 2020, including 79 deaths by suicide in 2020. This is consistent with previous reports which have revealed tragic circumstances, with ex-serving males 27 per cent more likely to die by suicide than Australian males and ex-serving females 107 per cent more likely to die by suicide than Australian females. Many who leave the ADF for involuntary medical reasons are three times as likely to die by suicide than those who leave voluntarily. It reaffirms why suicide prevention must be a matter of national priority and why we must remain vigilant.

The death by suicide of any Australian, including veterans and current serving ADF members, is a tragedy. As Commissioner Nick Kaldas said:

These aren't just numbers, but people who tragically felt they could not go on. Behind every death by suicide are family members, friends and colleagues whose lives are forever changed.

It's a travesty that Australia has lost more serving and former serving personnel to suicide over the last 20 years than through all of our operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. On top of this, we know that many veterans and families have had bad experiences dealing with Defence and the Department of Veterans' Affairs and have been treated appallingly. In many cases, they've not been able to access the support they deserve, compounded by the lack of information given about the tragic loss of their sons and daughters and also compounded by service related trauma. For that, we are all sorry. We owe a debt of gratitude to ADF personnel serving now and who have served in the past.

When the commissioners released their interim report in August, the new Albanese Labor government committed to responding. The report is a culmination of 2,000 submissions, 178 private sessions, and testimony from 208 witnesses. It's confronting reading if you choose to do so. We can't ignore the recommendations. They're 13 recommendations that fall into three categories and three themes: improving the claims processing, the royal commission administration and access to information by loved ones. I am pleased the Minister for Veterans' Affairs responded so strongly in a statement given to the House on 26 September, and we're following through on the commitment we made during the campaign.

One of the recommendations made which we're following through strongly and which has been implemented already was to remove the DVA average staffing level cap. The previous government privatised, outsourced and 'labour-hired' the Department of Veterans' Affairs to death. That was the evidence that came through in the royal commission. That's exactly the evidence that has come through, and that's what the royal commissioners have found with respect to the treatment of the department. Because we're a Labor government that knows the importance of secure work, we have lifted the staffing cap. The Department of Veterans' Affairs was singled out, more than any other department under the Morrison coalition government, for privatisation. Up to 50 per cent of people dealing with frontline claims processing were inexperienced people employed by multinationals through labour hire and outsourcing. That's the evidence that came through Senate inquiry; that's the kind of evidence that came through in this royal commission. The coalition government should hang their heads in shame for the way they treated the Department of Veterans' Affairs, which has had a clear link—that's exactly what Minister Gee said: 'A clear link'—with the tragedies that have been occurring.

We've hit the ground running. We've raised 500 additional staff in the department to reduce the current backlog of claims which blew out to 50,000 claims outstanding. That's 50,000 Australians who have served this country and who are waiting, sometimes for years, to get their claims processed. The royal commission is really important, and I look forward to the final report that's going to be announced in the next year or so. We have made commitments. We've made commitments to give another $15.5 million to support DVA's continuing engagement with the royal commission; there's $233.9 million put forward to engage additional staff—the additional 500 staff which we've already engaged; there's $87 million allocated to modernise IT systems in DVA to improve claim processing; and we've also put forward $9.5 million in developing a pathway for simplification and harmonisation of compensation. It should not be beyond the wit and wisdom of our parliament and the parliamentary draftsmen to harmonise the DRCA, the MRCA and the VEA, and I'm looking forward to seeing that happen. Many veterans are dealing with three pieces of legislation that are too complex to deal with. Veterans advocates around the country do a great job, but they are limited and inhibited by a legislative framework which is far too complex.

I finish on this note: the commitment for the 10 veterans hubs we're undertaking, including one in my electorate, will make a difference to building community and keeping veterans together. We must do everything we can as a parliament, and across the Chamber, to make sure that we get veterans into housing and employment and get them back into the community when they transition to civilian life, We must do everything we can to support those serving in uniform when they are no longer in uniform but in the general community.

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