Jacqui Lambie (Tasmania, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

After almost a year of consideration by the Senate Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade References Committee with five public hearings across the nation and over 450 submissions, the report on veterans suicide named, The constant battle: suicide by veterans, has been tabled. It is 191 pages in total and comprehensive. Part of this report addresses short-term problems which include streamlining, administration, staff training at the Department of Veterans' Affairs and improving engagement. It calls on targeted programs based on new research, increasing the understanding of the mental health community and addresses support issues of transition from military life into civilian life and the need for access to alternative therapies.

In the medium term, the committee found that there was clear evidence for a national suicide register. It noted concerns about negative interactions with the Department of Veterans' Affairs and that the claims process is the key stressor and contributing factor to suicide by some veterans. It noted issues with medico-legal firms retained by the Department of Veterans' Affairs to assess veterans. The committee has recommended the Department of Veterans' Affairs reassess medico-legal firms.

It has recommended that the carer assistance scheme include an option for veterans to undertake a period of work experience with an outside employer, and that the Australian Public Service Commission conduct a review to support veterans employment into the APS. Noting the complex range of services available to veterans, the committee recommended funding support of the veterans and veterans' families counselling services to create and maintain a public database of services which would provide an information service to assist veterans and their families.

The committee also recommends a review of the practice which prohibits lawyers appearing for veterans before the Veterans' Review Board. Longer term, it noted that addressing the legal and administrative complexities of veterans entitlements is long overdue. It has recommended a Productivity Commission review into the legislative and administrative processes, including an examination of the utilisation of the statements of principles with the objective of simplifying the entitlements system. It has recommended that this review be completed within 18 months, and the establishment of a bureau of veterans advocates. This bureau of advocates would be modelled from the Canadian system—that being the Bureau of Pensions Advocates—which has proven to be a success. I suggest that we have bipartisan support and that we do not wait 18 months to set that up. I will probably look at that tomorrow.

The Department of Veterans' Affairs can no longer hold on to the status quo nor justify incremental changes done in the past. Previous reviews of military compensation and the piecemeal approach of reforms have contributed to the overall complexities of veterans' entitlements in our country. It is now time for a complete overhaul of the compensation and rehabilitation system in this country.

Earlier this year, the Auditor-General, through the Australian National Audit Office, indicated it would conduct a potential performance audit into the efficiency of veterans' service delivery by the Department of Veterans' Affairs in its annual audit work program for 2017-18. As such, the committee recommends the audit be conducted as a matter of urgency. This audit will serve to complement and reinforce the work of administrative review by the Productivity Commission.

Given the context of this report and its recommendations, I am now calling on all veterans—young, middle-aged, old, enlisted and officers—to unite and put pressure on the Turnbull government to adopt and implement these recommendations as soon as possible. Over the last several years, the ex-service organisations of our nation and the veterans' community have been greatly divided on a host of issues. It is now time for healing. Veterans need to stop bashing veterans who are helping veterans. Stopping veteran suicides and attempted suicides is paramount. To be able to achieve this, we will all need to work together.

Where there are areas that veterans disagree on, we need to be able to agree to disagree. Where we find common ground, we all need to stand together as one. I'm calling on all retired Australian Defence Force senior non-commissioned and retired commissioned officers to take the lead and be the leaders that they once were when they served in uniform. Your nation needs you, once again, now more than ever as role models in the veteran community. Be the leaders who are healers where veterans are fighting and backstabbing other veterans. You need to call that out as leaders and show others a more constructive way of addressing issues and moving forward.

The time of a divided veterans' community needs to cease immediately if we are going to achieve tangible action on the recommendations of the committee's report. United we stand to demand the government takes action; divided we will continue to fall, with the status quo remaining. The veterans' community as a whole bears some responsibility here, because it has been so divided. All ex-service organisations, veterans and their families must band together to demand that the government of today implement these recommendations. Where the government decides to disagree with a committee recommendation, it should not be able to disagree without having a workable alternative to that recommendation.

We need a united front and sustained pressure to deny the government the space to wriggle out of its responsibilities to veterans once and for all. It is only with a united veteran community that we will be able to hold the government of the day, as well as future governments, accountable and ensure that the recommendations are adopted and implemented as quickly as possible. It is for this reason that all veterans and their families must stand together as one. I seek leave to continue my remarks later.

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