Mr NEUMANN (Blair) (16:38): I rise to speak on the fourth annual Ministerial Statement on Veterans and their Families. As the shadow minister for veterans' affairs and defence personnel I'm pleased to have this opportunity to respond to the statement and to outline some of Labor's approaches in this area. At the outset, I want to join with the minister in recognising the sacrifices of so many who are currently serving or who have served before, and the families that support them, and to recognise the veterans in this chamber. We must ensure that we value the sacrifices that have been made and that we continue to stand shoulder to shoulder with our veterans and their loved ones. To do this, governments and communities must ensure that veterans and their families are supported during service and during transition to civilian life and beyond. While we may disagree from time to time on the best method to achieve that end, the minister is correct in saying that we endeavour in this place, as much as possible, to adopt a bipartisan approach. But it is incumbent on us, as Her Majesty's loyal opposition and the opposition to the government, to criticise the government from time to time and to point out where we find failings, faults and foibles in the government's approach. Labor and I believe strongly that the government's approach to veterans' affairs can be summed up as 'too little too late'. The Morrison government's attitude has been to preside over a litany of delays, delivery failures, broken promises and bad faith. For example, the government had failed to respond to a major Productivity Commission report on veterans services and a review of TPI pensions for about 18 months. It's fair to say the response has left many veterans disappointed, and some have even expressed disgust at the government's response. A new veteran mental health strategy was supposed to be a priority; it was delayed for nearly six months. More recently, they've broken the hearts of many veterans and their families with their stubborn failure to establish a royal commission into veterans' suicide. The Morrison government has broken its promises to cut the Department of Veterans' Affairs claims waiting times, to increase the DVA fees for allied health workers and to look after TPI veterans, and they have done nothing in relation to the response to the DFRDB apology that was delivered by the government to so many men and women who served in our military and who were misled in terms of their retirement plans. No effort whatsoever has been made by the government to deal with that issue either. So many issues I've just raised cannot be found in the minister's annual ministerial statement because the government knows they've failed in these areas and veterans know they've failed in these areas. They've failed in terms of delivery and they've failed in terms of follow-up. The minister spoke about the transformation of the Department of Veterans' Affairs. Labor acknowledges some improvements and reforms to the DVA process in recent years, but, if they have improved, it's coming off a very low base indeed. The reality is that the Morrison government is failing to deliver on its commitment in terms of the timely processing of claims and cutting waiting times through the department. If anything, it's going backwards, with veterans continuing to experience long delays in receiving their entitlements. In the recent Senate estimates hearings, DVA officials admitted that waiting times on claims and the backlog of claims are continuing to blow out. They revealed that some veterans are waiting two to three months for initial liability claims and often longer for more complex cases. In addition, the department conceded that it's taking far too long just to allocate claims to a delegate, with 80 per cent of claims taking four to five months to allocate. Alarmingly, it's still taking up to 300 days to allocate some initial liability claims. This is the evidence at Senate estimates from the government's own officials. The minister almost boasted of the number of DVA clients increasing from 280,000 in 2017-18 to almost 330,000 in 2019-20, but it's as if this unprecedented increase in the claims received by DVA wasn't anticipated, when the government really did anticipate that this would happen. The fact that the government is not resourcing the Department of Veterans' Affairs properly has meant there's no commensurate increase in staff to deal with the surge of demand. What this means is that the department has had to rely on a high level of outsourcing contract and labour hire staff to prop itself up. DVA revealed in estimates that 42 per cent of the department's workforce are sourced from labour hire companies as a result of the Morrison government's arbitrary cap on the number of public servants. So what the government is doing is outsourcing, privatising and using labour hire to staff the department. This ridiculous staffing cap means that taxpayer dollars are going to multinational companies through labour hire fees when they could be better spent on frontline service delivery. The government needs to axe this misguided policy and allow a department like DVA to hire the staff it needs to support veterans and address the huge backlog of claims. It's a false economy, and our veterans and their families are the ones who are paying for it through poor service. They deserve much, much better. This experience only goes to reinforce many veterans' experience of DVA as having a culture of delay and denying claims, and it continues the finding of the Productivity Commission review of the veteran support system that DVA is too adversarial. This landmark report released in July last year found that the veterans' compensation and rehabilitation system is not fit for purpose. It's out of date, convoluted, hard to navigate and does not serve the interests of veterans, their families and the Australian community. That's the finding of the Productivity Commission. After veterans had waited for more than a year, the government finally provided an interim response in the budget, which addresses 25—that's less than half—of the report's 69 recommendations. The government has picked up some useful proposals—these are essentially the low-hanging fruit relating to changes to DVA's business processes—and a final response is not due until next year's budget. Frankly, veterans should have been able to expect a much more comprehensive response than the government has given so far. Labor welcomed the fact that the government rejected the Productivity Commission's recommendation to scrap the gold card, as we know it, for veterans' dependants and strict extensions to new groups. But the strong feedback we received from the veteran community was that the government should have ruled this out immediately, as Labor called for, to provide certainty for veterans and their families. I note the minister's comment that the 2021 census will include, for the very first time, a question about ADF service and this will improve data on veterans. Labor welcomes this. Indeed, along with the states and territories, we called for it. Labor has long called for better record keeping, data collection and information sharing between DVA, Defence and other agencies to address gaps in our understanding of the health of Defence personnel and veterans. The resulting data should help federal, state and territory governments and ex-service organisations to better target support for veterans and their families in areas like health, mental health, housing and employment. Too many ex-service personnel are falling through the cracks. We hope this will help the government get a better handle on how many veterans are out there, where they live and what services they need. Speaking of support for veterans, Labor acknowledges the government's health and financial assistance for veterans and their families during the coronavirus emergency. We thank the government. We welcome the telehealth coverage for veterans but, going forward, the government needs to ensure there is adequate support for allied health and mental health services to meet high levels of demand from current and ex-service personnel during the crisis. Veterans organisations have warned that more resources were needed for frontline mental health services and welfare services to support older, vulnerable veterans who have been self-isolating and are at risk of loneliness. It was disappointing that the government's stimulus package did not include more substantial support for charities and organisations, as many smaller ex-service organisations and their volunteers are heavily impacted by the pandemic. RSL sub-branches rely heavily on fundraising—from selling badges and pins, to raffles and other activities, through to their Anzac Day appeals and the like. So, with the cancellation of services this year, many have struggled to generate income to fund vital welfare and advocacy services for local veterans. And many small ESOs and RSL sub-branches have not benefited from JobKeeper payments as they are volunteer run and simply don't qualify. On top of this, many RSLs and service clubs who support these sub-branches and other charities financially had to close their doors during the pandemic, resulting in a significant loss of revenue and the standing down of thousands of staff. While the government has provided some support, it needs to do more to assist veterans and the organisations that support them. To that end, additional funding for mental health support in the budget is to be commended. In particular, the increase in the DVA fees paid to mental health, social work and community nursing providers should improve access to these services and help reduce long waiting times. However, it is very important that the government didn't increase DVA fees for allied health workers, including physiotherapists and occupational therapists. Ahead of the budget, the minister gave assurances, including to some government MPs, that there would also be an increase in DVA fees for these carers, these professionals, given that they are lower than what other government agencies and programs like the NDIS would pay. I know that some government MPs are very unhappy about the failure to increase fees for these allied health workers, and this represents yet another broken promise by the government. For that matter, as I've said before, the burdensome treatment cycle arrangements for allied health referrals should be suspended. Many veterans say they are discouraging them from seeking medical treatment, leading to poorer health outcomes. This comes on top of long delays with the government's new veterans mental health strategy. By the way, it was interesting that, in his statement today, the minister didn't reference it once, or, if he referenced it, he didn't talk about it at all. This was the strategy that was supposed to be there at the end of last year. It was put on a website in May. There was not even a press release, from memory, and they haven't even talked about it. The minister committed to delivering that strategy at the end of last year. He stood there at the dispatch box and said he would do it. We kept on putting pressure on and asking, 'When are you going to do it?' They put it on their website in May, almost six months late. That document, I've got to say, is very short on substance and concrete actions. It's more of a marketing exercise. It's a laundry list of existing programs. Really, that's what it is, and the minister hasn't really referenced it at all today. That's how important that that much-vaunted strategy of the government is. After speaking of marketing exercises, the announcement of a National Commissioner for Defence and Veteran Suicide Prevention has failed to convince many in the veteran and wider community that the Morrison government is genuine about tackling this appalling problem. The latest Australian Institute of Health and Welfare figures on defence and veteran suicide released last month, show we are failing our veterans, and we urgently need a royal commission into this terrible scourge. The research shows that there were 33 suicide deaths amongst serving and ex-serving personnel in 2018 and 465 suicides between 2001 and 2019, although many, many people think that the figures are much higher. The report shows that male veterans are 21 per cent more likely to die by suicide than men generally in the community, while the rate of suicide amongst ex-serving women is twice as high as the general female population. Alarmingly, the research showed that ex-serving men had a 66 per cent higher suicide rate when they were discharged for medical reasons compared to men who voluntarily discharged. This is a real wake-up call, and it shows we're losing the war when it comes to saving current and former defence personnel. The data, sadly, backs up the experience of veterans like former special service officer, Major Heston Russell, who's lost more of his mates to suicide than during four deployments to Afghanistan. The sad reality is that we've lost more veterans to suicide in the last 20 years than in all overseas conflicts and operations combined. It's highlighting why we urgently need a royal commission into veteran suicide to get to the bottom of these tragic deaths. Many veterans are concerned that the Morrison government's proposed national commissioner is simply not up to the job and doesn't have the resources and the independence. We welcomed, cautiously, the announcement earlier this year, in February. But they've ignored the pleas of people like Julie-Ann Finney and Karen Bird—both of whom I've met—who are mothers who tragically lost their children to suicide. We're disappointed that the government has rushed ahead and appointed an interim national commissioner on 30 September, when the initial consultation period had only just concluded, well before parliament had a chance to vote on the enabling legislation and before the legislation was even passed. The government rushed that out. It was interesting that the announcement was made late in the day, under the cover of dark, if you like, to avoid scrutiny, suggesting that the government knew there were going to be issues with the process and with the community. Labor's got no personal criticism of the interim national commissioner, Dr Bernadette Boss. We don't. She's a magistrate, a coroner and a brigadier in the Army Reserve. We're concerned that the government has made certain assurances that they would not appoint someone with a military background, in another case of bad faith with veterans. As an Army officer, we fear Dr Boss could have a conflict of interest which opens up the office to perceptions of institutional bias towards defence and undermines the trust in the office. This just confirms our suspicion that the new position will not have the independence or powers to get to the bottom of veteran suicide in the way a royal commission with broad terms of reference could. You would have thought the government would have appointed a former High Court judge, a Supreme Court judge or a Federal Court judge—someone to bring fresh eyes to the issue and a more appropriate appointment. One of the things the government says is that it's going to be like a royal commission. It's going to have all the powers. It's going be, in effect, a royal commission. If it's going to be like a royal commission, just appoint a royal commission. You're saying to us and to the public, 'It's going to be like a royal commission.' Then just go ahead and do it—call the royal commission into it. What the government seems to be establishing is a glorified federal coroner, which is essentially redundant because the states and territories have very experienced coroners and are very experienced at investigating veteran suicides. What's more, the so-called independent review into past suicides that the interim national commission's undertaking is an in-house desktop review. It's nothing like a royal commission. It's an in-house desktop review. That's not a royal commission. And the review's terms of reference are very narrow. For example, the review will only cover deaths between 1 January 2001 and 31 December 2018, which excludes, for one, David Finney, Julie-Ann Finney's son, who passed away in 2019. Julie-Ann has been one of the faces of the royal commission campaign. It is another slap in the face and an act of bad faith. It's no wonder people are suspicious about the government. The minister has made much of this and says that this rolling royal commission will be 'bigger and better'. But the veterans community is deeply sceptical of what the government's doing in relation to that, and it's fairly clear that this standing body will not have all the powers of a royal commission, as the government's claiming. The legal advice we've obtained underscores that only a royal commission could have, for example, unambiguous powers to hold public hearings, summons witnesses, compel production of documents of evidence, pursue disciplinary proceedings and, crucially, refer charges of criminal or official misconduct to appropriate authorities and make recommendations for compensation. As much as the bill may try to mimic a royal commission, with royal-commission-like powers, there's an inherent structural or design flaw in that a national commissioner will effectively be a government official sitting inside the Attorney-General's portfolio. This means that they could be hired or fired by the government at any time and are much less likely to exercise these powers to hold Defence, DVA and other agencies to serious scrutiny. The budget of around $30 million would be less than half of what an average royal commission budget would be. We fear that the national commissioner would not be properly resourced to do the job. Many veterans and their families are deeply cynical that the proposal in the bills represents an attempt by the government to limit criticism of it, the Department of Veteran's Affairs, Defence and its agencies—to protect these institutions. Among some in the veterans community there is an almost complete lack of trust or confidence in the government and departments. The bills refer to the national commission as having a 'trauma informed and restorative approach' to their work, and in particular having a preference to hold private meetings with the families of suicide victims, ostensibly out of respect for them. Some are concerned that this is a code for wanting to silence people behind closed doors, when in fact many families actually want a public platform to tell their stories in order to seek restorative justice. One researcher and veteran I spoke to put it like this: 'For some veterans, false promises and a lack of transparency and accountability will simply compound trauma, which does nothing to decrease the trust deficit between veterans and both the ADF and the DVA.' We know that only a royal commission will provide closure, healing and restorative justice for the defence and veterans community—just as we've seen, by the way, in so many other areas, like mental health, disability, child sexual abuse and aged care. Importantly, it would provide an opportunity for us as a community to listen to the parents and families of veterans who have taken their lives and assure them in a very public way that we're doing everything we possibly can to prevent these tragic deaths from happening in the future. The Prime Minister and the minister should show faith with veterans and their families and establish a royal commission so we can get to the bottom of veteran suicide and deliver real accountability and justice for the families once and for all. They deserve nothing less than a royal commission. We need to do a lot more to support our ex-service men and women and prepare them for life after the military through assistance with mental health and wellbeing, employment and housing. And the minister didn't even reference, beyond just a passing note, the issue of veterans homelessness. One in 10 people living in this country who are homeless are veterans. We need a plan, not a piecemeal approach, to tackle this issue and so many others in the area of veterans. That's why a royal commission is crucial. In closing, I want to say that when it comes to commemoration Labor is committed to acknowledging and commemorating all those who served in past wars, conflicts and peacekeeping operations, and we acknowledge the more than 102,000 Australians who've lost their lives serving our nation. Because of coronavirus, Anzac Day services and commemorations were different this year. There were no marches, no games of two-up and no gunfire breakfasts, and people were encouraged to commemorate that day in their own ways. One of the important ways we can give weight and meaning to that immortal phrase, 'Lest we forget,' is to ensure our veterans and their families receive the support and respect they deserve. It really is the case that we must support them. This is why we're committed on our side to work with the government as much as we possibly can, to commit to giving our veterans the best possible support with policies to provide tangible outcomes in areas of mental health and wellbeing, civilian transition and employment programs. We'll not forget you.