SASR pay debacle
SPECIAL Air Service troopers and their families say they have been warned theyface new debts this week because of overpayments, amid continued confusion over army bungling of their pay.
Defence Minister Joel Fitzgibbon has called in independent auditors to examine army pay systems, admitting he does not know whether to believe assurances from army chiefs they have stopped docking soldiers’ pay packets after a dispute about overpayment.Accusing the Army Chiefs of lying and sending in Auditors to prove it is a big call. I’m the first to admit the Army makes errors but I doubt very much whether the Army Chiefs would strive to hide the fact of subordinate incompetence or clerical ineptitude, particularly when Ministers and politicians are looking for someone to take the ‘hospital pass’. I personally know some of them and I do know they would not lie to a Minister of the crown to save their own career if they themselves had defaulted. As soon as the matter was raised in the House and become public knowledge the Army would have pulled out all stops to abide by a Ministerial Direction. If there was one. The Generals would have spoken severely to subordinates and ranks down the chain would have audited their procedures and had them verified. The SASR have been flogged and with frequent operational rotations they are left with little time back in Australia to requalify for their skills allowances or, in fact, qualify for new ones. They are the guys being disadvantaged and it should be fixed NOW with some leeway afforded the veteran. After all it is difficult to re- qualify for para allowance when you are busy fighting on the ground The immediate problem is troopers coming back from rotation and electing discharge. Their final pay calculation is a major part of their discharge or super payments and has the potential to cost them serious money and all they are guilty of his serving their country. The whole situation should have been interred four or five months ago but like the mythical Pheonix, it keep rising from the ashes of failed promises. As if all that isn’t bad enough we now have a Defence Minister calling Army Generals liars. Good luck with your future relationships with the Military Joel but in the meantime you would be well advised to fight like hell for the diggers and when in doubt maybe some ex gratio payments could be in order. After all your government is throwing money at everybody else that looks like a voter so why not give some to those demonstrably deserve it.
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I’ve been waiting for you to get on board with this story. Good news that the stuff ups have been deemed just that and the diggers will not have to pay any of it back.
What I was waiting for was to ask you about a comment by the wife of a soldier I heard on the radio the other day; She said;
“…. while my husband is flying missions over Iraq and Afghanistan”
That peaked my curiosity;
I didn’t realise we had active combat operations in Iraq, I thought we’d pulled most of those guys out and just had a small security force?
I didn’t realise our boys were “flying missions” anywhere, I thought they were all ground based?
And finally, I didn’t realise we had troops hopping back and forth between the two theaters of operation.
Perhaps I’m just thinking too hard. :-) Figured you’d know whats what, hence the comment. :-)
Iraq
Operation CATALYST currently comprises approximately 45 ADF personnel embedded in various coalition headquarters.
Operation RIVERBANK is the ADF’s contribution to the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI) and is comprised of two officers.
Operation KRUGER is a tailored security detail that facilitate movement and protection of members of the diplomatic mission and consists of approximately 100 ADF personnel.
According to Defence that’s it at the current time. The wife could have been referring to what her husband did over a period of some years.Or, are you sure she wasn’t a RAAF wife. They have a few assets around the place and they are more likely to be ‘flying missions’ SAS doesn’t exactly fly missions -they do use air assets but mostly as transport or gunship support but they don’t refer to it as ‘flying missions’ – more ‘on patrol’ and maybe ‘we were inserted by chopper’ is the closest they’ll get to sounding like a RAAFie. Or he could’ve been an Army BlackHawke driver but that’s still not SAS and he shouldn’t be subject to skills allowance overpayment anyway.
Just don’t really know Mathew
You could be thinking too hard but she does raise a question or two – put it down to hyperbole caused by the emotion of the moment or by being interviewed on air for the first time.
Kev:
“After all your government is throwing money at everybody else that looks like a voter so why not give some to those demonstrably deserve it.
——————————————————————————-The government’s solution to the financial crisis is to give money at those with the time to spend it ie the jobless and pensioners. These are the obvious drivers of economic growth and consumption is the vehicle. Soldiers, business men and workers are too busy producing to protecting the producers to be of any use in saving the economy so they just have to suck it up in the meantime.
Maybe yes, maybe no. The SASR housewife still has time to go shopping – it’s her husband who is busy.
The Defence Minister should be sacked over this.
No outcry from the media, yet look at the ‘children overboard’ and how the media fenzy went into hyperdrive.
The minister said he fixed the problem in October. Well he didn’t and blames others.
Sack him.