DVA under siege
Grant Martin, a sailor during the war to evict Iraq from Kuwait wants PTSD recognized and a pension to compensate.
“I have to sleep in a separate bed from my wife because of violent fits and throwing punches all the time,” he said. “You’re on a knife edge all the time. You can’t sleep, you can’t relax, you can’t concentrate, it feels like your head’s going to fall off.”All this angst because when serving on HMAS Canberra on Operation DAMASK VI following the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait (November 1992 to March 1993), someone did, or didn’t issue a missile alert indicating that the Iraq military might launch a scud missile aimed at someone, somewhere.
The initial report found there was “no evidence” to support Mr Martin’s claim the Canberra took evasive action after the missile threat was announced. In contrast, the tribunal’s final decision found “there was a missile alert … (Mr Martin) perceived a very real threat from the announced missile attack”.His subsequent illness was “war-caused”, the tribunal found, and he was “entitled to receive a pension in respect of incapacity associated with those conditions”. Hmmm
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I have no opinion on this particular case, because I lack the arrogance to judge without knowing all the facts, but this from the 161 Recce Association makes interesting reading – http://austvetmatters.net/avmforum/index.php?topic=26.165;wap2
as does this old report in the SMH – http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/veterans-spied-on-for-pension/2006/08/26/1156012790482.html?from=rss
The Oz (The Fart of the Nation) also has a report on Writeway dated 7th Jan 2015 by Dan Box (behind the paywall).
An extract – Court documents show the Department of Veterans’ Affairs subsequently conceded it had stopped using Writeway, which has received nearly $1 million to produce hundreds of “research reports” on
veterans since the late 1990s.