Hub for our Heroes: $5m to support veterans wellbeing centres in Mackay region

As the country reacts to the China-Solomon Islands agreement, Deputy PM Barnaby Joyce has backed plans to boost support for the Mackay region’s veteran community, describing the RSL and wellness centre as ‘vitally important’.

A united veteran community has welcomed funding for two projects that will shore up support for Mackay’s returned service men and women, and first responders.

Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce reaffirmed $5m was earmarked for Mackay RSL Sub-branch and PTSD Frontline to forge ahead its plans for veterans support in the region.

“The money is locked in to the budget,” Mr Joyce said in Mackay on Wednesday.

“The determination of how that $5 million will be allocated will be done by (Veteran Affairs Minister) Andrew Gee.”

Mackay RSL Sub-branch president Ken Higgins said the region’s veteran community had been fractured but was unifying behind the need for a revived club in the city, the Memorial Swim Centre, and PTSD Frontline’s wellness centre at Kinchant Dam.

“We need to connect with our community and make sure we’re all together in this,” he said.

“We need to make sure that we stay strong.”

Mr Higgins said the sub-branch wanted to transform the Heritage-protected Memorial Swim Centre into a physical and physiological facility as part of its overall plan to help the estimated 2-3000 veterans across Mackay.

He said that would complement Dr Peter Wirth’s plan for Kinchant Waters where plans were progressing for a veteran wellness centre.

“Peter Wirth has done a lot of great work,” he said.

“Slowly but surely we’re coming back to the fold, and need to make sure that we are connected and assist with their health requirements because everyone has got their different expertise.

“Let’s all join up, strength makes strength.”

Mr Joyce said the camaraderie an RSL could afford returned service men and women was “so vitally important” as he hit out at the China-Solomon Islands security deal.

He said China’s agreement with the Solomon Islands was “not because they’re worried about the Antarctic or New Zealand”.

“It’s a tragedy but it is also an incredible wake-up call when we hear the agreement between the Solomons and a regime in China,” he said.

Nationals' Dawson candidate Andrew Willcox, Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce, Mackay RSL Sub-branch president Ken Higgins and Capricornia MP Michelle Landry, announcing $5m for a revived RSL in Mackay and a veterans’ wellness centre at Kinchant Waters, campaigned for through the Hub for our Heroes campaign. Wednesday, April 20, 2022. Picture: Tara Miko Picture: Tara Miko Picture: Tara Miko

“This is an intimidatory tactic towards us to put pressure on us to drive us to a point of accepting the circumstances and the conditions that are placed on us by another country.”

Espousing his own service in the reserves and his family’s military record, Mr Joyce said an RSL allowed former soldiers an avenue to speak about the horrors of war.

“The solace and support … it comes from your brothers and sisters in arms, those who have served with you, with the understanding of things you can talk about that you cannot mention in the house,.” he said.

“Things are just barred – you’re not allowed to talk about in the house.

“This is why the RSL club, the camaraderie that comes from the RSL club and the support that comes from being a member of the RSL club is so vitally important and why today we announce the $5 million going towards the further support of that structure in this part of the world.”

The projects — united under the Daily Mercury and Courier-Mail’s Hub for our Heroes campaign — aim to revive the Mackay RSL in the city heart and establish a veteran’s retreat at Kinchant Dam through PTSD Frontline.

Mr Higgins said the Daily Mercury’s Hub for our Heroes campaign had helped propel the two projects forward.

“We’re now getting a long way further than we would have,” he said.

“I’d like to thank personally the Mercury who started the Hub for our Heroes which was started quite a few months ago and we’ve been bubbling along quietly.

“There’s a lot of help out there; it’s a bit fractured but let’s get on with it.”

Harrup Park Country Club has agreed to manage its operations.

This publication launched the Hub for our Heroes in March 2021, exposing the overwhelming number of veterans at risk of suicide when facing transition to civilian life after active service.

Mackay RSL sub-branch president Ken Higgins said the region lacked an RSL venue that connected veterans both socially and to essential services after the city’s RSL club shut in 2006.

PTSD Frontline chairman and emergency doctor Peter Wirth said first responders including veterans suffered to serve their communities and were then often adrift when their jobs ended.

Mackay is home to about 10,000 first responders and 2-3000 veterans.

“(The centre) is critical because there’s a gap in the market … in the way services are accessible to these groups,” Dr Wirth said at the campaign launch.

“We want to help them recognise they still have a role … and help relaunch them.”

Australia’s former governor-general Sir Peter Cosgrove backed the campaign and concept of a veteran wellness centre.

“I think that would be fantastic because while we have a lot of support from the Defence Force who as veterans may well be looking for this support, we have many, many thousands of first responders and we want to open the arms of this care to them as well,” he said.

The Nationals’ Dawson candidate Andrew Willcox said he was proud to support the push for a revived RSL in Mackay.

“These fine men and women have put their bodies on the line; we need to look after our returned men and women,” he said.

In a statement ahead of the official announcement, Veterans’ Affairs and Defence Personnel Minister Andrew Gee said the $5m in funding would be a welcome boost for veterans in the area.

The Veteran Wellbeing Centre concept was born in 2019 when the government committed $30m to developing a network across Australia to bolster support for returned service men and women in the wake of alarming suicide rates in the former armed services ranks.

Centres have been established in garrison cities of Townsville, Darwin, Perth, Adelaide, Wodonga and Nowra.

Additional centres were funded in the 2021-22 federal budget, tipping Southeast Queensland and Tasmania as sites for future expansion.

Mackay would be the first non-garrison city to secure funding for the veteran wellbeing centres.

“We have already delivered six Veteran Wellbeing Centres around the country, with more on the way in southeast Queensland, Tasmania and the Hawkesbury region and I have seen first-hand the positive effects they have on those who use them,” Mr Gee said.

“It’s part of our national approach to delivering integrated support services to veterans and their families by working with local organisations and the local defence and veteran community.

“Those on the ground know best what the community needs, and these centres are all about providing local solutions to local veteran issues.”

The Hub for our Heroes campaign secured support from stakeholders across the tourism, business, social and government spheres, backing early plans to transform the existing Kinchant Waters caravan park into a retreat that offered allied services for veterans and their families.

The Mackay RSL Sub-branch has secured a space in ReNew Mackay’s waterfront development on River St to revive the social arm of veteran support in the city.

Capricornia MP Michelle Landry said she supported the Kinchant Dam plan.