Darwin Productivity Commission sitting told of vets’ benefit anguish

DECADES of service took their toll on Dan Tellam’s body but getting the compensation he was entitled to was the real struggle

ADF veteran Dan Tellam addressed a Productivity Commission hearing at the Hilton Hotel in Darwin on Thursday.

DAN Tellam has mostly good memories from his time in the Australian Defence Force and regrets none of the 35 years he spent serving his country.

But the work was hard and decades of “jumping up and down on the back of trucks and hauling generators and welders” took their toll, injury eventually forcing him into early retirement.

But that would not be the end of Mr Tellam’s worries, as his struggle to be properly compensated for putting his body on the line was only just beginning.

“When I started my incapacity payments I was six months without pay while they processed me — I was in bed with a brace on for six months without incapacity payments,” he said.

“If it wasn’t for my wife working who knows where we would have been.”

Mr Tellam was speaking on the sidelines of a Productivity Commission hearing in Darwin on Thursday, where he told commissioners byzantine legislative changes over the decades meant some of his injuries were captured by one act and others fell under a later act.

“Under the Veteran’s Entitlement Act I get a gold card and $545 a fortnight and if I had a gold card with total and permanent disability on it it’d be on $1300 a fortnight which I’m entitled to now, but because I’m (also) under the Medical Injury Compensation Reform Act and I’ve got the neck problem I’m not entitled to it,” he said.

“Please give us what we’re entitled to, that’s all we ask, we’re not trying to get any more than what we’re entitled to.”

The inquiry is due to report back to the Australian Government in June.

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