Post by Dave Homewood on Feb 9, 2012 19:31:06 GMT 12
Old soldier battles for rights
Iain Hyndman | Saturday, January 14, 2012 6:00
Bureaucracy is the enemy now for Wanganui war veteran Jack Ennis, 66 years after the end of World War II.
Mr Ennis, who spent nearly five years fighting with the New Zealand Army in Egypt, Italy and Japan during WWII, is now battling to get a better deal for war veterans from the Government.
"I have been an RSA member for 65 years and only recently, and quite inadvertently, learned I was eligible to apply for a war pension under the War Pensions Act 1954,' Mr Ennis said.
"I estimate that there are thousands of service veterans who served in a war zone, who were traumatised by the utter carnage, and are still unaware that they could be eligible for a small war pension since 1954."
Mr Ennis believed the 1954 act was now outdated and contained anomalies and ambivalent passages that prompted the authorities to appoint Sir Geoffrey Palmer to rewrite it and bring it up to date.
"He spent three years travelling the country seeking submissions, eventually handing his completed 'A New Support Scheme for Veterans' document to the Minister of Veterans' Affairs in June, 2010. My question is why has this report, with 170 recommendations, not been tabled for consideration in Parliament?"
Mr Ennis said presumably it had been gathering dust somewhere in a parliamentary cupboard.
"Many deserving older veterans would have died during this deliberate political delay," the 88-year-old veteran said.
Mr Ennis, who only recently procured a copy of the Palmer report, believes it allows better access to a pension, although he concedes it may cost the taxpayer a little more than the existing system if adopted.
"That could provide a very specious reason for delaying the implementation of a rewrite of the 1954 act. Most politicians have never experienced the mass slaughter and butchery of war, so perhaps they may be unsympathetic in their treatment of those who laid down their lives to preserve freedom for our children.
"Two hundred thousand men and women wore military uniforms and 12,000 lie buried in lonely graves in foreign lands."
A recent example of the treatment veterans could expect from politicians was the 70th anniversary of the Battle of Crete, he said.
"New Zealand veterans were given $2000 government support, which was insufficient for even a return airfare, without considering accommodations and meals, while Defence Minister Wayne Mapp was provided with $26,000 for luxurious travel and suites for himself and his secretary. The Australians, by comparison, provided everything for their veterans.
"For some time I was a veterans' advocate, advising on the most efficient ways to present disability cases to the all-powerful, two-member claims panel, who are not necessarily veterans themselves, but who have absolute power to award or not award a pension.
"I was disgusted by the cynical, disbelieving, entirely unsympathetic attitude of the claims panel when veterans, supported by medical evidence, presented their cases. The one phrase repeated over and over was 'Your disability is age-related, not service-related' and their word was irrevocably final. I ask how could they be so dogmatically negative, unless they had instructions from above to curtail the awarding of pensions?"
Mr Ennis urged all MPs to badger those responsible for delaying the progress and ratification of Sir Geoffrey's recommendations.
Iain Hyndman | Saturday, January 14, 2012 6:00
Bureaucracy is the enemy now for Wanganui war veteran Jack Ennis, 66 years after the end of World War II.
Mr Ennis, who spent nearly five years fighting with the New Zealand Army in Egypt, Italy and Japan during WWII, is now battling to get a better deal for war veterans from the Government.
"I have been an RSA member for 65 years and only recently, and quite inadvertently, learned I was eligible to apply for a war pension under the War Pensions Act 1954,' Mr Ennis said.
"I estimate that there are thousands of service veterans who served in a war zone, who were traumatised by the utter carnage, and are still unaware that they could be eligible for a small war pension since 1954."
Mr Ennis believed the 1954 act was now outdated and contained anomalies and ambivalent passages that prompted the authorities to appoint Sir Geoffrey Palmer to rewrite it and bring it up to date.
"He spent three years travelling the country seeking submissions, eventually handing his completed 'A New Support Scheme for Veterans' document to the Minister of Veterans' Affairs in June, 2010. My question is why has this report, with 170 recommendations, not been tabled for consideration in Parliament?"
Mr Ennis said presumably it had been gathering dust somewhere in a parliamentary cupboard.
"Many deserving older veterans would have died during this deliberate political delay," the 88-year-old veteran said.
Mr Ennis, who only recently procured a copy of the Palmer report, believes it allows better access to a pension, although he concedes it may cost the taxpayer a little more than the existing system if adopted.
"That could provide a very specious reason for delaying the implementation of a rewrite of the 1954 act. Most politicians have never experienced the mass slaughter and butchery of war, so perhaps they may be unsympathetic in their treatment of those who laid down their lives to preserve freedom for our children.
"Two hundred thousand men and women wore military uniforms and 12,000 lie buried in lonely graves in foreign lands."
A recent example of the treatment veterans could expect from politicians was the 70th anniversary of the Battle of Crete, he said.
"New Zealand veterans were given $2000 government support, which was insufficient for even a return airfare, without considering accommodations and meals, while Defence Minister Wayne Mapp was provided with $26,000 for luxurious travel and suites for himself and his secretary. The Australians, by comparison, provided everything for their veterans.
"For some time I was a veterans' advocate, advising on the most efficient ways to present disability cases to the all-powerful, two-member claims panel, who are not necessarily veterans themselves, but who have absolute power to award or not award a pension.
"I was disgusted by the cynical, disbelieving, entirely unsympathetic attitude of the claims panel when veterans, supported by medical evidence, presented their cases. The one phrase repeated over and over was 'Your disability is age-related, not service-related' and their word was irrevocably final. I ask how could they be so dogmatically negative, unless they had instructions from above to curtail the awarding of pensions?"
Mr Ennis urged all MPs to badger those responsible for delaying the progress and ratification of Sir Geoffrey's recommendations.
