EDITORIAL: Defence’s day of reckoning must not be ignored

In the past decade and a half, the greatest threat to the lives of Australia’s defence force personnel has been not a foreign enemy, but suicide.

And not by a small margin — by a factor of 20.

Between 1997 and 2021, at least 1677 serving and ex-serving defence members took their own lives. In the past decade, Diggers have died by their own hands at a rate of three every fortnight.

It is, as the seven-volume final report of the royal commission into defence suicide found, a toll that is “unacceptably high”.

Among the dead include young men and women barely out of their teens. They include mothers and fathers of children who will grow up not knowing their parents outside of photographs and stories told to them by others. Beloved sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, partners and friends.

The three-year royal commission has been tough going. It has ripped open festering wounds and revealed a darkness within Australia’s most revered institution.

The bravery of the many hundreds who gave evidence, both in public hearings and in private sessions, and those behind more than 5800 submissions, in coming forward can not be understated.

Many were the loved ones left behind, who felt compelled to speak up for those who no longer could.

In particular, mothers speaking for lost children.

Julie-Anne Finney, whose son Petty Officer David Finney died by suicide in 2019 at just 38, is one of those mothers. Her fearless advocacy was instrumental in setting up the royal commission.

Now, she’s determined that the story doesn’t end here. She is demanding that all 122 of the recommendations made to the Government by the royal commissioners be enacted in full and in the spirit in which they were intended.

“We will not accept any promises of actions or give any more time to politicians to gaslight us and feed us political BS,” Ms Finney wrote today in a column for News Corp.

The commissioners’ recommendations include setting up a new agency within the Department of Veterans’ Affairs to help ex-servicemen and women overcome the dislocation that can come with a transition into civilian life.

This new agency, to be designed by veterans themselves, would check in with ex-soldiers, sailors and aviators at regular intervals, provide them with support and help them find new jobs in which their skills are of most use.

Other recommendations include addressing rampant sexual violence within the defence force by automatically discharging any member convicted of sexual offences and improving support available to victims of sexual assaults.

Many of the recommendations are simply common sense. Help those who need it. Recognise that military life comes with unique risks and challenges. Treat those who have put their lives on the line for us with respect and dignity.

That last point is a responsibility not only for our Government but for all Australians.

As the wife of an ex-serving army member wrote in her submission, “compassion for these servicemen is really crucial. If they think the world has given up on them, they will give up on the world.”

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Responsibility for the editorial comment is taken by WAN Editor Christopher Dore.