{"id":2430,"date":"2019-04-22T02:39:59","date_gmt":"2019-04-22T02:39:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/?p=2430"},"modified":"2019-04-22T02:39:59","modified_gmt":"2019-04-22T02:39:59","slug":"honouring-the-service-of-all-of-australias-veterans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/2019\/04\/22\/honouring-the-service-of-all-of-australias-veterans\/","title":{"rendered":"HONOURING THE SERVICE OF ALL OF AUSTRALIA\u2019S VETERANS"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Shorten Labor Government will recognise the role of all Australian veterans, investing $118 million to honour their service and support their families.
\nThis funding is an investment in local pride and national identity.
\nIt\u2019s about honouring Australia\u2019s oldest promise, that at the going down of the sun and in the morning, we will remember them.
\nLabor\u2019s\u00a0investment will mean that all veterans\u00a0\u2013\u00a0no\u00a0matter the conflict they served in\u00a0\u2013\u00a0receive\u00a0the same funeral benefits as their peers. For some, this will mean an additional $10,000 in support for their families at one of the toughest times of their lives.
\nLabor will also give local communities the chance to update their memorials to recognise all veterans\u00a0\u2013\u00a0including\u00a0those who fought in the Vietnam and Korean wars, and those who fought in\u00a0more recent\u00a0conflicts.
\nThis is about ensuring all our veterans are rightly honoured.
\nLabor\u2019s\u00a0package includes:
\nRespecting our veterans with more support:<\/strong>
\nLabor will address inequity in the treatment of our veterans in payment for funeral expenses\u00a0\u2013\u00a0ensuing\u00a0the families of our veterans are better supported.
\nWe will assist more than 84,000 veterans by increasing the amount they receive for funeral expenses by more than $10,000\u00a0\u2013\u00a0an\u00a0overall investment of $90.4 million.
\nCurrently, those veterans who access support through the Veterans\u2019\u00a0Entitlement Act (VEA) are entitled to a maximum of $2,000 to assist in funeral costs,\u00a0often leaving families with the burden of out of pockets costs.
\nA Shorten Labor Government will increase this amount to $12,053.62 for these VEA veterans, who are mostly our\u00a0Second World War, Korea and Vietnam era veterans\u00a0\u2013\u00a0this\u00a0is the same level\u00a0that\u00a0veterans\u2019 access under the modern\u00a0Military Rehabilitation and Compensation Act\u00a0(MRCA).
\nUpgrading community memorials to recognise all veterans:<\/strong>
\nLabor\u2019s\u00a0commitment to recognising\u00a0all\u00a0our servicemen and women will be cemented through the establishment of a $20 million Their Enduring Legacy grants program.
\nLabor will ensure memorials throughout Australia are upgraded to reflect all Australians who have fought in wars.
\nMemorials play an important role in recognising our servicemen and women.
\nMany local memorials acknowledge the sacrifices made by our\u00a0First\u00a0and\u00a0Second\u00a0World War veterans. Labor will ensure that local memorials will be upgraded,\u00a0and also\u00a0better commemorate those men and women who served in Korea, Vietnam and\u00a0more recent\u00a0conflicts,\u00a0who are often not recognised at these memorials.\u00a0Labor\u2019s\u00a0fund will address this.
\nInvesting in the Kokoda Trail:<\/strong>
\nA Shorten Labor Government will honour our\u00a0Second World War\u00a0soldiers who trekked the Kokoda Trail through a\u00a0Joint\u00a0Master Plan to acknowledge the importance of Kokoda in Australia\u2019s military history.
\nLabor\u2019s\u00a0Joint Master Plan will bring together various departments in Australia and Papua New Guinea to develop a plan\u00a0that\u00a0recognises the environmental, cultural and wartime significance of the Kokoda Trail.
\nOur Joint Master Plan will complement the Kokoda Initiative, which was first signed in 2008 and is scheduled to conclude in June 2020.
\nThis $2 million investment from Labor is a nod to those who fought through in the jungle on the Kokoda Trail, recognising the environmental, cultural and wartime significance of the site, conserving it into the future.
\nMore support for veteran carers:<\/strong>
\nA Shorten Labor Government will support the carers of our veterans to ensure they can continue to give our veterans high quality support and care.
\nCarers are the first line of support to our veterans and are often partners or family members.
\nLabor will provide funding for carer retreats to assist those who struggle with social isolation and provide greater emotional support to those who are looking after our veterans.
\nRetreats enable partners and carers to have a break from their responsibilities, spend time with others in similar circumstances and receive greater support.
\nThis $1 million a year commitment from\u00a0Labor\u00a0provides\u00a0greater support for our veterans through their families and carers.
\nExpanded therapy support:<\/strong>
\nLabor will expand mental health support to our veterans,\u00a0with greater access to complementary treatment programs.
\nA Shorten Labor Government will expand\u00a0veterans\u2019\u00a0access to mental health treatment through the development of an art therapy program.
\nLabor\u00a0understands it is not a case of one size fits all when it comes to treating mental health.
\nThis is a $2 million investment from Labor to expand mental health treatment for our veterans.
\nLabor will save the Department of Veterans\u2019 Affairs:<\/strong>
\nA Shorten Labor Government will not dismantle the Department of Veterans\u2019 Affairs. We call on Scott Morrison to guarantee the same.
\nLabor has a clear position: we will not dismantle DVA.
\nAbolition of the department\u00a0was a recommendation\u00a0of the\u00a0draft Productivity Commission report,\u00a0which the Liberals commissioned.
\nIn stark contrast, Scott Morrison and the Minister\u00a0for Veterans\u2019 Affairs\u00a0have not given the same guarantee, leaving more than 280,000 veterans and clients of DVA in limbo.
\nLabor will boost research into veterans\u2019 mental health:<\/strong>
\nA Shorten Labor Government will boost research into veterans\u2019 mental health, to provide greater understanding of the mental, physical and social health of current and ex-serving members of the\u00a0Australian Defence Force.
\nIf we can better understand the wellbeing of our current and ex-serving members, we can better understand how support them.
\nLabor will provide $4.47 million to Phoenix Australia to continue valuable research on veterans\u2019\u00a0mental health.
\nThis suite of policies from Labor is on top of\u00a0our\u00a0$121 million comprehensive Veterans\u2019 Employment Policy, $1 million to a Veterans\u2019 Recovery Centre in the Ipswich and Somerset Region, $4.9 million for the Scott Palmer Service and Veterans\u2019 Support Hub in the Northern Territory,$4.1 million towards Oasis Townsville, the Western Front Fellowship and a $2 million Family Engagement and Support Strategy.
\nOne of the most important and urgent ways we can give weight and meaning to Lest We Forget is to ensure our veterans and their families receive the support and respect they deserve.
\nLabor is proud to deliver this significant investment to better support our veterans and their families.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Shorten Labor Government will recognise the role of all Australian veterans, investing $118 million to honour their service and support their families. This funding is an investment in local pride and national identity. It\u2019s about honouring Australia\u2019s oldest promise, that at the going down of the sun and in the morning, we will remember … Continue reading “HONOURING THE SERVICE OF ALL OF AUSTRALIA\u2019S VETERANS”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2430","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-aussie"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2430","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2430"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2430\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2430"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2430"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2430"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}