Defence Force personnel are being promised easier access to veterans' entitlements under an overhaul of legislation, as the minister confirms the backlog of claims is still above 42,000.
Veterans Affairs Minister Matt Keogh announced the laws governing how military veterans are compensated will be replaced with a single piece of legislation.
The move to simplify the current model from three schemes down to one was the first recommendation of the Defence and veteran suicide royal commission's interim report.
"This is a system that clearly hasn't worked for some time," Mr Keogh said.
"We have a unique opportunity at this point, to provide better legislation, for our veterans and families communities to save lives."
The minister said the two older schemes would be closed and all veterans on those would be grandfathered onto the remaining scheme.
He did not give a firm time of when the legislation would be introduced or for how long consultation on the proposal would last, instead saying the government wanted to make sure it spoke to all relevant stakeholders to make sure it did not become a "political football".
Mr Keogh also said the backlog of claims had barely budged since May 2022, despite the Labor government's commitment to employ an extra 500 staff to clear it.
He said the reason for the slight increase to 42,641 cases at the end of January from 42,000 at the end of May was due to multiple factors but that the department was beginning to "turn a corner".
"We've been undergoing this process for some months, engaging new staff, getting them trained up, appointed as delegates to be able to work through these claims faster," he said.
"We've also seen over those months a continued increase in the number of claims coming in.
"So we've been able to process claims faster but we've had more claims coming in as well, we're starting to see that number reduce and reduce more quickly as more staff come online."
Mr Keogh said he believed the government was still on track to meet another royal commission recommendation to clear the backlog by March next year.
The Returned and Services League of Australia welcomed both the announcement of the changes to the legislation and the government's commitment to consult extensively with the veteran community.
GPs charging veterans 'disturbing'
The Veterans Affairs Minister said he was aware of reports some veterans had been told by their GPs they would no longer be able to pay for appointments with Department of Veterans' Affairs (DVA) white cards.
White cards are given to some veterans to access treatment for injuries suffered during their military service, including mental illness, and some other conditions.
Mr Keogh said he had spoken to the health minister about the issue and encouraged any veteran who found themselves in a similar situation to contact the department for guidance on which health clinics do accept white cards.
"What's really important to understand is that while we're seeing some GPs saying that they won't process white cards for out veterans, which quite frankly is really disturbing, we do know that there are many many GPs and psychs ... that do service our vets' community," he said.
While Mr Keogh noted that GPs earn a higher funding for seeing veterans with white cards than they do from the Medicare rebate, the funding is only marginally higher and not enough to remain "financially viable".
