Five veterans have staged a walkout from question time after the Minister for Veterans’ Affairs, Matt Keogh, avoided questions about why he would not meet with them personally.
Nationals MP Michael McCormack said: “More than 20 veterans and family members are in Parliament House today, as I speak, to raise their concerns about your broken promise to impose a $5000 cap on veterans’ allied health services … Why have you refused to meet them?”
Minister for Defence Personnel Matt Keogh (centre) had informed the five veterans who walked out of parliament that he could not meet them on Monday.Alex Ellinghausen
Keogh said Labor was making it easier for veterans to access allied health services.
“We have been hearing for a very long time that providers have been cutting back on providing these services or threatening to cut back on these services because of the fees paid to them, and so we have committed nearly $170 million to make the biggest increase in fees being paid to allied health service providers in 20 years,” he said.
The men stood while Keogh spoke, as Coalition MPs pointed and yelled at the minister to look at them. They were told to sit down by security, but when Keogh was prompted again to answer McCormack’s questions, and he said the government was “in the process of putting together a discussion paper”, they stormed out.
“As they were informed last week by my office, I was unable to meet with them today. But as I have continually said, and engaged with many service organisations, we wish to engage with them and the practitioners in allied health services to make sure that we deliver a service that is available with no gap,” Keogh said.