Every day is Remembrance Day at Veterans Centre

FOR the volunteers at the Gippsland Veterans Centre, “every day is Remembrance Day.”

The non-profit organisation is located beside the Sale Memorial Hall on Macalister Street, and dedicates itself to supporting ex-military personnel and their families.

Many of the volunteers are themselves former members of the military, and take great pride in assisting their fellow veterans.

Once such volunteer is Mike Barrett, who occupies a role formerly known as a “military compensation advocate”.

“I’m, if you like, a go-between for the veteran and the Department of Veterans Affairs,” Mr Barrett said.

“I’m not employed by DVA, but I’m trained by DVA, and my level of training allows me to submit claims on behalf of veterans into DVA, and I can do the follow-ups as required.”

To qualify for the role, Mr Barrett had to participate in an Advocate Training and Development Program, which is facilitated by the Department.

“Most of it is done online, but you then have to do what they call a one-on-one, where someone like myself has to go into Melbourne and they go through your cases,” Mr Barrett explained.

“They see if you’ve done them correctly and what’s your record keeping like, and then you go for a mock interview with a client.”

While he admits the training is “intense”, Mr Barrett said it is fulfilling to see a veteran get their claim approved.

To submit a claim on a veteran’s behalf, Mr Barret must first interview the prospective applicant to establish whether they have a claim, and which of the three Commonwealth laws their claim falls under.

“Then once that’s been established, I submit a claim to DVA, and then DVA goes through the bureaucratic process of sorting it all out, which could take quite a long time or could be very easy, depending on the size of the claim,” Mr Barrett said.

An approval can take days, weeks or months.

The Centre also provides assistance to the relatives of veterans, including widows and their children.

Lyn McLindin volunteers her time as both a wellbeing advocate and a liaison for Legacy, a charity founded to support the families of deceased and injured veterans.

“Legacy helps them with all manner of things – the wellbeing side of it is making sure that they’re not socially isolated, and we assist with the expenses of educating children and things like that,” Ms McLindin said.

“We support widows in any way they need – we visit them, which helps with the social isolation, and encourage them to come out to things like the (widows’) lunch club that they have once a month.

“Whatever they really ask of Legacy is what we try and do.”

Ms McLindin estimates that Legacy supports 100 widows across the local area, who range in age from 34- to 101-years-old.

Acting Sale RSL president Ross Jackson is another person who volunteers his time at the Veterans Centre, being its in-house researcher and historian.

“We do have people that are looking after the living, and we have people here that are looking after the dead – the ones that have paid what we call the ‘supreme sacrifice’, or those people who have died because of war,” Mr Jackson said.

As part of his role, Mr Jackson can assist people in locating war records or lost medals, including those of late family members.

Additionally, he has been a facilitator of Young Veterans Sale, a program created to draw recently-returned servicepeople to the Centre – with limited success.

Mr Jackson attributed the indifference of younger veterans being due to the Centre being “secondary to everything they’re doing at this point”.

“We do have some around; but when you have a look at what’s going on, the younger veterans are working, they have young children or teenage children, and they’re building their life,” he surmised.

The Centre has found other means of attracting veterans, such as a “sports library” that allows them to borrow sporting and recreational equipment, including snow gear; and an upcoming bus tour to the Woodside Beach Hotel.

Volunteers have also opened the facilities up to local initiatives such as Monday Tucker, which takes place in the Activity Room adjacent to the Centre’s office.

Yoga sessions are hosted on Tuesday evenings in the same Activity Room, while the meeting room has been made available to fellow non-profit groups.

Furthermore, the Centre has connections with organisations such as Soldier On and Open Arms, with which it has similar aims.

All of this is to ensure that not only veterans, but the community at large feels supported.

The Gippsland Veterans Centre is open Tuesdays to Thursdays, 9am to 3pm.

Those wanting more information can telephone the Centre during opening hours on 5143 1633 or send an email to vetcensale@netspace.net.au