Ali, Mr J.

The Hon. F. PANGALLO (16:29): Murray Bridge pensioner John Ali is Australia's forgotten digger, not by his Vietnam veteran mates, who have gone in to bat for him, but by the Australian government. Like many Australians, John served his country with pride and distinction in the 1970s while on a secret mission ordered by the Australian government, but an operation the Australian Defence Force does not want to admit was an official military operation.

Today, 50 years on, John's health is failing, with a heart ailment, post-traumatic stress disorder and a serious blood disorder. All he wants is to access some basic government support to make life a little bit easier for him and his wife. However, numerous attempts by John to claim for a paltry medical entitlement card under the Veterans' Entitlements Act have all but been rejected because the federal government refuses to recognise his active service. It is nothing short of a national disgrace and an insult to one of our surviving Vietnam veteran civilian volunteers.

Despite John being recognised for service during the Vietnam War and in Cambodia and receiving the Australian Service Medal and the Logistic Support Medal for Vietnam, he has been told that he does not qualify for a Veteran Gold Card because his service to his country in the secret operation was a civilian one, not military. It occurred as the war in Vietnam was deteriorating. Neighbouring Cambodia was being infiltrated by communist insurgents and the pro-Western government was struggling, so the Americans and Australians hatched a plan to undertake a secret mission. In John's own words, and I quote:

I was sent to Canberra with six others to meet then Army Minister Malcolm Fraser.

He told us this was a secret mission and we could only tell immediate family.

Under the American and Australian constitutions, we were not allowed to conduct operations in a neutral country like Cambodia.

So John signed the secrecy act and was shipped out to Vietnam and then on to Cambodia with his team. John was not a serviceman, nor were his co-workers; they were civilians working for a trucking company making International Harvester vehicles. Therein lies the problem and the escape clause for the federal government to deny John the commonwealth support he wants and deserves.

The covert operation was sanctioned by the Australian government, and there is ample substantiated documentary and photographic evidence to support this, including that John was part of a small group who were briefed by Malcolm Fraser for a secret mission to transport, drive and maintain hundreds of International Harvester trucks in Cambodia that were then utilised as troop carriers in Vietnam. John worked for International Trucks at the time.

Cambodia was a neutral country and friendly for a covert operation. John lived in barracks with the 102 Field Workshop. Defence authorities from Australia issued John with weapons, and he regularly took part in live-fire training while in Cambodia. He operated under orders from Australian and US defence personnel. John worked alongside CIA US servicemen and other US government employees. He was paid in US dollars. John and his colleagues were transported by the RAAF from Saigon to Nui Dat and Vung Tau.

He and his comrades risked their lives in service for their country, regardless of whether they were part of the official ADF operations in Vietnam. His version of events was corroborated by another member of the team, the late Robert Outram, who died in September last year and who provided a written statement in June 2010 about the mission, which should be in the ADF's records.

In 2019, the then federal Treasurer, Josh Frydenberg, was able to fast track the delivery of gold cards for members of the Australian civilian surgical and medical teams who provided aid, training and treatment to Vietnamese people during the Vietnam War through the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization. At the time, Mr Frydenberg and the then veterans' affairs minister, the Hon. Darren Chester, hailed them as heroes—they were, and they still are.

Similarly, I contend that John and other members of his unit who are now all deceased are also unsung heroes deserving of support by the federal government. Acknowledging what John did and providing him with a gold card is hardly going to break the Australian government's defence or veterans' affairs budgets. In effect, it will only be a one-off special entitlement made to John, yet his pleas continue to fall on deaf ears. Fifty years on, John is still suffering. John deserves to be treated better—so much better—by a government that sent him to Cambodia in the first place.