The compensation claims & payouts are a sore point with me. Not for the blokes on the Voyager of course because their ship, and home, was cut in half and sunk. But for my shipmates on the HMAS Melbourne it smacks of deceit.
Once the "no win - no cost" lawyers tapped into this potential bonanza of 1000 odd ex - Melbourne crew they were able to turn themselves into very wealthy practicioners. I think they get about 30% of the payout as their fee. There is a standing joke about one of these firms near me.
When they win a case its said all the partners buy a new BMW.
The compensation claims put in are for PTSD and my ex-shipmates collude to present a strategy that works well with the gov't medical review board and a magistrate or jury.
They normally present as being heavy smokers & drinkers, where previously they hardly touched either !, and they've had one or two marriage breakups. Well, half the community is on its second or third mariage. ( I'm looking for a third )Should we compensate all them ? As for the smokes and booze - what a load of bullshit. Back in the early 60's 90% of all sailors were pisspots. It was the standard culture. At only 16 I was an apprentice pisspot.
And everyone smoked because the cigarettes were duty free.

I've had the "Beamer" solicitors contact me on two occasions touting for business. Hell - I could do with the money after my second wife became addicted to poker machines and lost close to $100,000. Left me almost bankrupt and without a house.

Several ex-shipmates have approached me to stand in court a attest to the fact that the claimant became "a changed man after the collision".
I always refuse. The Crown Solictor, who defends against these claims in court, actually rang me to discuss a current case and in doing so said, that if he was acting for me in a claim, and told the jury that poor little John was sent to sea by the cruel navy at the tender age of only 16 and subjected to such a horrifying event, then they would have tears in their eyes. He said if he couldn't get them to award $2 million he'd take down his shingle.

The "Beamer" solicitors have tapped into another vein. VietNam veterans. In my small RSL ( Returned Servicemen's Club ) out of 16 ex-VietNam veterans I am the only one still working. The rest are on partially or totally & permanently incapacitated gov't pensions. With PTSD of course. As far as I'm aware, only 2 of them ever heard a shot fired in anger. They are not too incapacitated to interfere with 2 or 3 golf rounds a week.
Its a similar scenario to the Ex-Melbourne claimants.

Several of the RSL vets have encouraged me to take the same course of action they did. They don't feel comfortable with me around as I'm evidence that they put up the white flag.

It was interesting to see it all evolve. They all had low tier jobs. None of them went for extra education or re-training and over the years they were stuck in low esteem positions and all the educated young bucks were passing them by. They needed an out and PTSD was it.

People who survive car crashes would probably have grounds for a stress claim but there wouldn't be enough in the Treasury.

Two asides. 1. The collective thought on Melbourne when we didn't sink was, "thank fuck WE didn't sink".
2. During Australia's 10 year engagement in the VietNam war we lost 550 military personnel. During the same period we had over 30,000 deaths on our roads. Statistically - we were much safer in VietNam.

I've probably gone on a bit long here, and I'm conscious of the martyr factor, but I have 3 wonderful sons, and I'd like to think that they'll remember me as a reasonably honourable bloke.

JG/FME