Royal commission the only solution to veteran suicides, researcher says

Her comments come amid rising calls in the veterans community for a royal commission into both the Department of Veterans' Affairs and the entire Australian Defence Force, which has been plagued by cultural problems across the system in recent years.

Indeed one family of a veteran who took his own life has taken to change.org campaigning for a commission, and has received almost 300,000 signatures from the public supporting the proposal in recent months.

Griffith University military analyst Deborah Morris said while the recent inquiry was good, a royal commission that also investigated the entire Defence Force was the only way to find a solution to institutional and systemic failings contributing to the problems.

She said simply looking at the DVA may help veterans access compensation and services more successfully, but would fail to actually address the cultural issues that were leading to many of the mental health problems ex-military staff were facing.

Ms Morris said there were serious institutional and cultural problems in Defence that were leading the forces to mismanage the health of both serving and ex-military staff, as evidenced by more than 70 inquiries over more than 50 years.

"Defence is very strongly against it [a royal commission] and while everybody in the ex-service community was screaming for change, and we've had a Productivity Commission inquiry look into these things, now a lot of the community is against much of what the inquiry had to say," she said.

"If you look at any of the inquiries, from the one into ADFA to the Defence abuse section of the royal commission into child sexual abuse, it is clear there are specific institutional problems within Defence that need to be more fully investigated."

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Ms Morris also cited DVA secretary Liz Cosson's recent comments that it was time to pull the band-aid off, saying if the government was serious about the issues facing ex-service personnel, it would also look underneath at what it revealed.

Minister for Veterans and Defence Personnel Darren Chester has stopped short of clarifying what position the government will take on calls for the wide-ranging legal inquiry, but has previously said he would rather spend money on mental health services than on a independent judicial probe into the military.

But Prime Minister Scott Morrison has left the door open on the idea, saying little but that all options are on the table, though it is understood the defence establishment is not fully supportive the proposal internally.

While the draft report of the Productivity Commission has been released, the government is yet to formally respond to its recommendations, which included turning the funding mechanism for veterans' support into a premium paid by Defence into a new independent agency. The inquiry also recommended simplifying the the veterans' support system and a raft of other changes, despite backing away from an earlier proposal to completely overhaul DVA.

Mr Chester said the government was already acting including on a new veteran mental health strategy and plan to be out later this year.