Caldow and Repatriation Commission (Veterans' entitlements)

The Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT) considered an appeal by an applicant concerning his claims for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and alcohol use disorder (AUD), which he asserted were defence-caused. The Repatriation Commission had rejected these claims, and the Tribunal was tasked with reviewing this decision.

The central legal issue before the AAT was whether the applicant's psychological injuries were defence-caused, specifically whether he would have suffered these injuries "but for" his defence service. This required the Tribunal to assess the evidence presented, particularly concerning a Category 1A stressor, and determine if it was reasonably satisfied that such an event occurred during his operational deployment in Butterworth, Malaysia. The Tribunal also had to consider the legal standard of "reasonable satisfaction" as interpreted in relevant case law, and whether any medical opinions provided a sufficiently strong connection between the alleged stressors and the claimed conditions.

The Tribunal applied the standard of reasonable satisfaction, as outlined in *Repatriation Commission v Smith*, requiring it to be persuaded on the civil standard and to distinguish between probabilities and mere possibilities. It also considered the principles from *Repatriation Commission v Money* regarding the identification of the factual basis for a connection between service and injury, and the requirements from *Repatriation Commission v Bey* that medical opinions must "point to" a hypothesis connecting a condition with defence service, rather than merely suggesting a possibility. The Tribunal found inconsistencies in the evidence and was not reasonably satisfied that the Category 1A stressor occurred.

Consequently, the Tribunal affirmed the decision of the Veterans Review Board, which had upheld the Repatriation Commission's determination that the applicant's claimed PTSD and AUD were not defence-caused for the purposes of the *Veterans' Entitlements Act 1986* (Cth).