“Social Security is designed so that any lying parasite can rip off the system. The Department of Veterans’ Affairs is designed so that even perfectly honest people can rip off the system.”With these words, the author sums up one of the least publicised scandals of our time. Before he joined the Department of Veterans’ Affairs, he had given little thought to the workings of veterans’ compensation but, like most people, assumed that it was dedicated to caring for ex-servicemen injured, maimed, or sick from the effects of battle, and for the widows of those killed in war. Over the next 30 years, however, he watched a combination of badly-drafted legislation, irresponsible court decisions, and political cowardice turn it into a monster. To read this book is to walk through Alice’s looking glass into a world where normal reality is inverted, creating a surreal world where, for instance:* a 90-year-old’s death can be considered war-caused;* a deceased veteran can have two widows; and* a tap of the shoulder can leave a man a nervous wreck for life.Altogether, inappropriate pensions are costing the taxpayer two billion dollars a year. The further tragedy is that those who really have been traumatized by war are being made worse by the system.With 30 years’ experience in the department, the last nine as one of an elite group of advocates representing the department before the Administrative Appeals Tribunal, Malcolm Smith is well placed to describe in layman’s terms the tortuous path of law and practice which has led to the present scandal. With understanding and sympathy for the veterans and widows involved, he points out that it is not the lies and abuses - of which there are many - which are the main problem, but the law itself, which permits perfectly honest people to rip off the system without even knowing it.

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