Vol 63

Sept  2018

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Comment.

Back in March this year, that’s 6 months ago, we wrote to Defence Media seeking permission to tour the Army Base out at Oakey (west of Toowoomba - Qld) with the intention of completing a story on the Base so you, our readers, could see how the blokes and blokettes posted out there lived, socialised and messed and could compare today’s facilities to those you enjoyed when in uniform.

We’ve done this many times previously, normally we find Defence Media to be very helpful indeed and tours are organised with a minimum of fuss. We’ve been allowed tours of Air Force, Army and Navy Bases, we’ve been on Navy Ships, climbed into many of Army’s heavy stuff and flown in the Air Force’s aircraft and not ONCE has anyone from Defence had the need to criticise our reporting. We deliberately do not report or photograph any thing of an operational nature instead concentrate our reports on the social aspects.

But this time things were different.

Defence Media weren’t even courteous enough to respond to our request, we rang them many times only to be told “It’s been looked at”. We never did get a reply. In frustration, on the 22 May, we wrote to the then Defence Minister, Marise Payne, asking her to intervene on our behalf. We got a response back from the Minister’s Office on the 8^th June confirming receipt of our letter and stating that it was being considered.

We appreciate that the Minister’s Office has a lot more important things to worry about than our little matter, we also appreciate that our request is much more important to us than it is to them, but, as busy as they are, we did get a response on the 16^th July – but it was not as we’d hoped. You can see their response HERE.

We’ve since written back to them, reminding them we’re not the media nor are we the general public – we’re an ex-Service Association, we’ve given part of our lives in defence of this nation, we deserve better. We haven’t heard back since we last wrote but on the 21^st Sept we have a meeting in Canberra with the Defence Department and with the Vet Affairs Department – we’ll bring it up again and let you know the outcome next issue.

2021 Celebration.

Later this month I’ll be in Canbarra to see the RAAF to discuss our wish list re the celebration.  You can see what's planned HERE.

We’re planning for the Sunday Concert event to be open to all in Melbourne and it could look like this below, you’ll definitely want a reserved seat. A thousand of those seats down the front will be reserved for those that attend the reunion – we’re limited to 1000 for other events too, so if you think you’ll be able to attend, even though it’s a while off, we suggest you get your name in now. After we have 1000, you’ll have to go onto the wait list. At the moment we have 213 – don’t put it off, if you wait too long you could miss out.  Tell all your friends too – get them involved.

Please click HERE and do so, the more numbers we have the easier it is when we discuss our plans with venues and sponsors.

We must stress though, this is not an official Air Force event, it is being organised by the Radschool Association.

Remember, the “other day” Celebration events are open to anyone and everyone who has spent time at Ballarat, Laverton, Point Cook, St Kilda or Frognall, it’s open to clerks, cooks, framies, pilots, instructor, even radtechs, it’s irrespective of mustering. The individual cost to everyone will be minimal as we’re down the road aways with sponsors and it’s looking good.

If you’re an ex-WAAAF, ex-WRAAF or female RAAF and you would like a “Girls-own” night on the Thursday 25 March in the Officers Mess at Laverton, we’re pretty sure we can arrange this, it will all depend on whether there is enough demand (there isn't at the moment - there's only 3) and whether the RAAF has plans for the night – which at this stage looks like they don’t. You’ll need to fill in the FORM though.

We’ve also arranged to hold a “Sleep Rough” night to be held in the Melbourne Showgrounds to honour and remember those that went before us and fought in WW2. A lot of those brave men and women were billeted or worked at the Showgrounds during the war and this will be our way of remembering them. If you want a rough night out, we ask that you get sponsored as we would like this to be a fund raiser event for the RAAF Association. Bring your own sleeping gear but we'll supply the food and water.

Early in 2020 we’ll need you to commit and fill in another form with all names, shirt sizes etc and soon after that you’ll need to make a payment – but more on that later too. Remember, the cost to everyone will be minimal as we’re down the road aways with sponsors and it’s looking good.

We’ll be asking for volunteers later too, people to help with set up, team leaders, crowd management, waiters etc, more on that later too.

Remember, keep an eye on our UPDATE page for the latest info.

Early Editions.

We’ve fixed the early editions that had “dropped off”, you can now access every edition from number 1 (back in May 1999) onwards. And the index has been updated too.

Membership.

We’ve decided to go with the following membership.

·                1 year’s full membership for $12.00.  (now till 30 June 2019

·                Full membership for $35.00 to 30 June 2021.

Annual Membership will run from July one year to June the next, with this year’s annual membership now expiring in June 2019. As we’ve said, full membership is not compulsory, you can still receive the RAM which will remain open, free and available on the net.

So, if you’d like to contribute and help us with the ever increasing costs, please join as a full member.

If you are already a member (ie: if your name is on this LIST), please fill in the form below and send it to us, if you haven’t already joined (if you're not on the list), please use the form HERE.

BSB: 124-021       Account number: 1048 7401      Title:  RAAF Radschool Association.

Bank:  Bank of Queensland.

and include your name in the "Remarks" window on the deposit.

You can of course pay more if you wish!!

AND!!  If you work for or know of a firm that would be kind and generous enough to sponsor the Radschool Association, please get in touch.

Reunions.

If you're having a reunion and you would like us to cover it and publish it, let us know and we'll see what can be done.

Errors

Our aim is to have this site error free – but that’s probably impossible. But with your help I reckon we can get pretty close. If you see any errors, be they punctuation, spelling, links that don’t work, facts wrong etc, (no matter how small) please let us know so we can fix them.

You can download the full magazine in PDF format HERE.

It is a very large file, contains 299 pages and will take a while to download.

The margins have been set so you can print on both sides of the page.

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