Tasmania Senator and veteran Jacqui Lambie says she is “begging” the Prime Minister not to follow through with a $5000 cap on allied health services in an emotional plea, as Veterans Minister Matt Keogh faces calls to be “sacked”.

From July 2027, veterans will be capped at $5000 per year for allied health services. A change, the government says, will cut down on unnecessary services.

In an emotional speech before question time on Wednesday, Senator Lambie said about six months earlier her vagina had begun to prolapse, which she said was connected to her time in the military.

“Because there is such limited access to quality progesterone in regional areas like Tasmania, I was looking at waiting for months for an appointment and that’s the private system in Tasmania. Just to see a gynaecologist,” she said.

Senator Lambie said she put in a claim with the Department of Veterans’ Affairs, but ultimately came to Canberra to have the $7000 procedure.

She told the Senate a survey of almost 500 female veterans found 2/3 of women reported pelvic pain.

Their treatment, she said, was either inadequate under what was being funded by the DVA, or not classified.

She continued: “I would like to ask the Prime Minister, Minister Marles, and Minister Keogh what they would do if their penis was hanging by a thread.

“What would they do with treatment for that injury, directly connected to their military service, was denied by the Department of Veterans Affairs.

“Would they say, okay, no worries, I don’t really need my penis. I don’t think so. I don’t think so.

“I’m asking you once more. I’m begging you, Prime Minister. We are already suffering enough. Drop the bloody cap.

“Veterans have had enough. Leave us alone.”

Later, speaking to an urgency motion she moved calling on the government to scrap the cap, Senator Lambie said she believed it would result in veteran suicides.

Speaking separately in the House of Representatives, Veterans Minister Matt Keogh said his government had moved quickly to address recommendations of the Royal Commission into Defence and Veterans Suicide, and was working on implementing more.

He said the DVA was now the “best funded in three decades”.

Herbert MP and veteran Phillip Thompson said a veteran had told him he had his hearing aids maintained and a psychology appointment, which totalled 80 per cent of the cap.

“So, what do I drop off? Just my psychology?” he said.

Mr Thompson said Mr Keogh did not address the cap and that veterans had “lost faith” in the Minister.

Minister defends job

Veterans Minister Matt Keogh was forced to defend his job as pressure mounts over the temporary snubbing of an ex-servicemen’s group in Canberra to protest plans to cap allied health services at $5000 per year.

Mr Keogh was asked five times – and Anthony Albanese once – about the Monday meeting with the Coalition of Veterans’ Voices during question time on Wednesday.

The minister’s office had initially told the group Mr Keogh did not have time to meet them; however, under pressure, he eventually did so.

During question time on Tuesday, Mr Keogh admitted he “got it wrong” by not agreeing initially to met with the ex-servicemen.

However, Mr Keogh continued to face a grilling over the meeting on Wednesday, with opposition spokesman Michael McCormack asking how Mr Keogh could continue in the role if he “cannot uphold Defence values”.

He quoted former navy diver and Fair Care for Veterans spokesman John Armfield who said after the meeting that “I enlisted under the navy values of courage, honour, honesty and loyalty, yet you fail to display any of niece values, minister”.

Mr Keogh said he had heard Mr Armfield’s evidence before the Royal Commission into Defence and Veterans Suicide, and had engaged with him “about the circumstances he had to confront, (which) were tragic and terrible”.

“I can very much understand why he would feel that there has been a breach of faith with him in terms of the upholding of the Australian Defence Force values and his commitment. And, so I understand that,” Mr Keogh said.

“I’m sorry that he holds that view about this, and all I can do is I try to do each and every day is to make sure that we’re continuing to the work of improving the system that exists to support our serving personnel and our veteran community and their families, so that they get the service and the support that we all agree that they deserve.”

Mr Keogh denied on Tuesday he had been disrespectful to the cohort on Monday.

On Wednesday, Herbert MP and veteran Phillip Thompson asked if by making that claim he was called former fighter pilot Tim Nelson a “liar”.

“I meet with many veterans, veteran family members, defence personnel on a regular basis and with I respect every position that they put to me in what they can say and describe,” Mr Thompson said.

“But, I also am not in the habit of repeating the content in detail of those conversations and meetings in the parliament every day.”

Anthony Albanese was forced to step in to defend Mr Keogh after questioning from Opposition Leader Angus Taylor.

“Why won’t the Prime Minister sack this incompetent and disrespectful minister?” he asked.

In response, Mr Albanese said he had “every confidence in the Minister”.

“I consider it to be one of the great privileges of my time in this place … to engage with those men and women who wear our uniform,” he said.

“They serve in our name and deserve our total respect at all times for that they do.”

Mr Albanese began laying into the former government, before being cut off.

The Veterans’ Minister has been under pressure over the cap, which was not a recommendation of the Royal Commission.

The government claims it will help cut down on unnecessary services, while advocates have blasted it as “cruel”.