GLEN Shade is a nuclear veteran.

A term not often heard and one the Australian Government has ultimately forgotten.

Mr Shade was one of 8000 Australian servicemen who served during the British Governments testing of nuclear weapons in the 1950s and 1960s.

The tests included 12 nuclear detonations which took place in the South Australian desert.

Shockingly, 53 years after his service Mr Shade has never been recognised for his duty to his country.

The Mitchells Flat local served at Maralinga in 1957 and was present for three of four radioactive detonations including Biak, Tadjeo and Taranaki.

With a high death rate among the nuclear veterans exposed to radioactive fallout, Mr Shade at 72 is one of three from a 43 man platoon still alive.

“The government is still trying to deny it happened,” Mr Shade told The Singleton Argus this week.

“But even back then they knew the affects,” he said.

For over five decades, nuclear veterans have fought to be recognised and to receive the entitlements other Australian servicemen and women are given.

Veterans continue to fight with a landmark class action to be filed against the British Government in May.

The landmark case, led by QC Cherie Blair, wife of former British prime minister Tony Blair, is one Mr Shade is following closely.

While his name is not one of the 170 names on the list, a win could mean nuclear veterans finally get the recognition and entitlements including a gold card they so rightly deserve.

As a member of the Atomic Ex-Servicemen’s Association, Mr Shade’s group is not part of the legal case instead opting to go through channels of the RSL lobbying people in parliament to “support widows, children and veterans themselves who need to have recognition”.

He is disappointed veterans have been forced to take legal action for their rights however Mr Shade has been watching and will continue to follow the case intently.

“If they give it to one they have to give it to the other,” he told The Argus.