The Royal Commission's interim findings, released on Thursday, included the devastating finding that Australia's veterans compensation system might itself be contributing to suicides.

Mick Bainbridge, who studied law after returning from four special forces tours of Afghanistan, said the system should not be contributing more mental and financial stress.

"Having clients that have been before the Royal Commission has shown us that the system is in part much of the problem, and the way that system operates [needs] to allow people a smoother process to getting access to their claims and moving on with their lives," he said.

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"It's what the veteran community expected from the Royal Commission, but it's extremely frustrating as veterans and legal practitioners seeing people suffer to greatly trying to access basic rights and basic claims."

The Royal Commission will run for another two years but the release of its interim findings allows the new government in Canberra to begin to act on its recommendations.

"It is clear to us that Australia's veteran compensation and rehabilitation legislative system is so complicated that it adversely affects the mental health of some veterans - both serving and ex-serving ADF members - and can be a contributing factor to suicidality," the Royal Commissioners said.

They found there was a backlog of almost 42,000 claims from veterans which hadn't yet been referred to a decision-maker, and recommended work to clear this begin immediately.

Mr Bainbridge is a director of Operational Legal Australia, a veterans-focused legal practice in Wollongong, and a former vice-president of the NSW Returned & Services League (RSL).

Co-director Paul James, whose own claims are among the 42,000, said funding to the Department of Veterans' Affairs had been cut in recent years, while changes to the definition of a veteran had seen the workload balloon.

"If someone is discharging today, their claims [rightly] will be accessed first and my claim just sits on the list unallocated," he said.

"Unless you ring up and say you're going to kill yourself, they don't know you exist. They can't even process you until they get through their workload. You're not a person, you're just a number at the moment, and once you get through that gate, someone will actually look at it."