It's the kind of dollar figure that would go a long way towards acknowledging the real financial hit people living in the shadow of Williamtown RAAF Base have taken on their property values because the Department of Defence has allowed a known contaminant to pour from its land for years.

Instead $53 million has been set aside by the department to fight the legal cases brought against it by people at Williamtown, or Oakey in Queensland or Katherine in the Northern Territory.

We only know this because the Department of Defence was required to give evidence to a Senate estimates hearing about how the department is responding to the release of per- and poly-fluoroalkyl, more commonly known as PFAS chemicals, from its sites across the country.

We now know Defence budgeted $205 million for PFAS examination and management across 27 sites over the next financial year, which includes the salaries of 40 public servants at an estimated $120,000 each annually, and 44 consultants.

There is no doubt the PFAS scandal is an expensive exercise for Defence, the Australian Government and, ultimately, Australian taxpayers.

That Defence allowed the contamination to continue from its sites for years is an issue many in the community are still struggling to come to terms with.

The line from governments and Defence itself, that there is no consistent evidence PFAS causes "important" health effects, is of no comfort to the people living with it under and around them everyday, and in ignorance for many years. It is important to people that they don't feel their own governments are against them.

If Defence and the Federal Government had responded well back in 2015 when PFAS at Williamtown, and in surrounding neighbourhoods, was made public, the affected communities might not be as angry as they are now, and determined to get answers and justice.

But as Coalition Against PFAS president Lindsay Clout said, Defence has continued to "deny, deflect and distract" from the start. Thus it is no surprise it has set aside $53 million to defend the lawsuits against Australians, and nothing to compensate them.

Issue: 39,194.