British Servicemen: Vexatious Law Suits

Lord Thomas of Gresford Excerpts

Wednesday 19th October 2016 Lords Chamber

[Earl Howe]

As regards combat immunity, the Government have previously made it clear that we will not rule out legislating, which is being considered among a range of options. It has been suggested that we should simply reinstate Section 10 of the Crown Proceedings Act; that is one of the options we are looking at, but it would be possible only under certain specific circumstances. No plans are in train for any immediate change on that front.

[Lord Thomas of Gresford (LD)]

My Lords, I have professional experience of fraudulent claims and of legitimate claims like the Baha Mousa case, where the deceased received 95 injuries before he died. I note that the Ministry of Defence has settled 326 claims at a cost of £32 million; I assume that those were legitimate claims. Do the Government now intend to abolish or prevent all claims being brought by prisoners or civilians who are injured in the course of operations, regardless of whether they are legitimate or vexatious?

[Earl Howe]

As the noble Lord is aware, the Iraq Historic Allegations Team looks into these allegations, which have totalled more than 3,300 to date. The current case load is around 1,600 and it expects to reduce that number to 250 by next January. We cannot simply close it down, because that would mean leaving these allegations open to referral to the International Criminal Court in The Hague, with the possibility of trials there. We must therefore investigate properly in this country.