This High Court case was brought by soldiers
who had developed psychiatric injuries (Post Traumatic Stress
Disorder) as a consequence of exposure to the stress and trauma of
combat in Northern Ireland, Bosnia, the Falklands and the first
Gulf War. Their case was not that they had been negligently
exposed to the risk of psychiatric injury, rather it was that that
their employer had failed to diagnose or to properly treat such
illnesses. In deciding the case in the Ministry of Defence’s
favour, Mr Justice Owen stated the following principles:
1) That a soldier does not owe a fellow
soldier a duty of care in tort when either (one or both) are
engaged with an enemy in the course of combat.
2) The Ministry of Defence is not under a
duty to maintain a safe system of work for service personnel
engaged with an enemy in the course of combat.
3) Combat included all active operations
against an enemy, and covered attack and resistance, advance and
retreat, pursuit and avoidance, reconnaissance and engagement. It
also included anti-terrorist, policing and peacekeeping operations
in which service personnel came under attack or the threat of
attack. The immunity extended to the planning of and preparation
for such operations, including decisions as to the deployment of
resources.
In contrast to the above cases, where the
claimant is a civilian injured as a result of MOD operations, a
claim for personal injury can be fairly straightforward.
Citizens of foreign countries injured as a
result of negligent and other unlawful acts of British service
personnel stationed in those countries may also bring claims
through the UK courts.