NUCLEAR TEST VETERANS LEGAL ACTION UPDATE (23rd May 2025)
- Invisible Enemy
- 6 days ago
- 3 min read
An update from McCue Jury and Partners. As you know, we are continuing to fight for the release of Veterans’ missing medical records, while the Ministry of Defence (MOD) continues its pattern of denial and delay. We could not have continued without the support of everyone who has been part of the campaign and donated to the Crowd Justice page, so thank you.
Letters Before Action
In March 2025, the MOD finally responded to our demand to engage the proposal for a Special Tribunal or face legal action. Once again, their short response failed to engage with the legal arguments and instead pointed to historic litigation bought on different grounds. This is no surprise and represents a continued pattern of obfuscation and delay by the MOD.
Their letter attempted to provide some comfort to Veterans and their families, noting that the Minister for Veterans and People had agreed to examine unresolved questions around the medical records. However, disappointingly, a recent meeting between campaigners and that Minister has revealed that no progress has been made, no budget allocated, and no time limit provided for when this review will be completed. Once again, we see this as nothing other than an attempt to kick this important issue into the long grass.
The Merlin Database
In addition, pressure from the campaign has forced the MOD to agree to the release of the Merlin database – containing documents collated for the purposes of Nuclear Test Veterans litigation – to the National Archives. Although this is a welcome step, at over half a million documents, the release is likely to take an unacceptable amount of time to upload as well as creating an overwhelm of documents for the Veterans to review. Additionally, if the government chooses to place a cost on accessing these documents, it is likely to impose an unaffordable burden on Veterans and their families, rendering the right of access illusory. We hope that this will not be the case.
Moving Forward – Issuing Civil Claims
These empty promises and false notions of progress are disappointing and leave us with no choice to prepare to issue civil claims on behalf of Veterans and their families. Evidence is currently being prepared and finalised on behalf of certain representative claimants, whom we have selected from the wider pool of potential claimants because they reflect characteristics of all those involved in the claim. The aim of this approach is to move forwards as quickly as possible, in order to get a Court to order the MOD to answer the questions it has been dodging for so long. Any precedent set by the lead claimants’ claim will then be rolled out to the wider claimant group to ensure that we force the MOD to right this historic wrong.
Litigation was not the path we had hoped for, but it is now the only way forward to hold the MOD to account and push them to promptly disclose the veterans’ medical records after decades of concealment.
Criminal Dossier
Aside from the civil claim, on 11 May 2025, a criminal dossier was served on the Metropolitan Police alleging misconduct in public office over the campaign to cover up the nuclear experiments. The 500-page dossier identifies numerous officials who are alleged to have taken part in the cover-up and will now be reviewed by the Police.
Political Lobbying
Additionally, alongside the legal action, we also continue to lobby parliament and push for change through political means. On 11 April 2025, Brian Unthank (one of the brave nuclear test veterans) and Oli Troen (Senior Associate on the legal team representing the veterans) briefed MPs alongside Rebecca Long-Bailey in Parliament. There was cross-party support and engagement on the issue, and we will continue to ensure the campaign remains on the political agenda.
Thank You
Once again, we thank you for being part of this important legal campaign, and to all our supporters for their generous contributions in funding the case. We could not have made it to this point without you. We will continue to fight for justice for you and all Veterans; and will keep you updated with our efforts.
Kindest regards,
McCue Jury & Partners LLP
You can support the campaign by donating on the Crowdjustice website. To reach our goal, we need £17K.
Billions of pounds paid to another country just to take an island off our hands then also pay rent to still use it.
No money available!
A small part of that money would have covered the Nuclear Veterans claim and solved the problem.
I am personally fed up with all the duplicity from successive Governments.