HC Deb 16 January 1995 vol 252 cc375-6W
Dr. Clark

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence on how many occasions in the last 15 years his Department has paid compensation to service personnel or former members of the armed forces who have suffered from post traumatic stress disorder.

Mr. Soames

Members of the armed forces may be subjected to traumatic experiences and may suffer stress as a result. We have a duty to ensure that they receive proper medical treatment, and the question of compensation arises only if there has been a negligent failure on the part of my Department. No-one has been compensated simply for having developed PTSD.

There has been one case in which a former soldier has been compensated for a failure to diagnose and treat PTSD. In some other claims for personal injury, PTSD may have been claimed as one of the consequences of an injury which was caused by negligence; if so, compensation may have been paid under the conventional heading of "pain and suffering". No figures are available for these cases and data is not held in a form which would enable such information to be extracted.