Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how many (a) applications his Department has received and (b) payments his Department has made for injury compensation in the last nine years where the injury was sustained more than (i) five years and (ii) 10 years previously; and if he will make a statement.

The Ministry of Defence does not hold centralised information on injury dates relating to War Pension Scheme (WPS) claims on the War Pension Computer System (WPCS). To compile this information would incur disproportionate cost as paper claim files would have to be manually reviewed by Defence Business Services Veterans UK. There is no time limit on submitting a WPS claim.

The response relating to the Armed Forces Compensation Scheme (AFCS) has been compiled using data held on the Compensation and Pension System (CAPS). However, it has not been possible to separate injury and illness claims as they are not recorded separately on the CAPS and to compile this information for injury claims only would incur disproportionate cost through a review of paper files. The response therefore includes both injury and illness claims.

The incident date as recorded on the CAPS has been used to determine claims registered five or ten years after the individual's injury was sustained or the onset of illness. It should be noted that the incident date information may not always be precise and the information provided is therefore an estimate. Claims under the AFCS can be made up to seven years from the date of the original injury/diagnosis.

There were 10,767 injury/illness claims registered under the AFCS since 1 April 2010 where the injury/illness was recorded on the CAPS as having been sustained more than five years prior to the date the claim was registered. Of these, 5,193 were awarded compensation as at 31 March 2019. Those not awarded include claims pending a decision, rejected claims and claims assessed as not serious enough to attract a lump sum payment.

There were 619 injury/illness claims registered under the AFCS since 1 April 2010 where the injury/illness was recorded on the CAPS as having been sustained more than ten years prior to the date the claim was registered. Of these, 123 were awarded compensation as at 31 March 2019. As above, those not awarded include claims pending a decision, rejected claims and claims assessed as but not serious enough to attract a lump sum payment.

For common law negligence claims, records are not kept which allow the time between the date of injury and date of claim to be calculated. In addition, not all claims result from a single incident so dates cannot be assigned. The date of knowledge of the injury or illness caused by a potentially negligent act is often the significant factor.