A Tory Cabinet minister has urged nuclear test veterans to sue the Government after being shown evidence their medical records are being unlawfully withheld.
Veterans Minister Johnny Mercer was presented with the Mirror’s evidence showing blood testing was carried out on servicemen who took part in nuclear weapons tests in the 1950s and the 1960s. Campaigner Alan Owen’s father James witnessed 24 nuclear bomb blasts in 78 days, and later died aged just 52. When Mr Owen showed Mr Mercer the documents in the summer, the minister said he could not do anything to help. The veterans are now crowdfunding to pay for legal action.
Mr Owen, 52, of Carmarthen, South Wales, said: “I told him that not having this information meant veterans weren’t getting the right medical treatment today, on his watch. He skimmed it and said ‘if you’ve got the evidence, you need to start a legal case against the MoD’. On my way out of the meeting, one of his officials said ‘please don’t make the headline Johnny Mercer tells veterans to sue the MoD’.”
Mr Owen was recently diagnosed with a genetic heart condition which claimed the life of his father and older brother, and gave him a near-fatal cardiac arrest last year. The MoD confirmed they hold blood tests from his father, but refused to let him see them, even when told it could help to diagnose or answer concerns about his family's health.
He added: “Mercer stood up for Northern Ireland veterans and resigned from the Government when they were being prosecuted for murder. He’s refusing to stand up for nuclear veterans who are dying without the truth, and without the right treatment.”
Mr Owen decided to speak out after ex-MoD minister Lord Tom Watson demanded a review of 150 hidden documents about blood sampling of test veterans, uncovered by the Mirror. Blood tests would provide definitive evidence of whether radiation at the weapons trials entered the men's bodies and caused damage.
The Atomic Weapons Establishment and Ministry of Defence have repeatedly denied holding any medical records, blood tests or data, most recently in Parliament less than a fortnight ago. Yet the files we uncovered have titles such as “medical examinations of personnel”, “blood counts” and “medical examination and blood count”. Most have been withheld from the National Archives for between 20 and 70 years, which will have required approval from multiple Cabinet ministers.
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Lord Watson said: “It implies the government’s knowledge on this matter is far more extensive than previously disclosed... the scope of the files is substantial. Astonishingly, most of these documents have not been transferred to the National Archives or are publicly available. It is highly likely that even ministers are unaware of their existence.”
Lord Watson, Tory grandee Sir John Hayes, and Salford MP Rebecca Long-Bailey, have all asked for copies of the files to be given to Parliament. Watson has also written to ministers urging them to review any previous decisions to keep them hidden.
Lord Watson said: “The time for obfuscation and deferral is over. The state owes it to these veterans to bring the truth to light and, where necessary, make reparations.”
A government source confirmed the meeting and conversation, but said Mercer had sought and received reassurances from the MoD.
“The minister met with the individual to listen to the issues he wanted to raise around medical records and help him with the questions he had around their correspondence with the MoD.”
Further questions are being asked in Australia, where concern is growing that some of the documents involve medical examinations of Aboriginal people up to 1,000 miles away from the weapons range.