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Update Bulletin - July, 2007

Details of PTSD Group Action Lead cases - Update from Federation Solicitors.

The Judge's decision dismissing every one of the 10 lead cases is a grave disappointment and is particularly hard to bear for those individuals who suffered the most harrowing of experiences during the trial. We have only just been given the written judgments and therefore have not had the opportunity to analyse them but will be doing so over the next few days.

The loss of these cases will not rule out success in other cases as these decisions were very specific to the individual facts. Indeed in some of these cases the criticisms of the generic judgment regarding training, education and culture were reiterated but it was found that on an individual basis this would not have made a difference.

In group litigation there are always a range of cases & circumstances & this demonstrates the massive complexity of this type of case.

The position remains, as we said on Friday, that the Defendant lost some key issues and that still has to be applied to the remaining cases.

In litigation of this type, where there is a mixture of points won and lost, it is for the parties to sit down together and work out how to apply the Judgment. That is what should happen here, otherwise the saga continues, the costs get even higher and more people are damaged in the process.

The Judge actually said in some of the cases that the litigation played a very significant part in the suffering of some of the individuals. That is shameful and could have been avoided had the Defendant recognised the need to talk.