MoD spend £600k spying on ex troops SNOOPERS TARGETING COMPO CLAIMERS
DEFENCE chiefs have paid private eyes more than £600,000 to spy on crocked servicemen.
Troops with conditions including mental health problems have been watched to see if they are lying.
Those suspected of submitting false or exaggerated compensation claims for injuries received during military service have been watched for the past 14 years. Many suffered injuries such as gunshot wounds, hearing loss, limb amputation, paralysis and PTSD.
A Freedom of Information request by this newspaper shows almost 400 wounded military personnel and civil servants have been subjected to surveillance since 2003. The MoD began spying on injured serviceman after a huge rise in compensation claims. Since 2003 over 78,000 have been brought against the MoD.
There have been a further 82,000 claims by troops under the Armed Forces Compensation scheme which have resulted in payouts of more than £770million.
In 2017/18 the MoD paid out almost £90m in compensation, up £9m on the previous year. But figures also show that since 2005, the MoD has rejected 21,740 claims for being exaggerated or entirely false.
In response to the FOI, the MoD said: “In exceptional circumstances surveillance might be undertaken to observe the true extent of a claimant’s alleged injuries in cases where there is a reasonable suspicion about the veracity of a claim or where medical evidence suggests the claimant’s disability is wholly inconsistent with the type of injury. “Surveillance should be of no concern to claimants with a legitimate claim and where the alleged injury has not been grossly exaggerated in an attempt to extract higher levels of compensation.”
In November 2013 it was revealed three female recruits were paid £100,000 each for injuries suffered while marching in step with male colleagues.
The women waited more than five years for compensation after the MoD accused them of exaggerating their injuries.
Each of the women suffered pelvis damage during the first weeks of training but were compensated for loss of earnings over nine years. In 2007, a civil RAF typist who sustained an injury to her thumb received £484,000 compensation.
An MoD spokesman said: “Unlike other organisations who use surveillance as a matter of course, we only use it in a small minority of cases where there is evidence the extent of an injury has been grossly exaggerated.”