All news on this page courtesy of the The Telegraph Newspaper, London, UK

DATE 12/May/1997

By Tim Butcher, Defence Correspondent

THE Ministry of Defence publishes a new action plan today on health problems arising out of military service in the Gulf, confirming Labour's relatively sympathetic attitude to victims of so-called Gulf War Syndrome

The plan is unlikely to contain a commitment to pay immediate compensation to veterans until scientific research has been completed, although interim payments have not been ruled out. The Government will be committed to spend more on medical research into whether an individual syndrome exists and to be more open and accountable over the issue. Labour repeatedly attacked the last Government for being insensitive to the needs of Gulf veterans.

The policy statement will be the first major initiative announced since Dr George Robertson and Dr John Reid took over from Michael Portillo and Nicholas Soames as Defence Secretary and Armed Forces Minister.

Dr Reid is known to be sympathetic to the hundreds of Gulf veterans who have developed a wide range of illnesses after helping in the liberation of Kuwait in 1990 and 1991. He is expected to announce the new plan with a commitment to test scientifically the combined effect of the various pills and injections that were given to soldiers to protect them from biological and chemical weapons. Plenty of research has gone into individual treatments but little is known about the synergistic effects when taken together.

The plan will further commit the MoD to establish how ministers came to mislead the public repeatedly over the use of harmful organophosphate pesticides on British troops.

Gulf veterans and campaigners, who have long claimed the existence of a single syndrome, welcomed the new policy yesterday. "We have been asking for this work to be done for four years now," said Tony Flint, spokesman for the Gulf War Veterans' and Families' Association. "This is the best bit of news we have heard for years. We are feeling very hopeful now that we are getting the recognition we wanted. Until now the Ministry of Defence and the Government have treated us as if we were hypochondriacs."

Richard Barr, a solicitor for the firm appointed by the Legal Aid Board to co-ordinate the investigations, also welcomed the news. "It represents a complete about-turn in governmental attitude towards the problem," he said. He hoped that the Government might now reveal the names of some of the vaccines used to innoculate soldiers going to the Gulf, which have hitherto remained secret.