A current serving officer with 26 years of service was subjected to derogatory and insulting remarks about his nationality and intelligence during a consultation with a civilian panel advising the MoD on his AFCS claim.
During a 10-minute recess in the online meeting the legal team forgot to mute their microphones, during which the officer heard them mocking his defence of his claim.
“They laughed and said, well, he is Welsh. He doesn’t understand why he is here. He can’t be that intelligent given he doesn’t know why he’s here,” the officer told The Telegraph.
The case was described as “kicking a can down the road” with one panel member adding “if he knows what’s best he should withdraw the claim”, the claimant said.
Referring to a previous injury when the officer was blown up in Afghanistan in 2009, one panel member said he “did not look like [he’d] had a blast injury”, a comment that made other board members laugh, the officer said.
The panel then proceeded to discuss sensitive information relating to other individuals
At one point the judge remarked it was a good job the discussion was not recorded.
“Hearing what they had to say about me in a manner that was derogatory and discriminating was unacceptable,” the officer said.
“I have never felt so belittled in my life. I was angry and felt completely let down by the very system designed to support our injured soldiers.
“I was lucky – or unlucky – enough to have heard what a typical panel of professional board members had to say about me in a tribunal.”
He said he feared for other soldiers going through the same process “unaware of what was mentioned during their 10 -minute adjournment”.
The President of the Chambers subsequently wrote to the officer and apologised for the “unfortunate incident” during the adjournment.
In a letter to the officer on Aug 9, seen by The Telegraph, the Chamber President said: “I very much regret what has occurred and apologise for the offence caused to you… It sounds, from what I have been told so far, that we have fallen short today.”
– Welsh soldiers, good enough to serve, good enough to die, but “too stupid” to be given fair compensation or hearings
Also discusses other incidents with other soldiers injured in the line of duty and given tiny payouts while being treated with disdain
I can relate to this after getting PTSD from abusive hospital ‘care’.
The DWP will laugh down the phone at you after wrongly stopping benefits.
I even looked up the actual laws on the statute and quoted them. They said a decision has been made and there’s nothing I could do.
I won against them at tribunal that they never turned up for, obviously because they had no case.
Moral of the story: when you’re down, people wIll kick you and laugh about it.
Taking the piss out of people who’ve had their health fucked up by trying to serve and protect their country. Sociopaths who find the difficulties of the poor and vulnerable entertaining.
But I thought the state really cared about soldiers!
If they treat a senior officer like this, imagine how they treat the soldiers
Sack them . It’s the least they deserve
So the usual lot who go on about, why are we helping refugees when we have homeless vets and we should be helping ours first.
No doubt this is the time and the campaign you have been waiting for to get vocal and demand a change.
Please don’t let us stop you please go ahead.
Why is Welsh in inverted commas？ Was he not Welsh？
Why anyone would put themselves in the armed forces to do the bidding of this government is beyond me but this story proves how little they actually care about the people who do put themselves on the line
At this point the UK military is just a fighting arm of various megacorporations, if you actually join thinking you’re serving your country, your deluding yourself.
Anyone who joins after the Iraq war must be living on a completely different planet if they think that joining the army is going to help protect British people at home.
10 comments
Behind the paywall:
A current serving officer with 26 years of service was subjected to derogatory and insulting remarks about his nationality and intelligence during a consultation with a civilian panel advising the MoD on his AFCS claim.
During a 10-minute recess in the online meeting the legal team forgot to mute their microphones, during which the officer heard them mocking his defence of his claim.
“They laughed and said, well, he is Welsh. He doesn’t understand why he is here. He can’t be that intelligent given he doesn’t know why he’s here,” the officer told The Telegraph.
The case was described as “kicking a can down the road” with one panel member adding “if he knows what’s best he should withdraw the claim”, the claimant said.
Referring to a previous injury when the officer was blown up in Afghanistan in 2009, one panel member said he “did not look like [he’d] had a blast injury”, a comment that made other board members laugh, the officer said.
The panel then proceeded to discuss sensitive information relating to other individuals
At one point the judge remarked it was a good job the discussion was not recorded.
“Hearing what they had to say about me in a manner that was derogatory and discriminating was unacceptable,” the officer said.
“I have never felt so belittled in my life. I was angry and felt completely let down by the very system designed to support our injured soldiers.
“I was lucky – or unlucky – enough to have heard what a typical panel of professional board members had to say about me in a tribunal.”
He said he feared for other soldiers going through the same process “unaware of what was mentioned during their 10 -minute adjournment”.
The President of the Chambers subsequently wrote to the officer and apologised for the “unfortunate incident” during the adjournment.
In a letter to the officer on Aug 9, seen by The Telegraph, the Chamber President said: “I very much regret what has occurred and apologise for the offence caused to you… It sounds, from what I have been told so far, that we have fallen short today.”
– Welsh soldiers, good enough to serve, good enough to die, but “too stupid” to be given fair compensation or hearings
Also discusses other incidents with other soldiers injured in the line of duty and given tiny payouts while being treated with disdain
I can relate to this after getting PTSD from abusive hospital ‘care’.
The DWP will laugh down the phone at you after wrongly stopping benefits.
I even looked up the actual laws on the statute and quoted them. They said a decision has been made and there’s nothing I could do.
I won against them at tribunal that they never turned up for, obviously because they had no case.
Moral of the story: when you’re down, people wIll kick you and laugh about it.
Taking the piss out of people who’ve had their health fucked up by trying to serve and protect their country. Sociopaths who find the difficulties of the poor and vulnerable entertaining.
But I thought the state really cared about soldiers!
If they treat a senior officer like this, imagine how they treat the soldiers
Sack them . It’s the least they deserve
So the usual lot who go on about, why are we helping refugees when we have homeless vets and we should be helping ours first.
No doubt this is the time and the campaign you have been waiting for to get vocal and demand a change.
Please don’t let us stop you please go ahead.
Why is Welsh in inverted commas？ Was he not Welsh？
Why anyone would put themselves in the armed forces to do the bidding of this government is beyond me but this story proves how little they actually care about the people who do put themselves on the line
At this point the UK military is just a fighting arm of various megacorporations, if you actually join thinking you’re serving your country, your deluding yourself.
Anyone who joins after the Iraq war must be living on a completely different planet if they think that joining the army is going to help protect British people at home.