The Hillsborough Law and Personal Injury Claims Against the Ministry of Defence

The long-awaited Hillsborough Law represents one of the most significant developments in public accountability for decades. Although born from the Hillsborough disaster, its implications extend well beyond police misconduct and public inquiries. For practitioners acting for service personnel, veterans and bereaved military families, the legislation has the potential to reshape how the Ministry of Defence responds to personal injury claims, inquests and investigations.

In practical terms, a duty of candour requires public bodies to act with openness, honesty and cooperation when their conduct is under examination. It is not simply a duty to avoid lying. It requires relevant information to be identified, preserved and disclosed at an early stage; witnesses and decision-makers to give a fair account of what happened; and public authorities to avoid adopting an unnecessarily defensive approach where the facts indicate that mistakes were made.

For claimants, the significance is that the State should assist the court, coroner or inquiry in establishing the truth, rather than waiting for individuals and families to uncover the evidence through persistence and litigation pressure.

However, given the Government's repeated commitment to the reforms and the recent progress through Parliament, practitioners should expect the duty of candour provisions to become a significant feature of litigation involving public authorities in the near future. The precise commencement date will depend on the final version of the legislation and any transitional provisions enacted following Royal Assent.

The Ministry of Defence is a major public body and frequent defendant in personal injury litigation. Claims commonly involve noise-induced hearing loss, non-freezing cold injuries, training accidents, aviation incidents, psychiatric injury and fatalities during service.

Historically, claimant representatives have often expressed concerns regarding delayed disclosure, fragmented record keeping and the difficulty of obtaining historic safety documentation. The proposed duty of candour seeks to address precisely these concerns. If you are pursuing a military NIHL claim or a claim arising from a training injury, earlier and fuller disclosure could be transformative for the strength of your case.

Learn more about how PDA Law handles military noise-induced hearing loss claims and what evidence is typically required to succeed.

Although the Covenant is not itself a freestanding duty of candour, its underlying principles of fairness, respect and support sit comfortably alongside the objectives of the Hillsborough reforms. Claimants may legitimately question whether prolonged disputes over liability, delayed disclosure or unnecessary procedural obstacles are consistent with those principles.

If relevant documents exist, a strengthened duty of candour may support arguments that the MoD should proactively identify and disclose such material, rather than requiring claimants to discover its existence through lengthy litigation. This is particularly significant in the context of the Military Deafness Litigation (MDL), where thousands of veterans have already had issues of breach of duty conceded by the MoD.

Read our detailed guide to the 2026 High Court ruling in Abbott v Ministry of Defence and what it means for tinnitus and hearing loss claims.

For bereaved military families, this could lead to earlier disclosure of critical evidence and more transparent engagement with coronial investigations. The duty of candour, if properly enforced, would require the MoD to proactively surface relevant documents rather than waiting for families to identify and request them through protracted litigation.

The principal impact is likely to be procedural: improved transparency, fuller disclosure and greater scrutiny of how public authorities conduct litigation. For claimant solicitors, this means the duty of candour becomes a powerful tool when seeking disclosure, challenging incomplete witness evidence or requesting clarification of historic safety decisions.

The Matrix agreement appears to operate as a structured compromise: in return for those concessions, claimants accept a defined discount to any compensation agreed or awarded. With the Hillsborough reforms and an enshrined duty of candour, the MoD may need to reconsider whether there should instead be improved transparency, fuller disclosure, and, where no defence exists, an early admission and acceptance of fault.

Given that the MoD has already accepted and conceded issues under the Matrix agreement, the Hillsborough reforms raise questions as to whether the MoD should go further — and whether injured service personnel should be expected to compromise the compensation they receive for issues which could and should be conceded without conditions.

Understand how the Matrix agreement currently operates and whether it affects the value of your military hearing loss claim.

For veterans and service personnel pursuing claims against the MoD, this means that the legal landscape is shifting in your favour. Solicitors acting for claimants should be alive to the duty of candour principles and prepared to invoke them at the earliest opportunity.

Find out how PDA Law's specialist military claims team can support your claim against the MoD on a No Win, No Fee basis.

For injured service personnel and bereaved military families, that change could prove as significant procedurally as any substantive reform of the law itself. If realised in practice, that cultural change could materially improve access to justice for service personnel, veterans and bereaved families, and may call into question litigation practices which require claimants to compromise damages in return for concessions that should properly follow from the evidence.