article: Under the proposed scheme, personnel would no longer be able to sue the MoD for negligence. Compensation would instead be awarded by an MoD-appointed assessor. The MoD said the proposals, which are being consulted on until next week, would lead to "better compensation". But Colin Redpath, whose son was killed in Iraq, told the BBC the proposal was "wrong". In 2007, Lance Corporal Kirk Redpath, a keen drummer in the Irish guards, died when a roadside bomb exploded next to his lightly-armoured Snatch Land Rover in Iraq. He was one of some 37 servicemen and women killed in Snatch Land Rovers in Afghanistan and Iraq. After a five-year struggle, his father Colin won a Supreme Court ruling allowing him the right to sue the MoD. That claim he brought is only now close to a conclusion. He said: "At the end of the day, they are an employer. "The fire brigade, the police, the ambulance service, they all have to go out with equipment that works. And the right equipment. That should be the same for a soldier. "If not, then what the MoD are saying is that we could send our boys and girls out with broomsticks. It wouldn't matter. There's no comeback." The MoD's proposals cover battle and the preparations for it, and include: There is already a concept of "combat immunity" which means decisions taken in "the heat of battle" cannot be second-guessed by the courts. Claims in negligence cannot be brought in relation to battlefield acts or omissions. The MoD is proposing to widen the concept of combat immunity to include all deaths and injuries in combat, including where the failings occurred far from the battlefield, for instance in failing to provide adequate equipment. Conservative MP and former army soldier Iain Duncan Smith said he supported the proposals after growing concerned about the use of courts to assess combat issues. He added: "It doesn't seem to me like the courts are the right place to be. "Issues surrounding combat are often very difficult to judge against a standard common law process. I think dragging things through the courts satisfies only lawyers." In July 2016, Sir John Chilcot's Iraq Inquiry Report identified numerous MoD failings in preparing for the Iraq War which were described as "wholly inadequate". They included being slow to respond to the threat from improvised explosive devices and delay in replacing the poorly-armoured Snatch Land Rovers. Chilcot identified a failing to have in place a system for identifying gaps in capability. Lawyers say that without the duty of care owed to service personnel there is a real danger that the lessons of Chilcot will not be learned. Some solicitors who have represented service personnel in actions against the MoD make the point that the duty of care owed to soldiers puts their safety at the centre of the defence agenda. The Law Society of England and Wales says that without it, MoD officials making decisions on equipment and procurement know that cases will not be heard by an independent judge. It argues that facts will not
summary: The father of a soldier killed in Iraq has criticised proposals by the Ministry of Defence to scrap the legal duty of care it owes to service personnel in the course of combat.