EXCLUSIVE: How MoD officials blocked evidence of Nuked Blood cover-up
Senior civil servants blocked the release of records that showed nuclear hero's medical data had been tampered with
Ministry of Defence officials blocked a minister from publishing evidence of wrongdoing in the Nuked Blood Scandal.
Emails obtained by the Mirror show civil servants unlawfully withholding the full truth from the family of a nuclear veteran 'lab rat' used in Cold War radiation experiments.
Alan Owen of campaign group LABRATS said: 'Either the officials don't know what they're doing, or they intentionally misled a minister of the Crown to authorise an unlawful act.
"In either event we believe this is a criminal offence in which state employees have knowingly, or at best recklessly, broken the law. Keir Starmer is their boss, and as a former head of the Crown Prosecution Service he must act on this.'
Group Captain Terry Gledhill had been medically monitored while leading squadrons of 'sniff' planes on sampling missions through the mushroom clouds of Operation Grapple at Christmas Island in 1958. It was revealed in a top secret memo sent between Atomic Weapons Establishment scientists discussing the 'gross irregularity' in his blood tests.
When his horrified daughter Jane O'Connor asked to see his personnel file, she was refused. A judge later ruled that as his executor, she had a legal right to it. The memo, some of the blood tests, and 14 months of records were found to be missing from the file. It also showed Terry was given unexplained chest x-rays after his return, and was having 'routine' checks on his blood 11 years later.
Following Jane's win, the Mirror made a Freedom of Information request to see the advice given by officials who had refused her access. After an 11-month battle, a dozen pages of redacted emails have been released, and show officials repeatedly misled then-defence minister Andrew Murrison.
In June 2022, a squadron leader from the RAF medical archive told the MoD that Jane had no right to access the records. Six months later, after Jane asked to see the advice and told them she was executor, the emails show deputy heads of department agreeing she could not have it, and asking the minister to rubber-stamp it.
A senior civil servant team leader claimed: 'Releasing this information for public consumption would expose officials to public rebuke and, therefore, more likely to react defensively to criticism making it harder to achieve the most effective outcomes.'
But guidance from the Information Commissioner states: 'The threat of future disclosure could actually lead to better quality advice.'
They also told the minister there was 'no media interest' and 'no direct financial implications', even though Terry's blood tests had been subject of extensive coverage three months earlier, and withholding medical records can make organisations liable for damages.
The emails show Mr Murrison questioned 'the validity of the actual advice we wish to withhold'. Senior civil servants then agreed the wording of an email to send him and the rest of the frontbench ministerial team, falsely claiming 'there is no legal obligation' to provide the records to Jane.
She said: 'If they had just published when I first asked, we would have known three years ago what happened to my dad. Because they fought it, there are now half a dozen senior civil servants involved in what sounds like a cover-up. He would be devastated to know this is how the country he served was treating him and his crews, after all they did for us.'
A source close to Mr Murrison said he had been 'very keen to release as much as possible' on a range of topics while in office, and had taken officials' advice at face value. He was no longer in a position to check if they had been in the wrong, said the source.
Civil servants blocked the Mirror's request for the emails for nearly a year, claiming a change of government made a difference to the FOI laws, and that new ministers were not allowed to see what previous ministers had been told.
They even sought help from the Cabinet Office and Attorney General, before finally releasing some of them with redactions.
'We would like to offer our sincere apologies for the length of time taken to provide you with a response which has been due to the complexity of the request and the need for serval government departments to liaise in order to ensure that your request is considered robustly,' the MoD told the Mirror.
Asked about the contents of the emails, a spokesman said: 'The government is committed to being open and transparent and takes its obligations under the Freedom of Information Act very seriously.
'We have accepted the FOI Tribunal's ruling and provided the requested records to the family. We have reviewed our internal guidance and processes to ensure they fully align with ICO requirements and that ministerial decisions on disclosure are properly supported with accurate and complete information.'
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