Landmark decision in Military Deafness Litigation

The High Court (Mr Justice Garnham), on 24th April 2026, handed down the long-awaited judgment in the ‘Hugh James Military Deafness Litigation’. The judgment provides welcome clarification for Claimants making claims for Military Noise Induced Hearing Loss (M-NIHL) against the Ministry of Defence.

This litigation, brought on behalf of several thousand former and serving military personnel, concerns claims for M-NIHL (and tinnitus) and financial loss suffered as a consequence of their exposure to noise during their service in the Armed Forces.

The litigation was initially defended on all fronts with a number of test cases chosen from the cohort of Claimants whereby ‘generic issues’ would be determined at trial. Two claims were heard as test cases during the course of the trial (Lambie and Craggs). Others that had been selected but either settled or discontinued and did not therefore require judicial determination.

The MOD and Hugh James had narrowed the issues in the litigation before trial. The MOD and the Claimants reached an agreement whereby in exchange for the implementation of a matrix (see below), that would see reductions made to quantum, the MOD would concede the following issues:

a.       The MOD would not pursue the defence of limitation;

b.       The Overseas Operations (Service Personnel and Veterans) Act 2021 and combat exemption would not apply to claims;

c.       The MOD accepted that they owed a duty of care to servicemen and women and that they had failed to discharge the same; and

d.      From a causation perspective they accepted that noise exposure in service was sufficient enough to cause hearing loss.

As detailed above in exchange for these concessions the MOD would benefit from a reduction to quantum. This is all based upon the date service concluded plus 1 year. The table detailing those reductions is set out below:

Band  Effective Date                                  Discount (%)

1           Up to 31 December 1999                          30

2           1 January 2000 to 31 December 2004    25

3           1 January 2005 to 31 December 2009    20

4           1 January 2010 to 31 December 2014     18

5           1 January 2015 to 31 December 2019      15

6           From 1 January 2020 onwards                10

From 6th October 2025 through to 8 December 2025 Mr Justic Garnham heard from various experts so as to determine the remaining generic issues between the parties. The key parts of the judgment are:

1.       The preferred diagnostic method: The Court preferred the rM-NIHL method for the purposes of diagnosing M-NIHL. This is a significant outcome for Claimants who have been relying on this method, through ENT evidence, to support their claims. It was held that the CLB, which the MOD submitted should be the preferred method, will not generally be suitable for military cases. It was specifically noted that ‘M-NIHL can present without a CLB notch/bulge and the absence of a notch does not exclude NIHL, that military noise commonly affects at 8kHz and this can erase or disguise a notch or bulge; and that military impulse noise tends to produce a different and more variable audiometric pattern than steady state noise’.

2.       Quantification: Again in another significant outcome for Claimants the Moore, Cox and Lowe method of quantification has been held to be the preferred method. However, in using that method:

(i)     The choice of the percentile in the relevant dataset should be dictated by the clinical judgement of the medicolegal ENT surgeon based on the hearing of the individual ascertained from all the audiometry;

(ii)    The conventional 1, 2, 3 kHz average should continue to serve as a baseline descriptor. However, it is entirely legitimate to consider supplementary metrics that incorporate 4 kHz, particularly where speech‑in‑noise difficulty is a prominent feature.

(iii)   NIHL should generally be quantified using the 4:1 binaural calculation. But where the excess loss calculation does not fully reflect the totality of the problems experienced by the Claimant, the clinician, and ultimately the Court, needs to identify and reflect the additional disability.

3.       The theory that hearing loss may continue to develop after exposure was held to be plausible, intellectually coherent but a very long way from being proven in human beings. The orthodox view that hearing loss does not progress after exposure ceases has not, at least at yet, been displaced. Further, and more fundamentally, there is at present no conceivable mechanism by which the effect of this alleged phenomenon can be identified or quantified in any individual Claimant.

4.       Pure Tone Audiometry (PTA) conducted in compliance with the protocol and standards set by the British Society of Audiology (BSA) is and remains the gold standard of audiometric testing and should be used in medico-legal cases as the best evidence whenever it is available. However, screening audiograms, including military screening audiograms, are suitable for screening and triage. Furthermore, when they are part of a consistent pattern they may also be used, as part of the exercise of clinical judgment by clinicians advising in medico-legal cases, for diagnostic and quantification purposes. Audiometry evidence (including BSA compliant PTA) should, wherever possible, be considered in context and as a whole, rather than in isolation. However, there may, on occasions be systemic or operational inadequacies and the Court should be alive to that possibility.

5.       Tinnitus normally begins during exposure to noise or shortly after the cessation of noise. It is not possible to identify an arbitrary time after exposure to noise beyond which a claim should not be considered. The most that can be said is that the closer the onset of tinnitus is in time to the exposure to dangerous noise, the more likely it is to be caused by it. The longer the period between the end of exposure and the onset of tinnitus the greater should be the intensity of the examiner’s scrutiny of the circumstances of the case and the veracity of the informant. And the Court, faced with a disputed claim will have to be equally circumspect.

6.       A hearing loss of less than 4 dB without other consequences should be regarded as de minimis. It will be a matter to be determined on a case-by-case basis whether exposure to noise which causes loss below that cut off nonetheless causes appreciable damage.

7.       The JC Guidelines are the appropriate starting point for assessing general damages for PSLA. The Judge’s task is to consider all the facts of the case in question against those guidelines. The dB measure of NIHL is a highly relevant factor but is not necessarily determinative of the appropriate damages bracket.

8.       Depending on the evidence in a particular case, a Claimant may be able to justify the cost of private, high-performance, rechargeable hearing aids with such advanced features as are recommended by a reputable Hearing Aid Expert. The precise costing will have to be determined on a case-by-case basis.

9.       Future loss of earnings claims: Such claims are highly fact sensitive, and the relevant principles are best considered in the context of a particular case.

Tom has been instructed to advise on a number of the claims within the cohort of Claimants in the Hugh James Military Deafness litigation and continues to accept instructions in this area of work.

Thomas is highly technical and knowledgeable in the field of Personal Injury litigation. Tom acts for both Claimants and Defendants on high value claims and prides himself on good client rapport.

For more information, or to instruct Tom, please contact the Civil Clerks on civilclerks@kbgchambers.co.uk