Solicitors dubbed the government’s response to the Law on Damages consultation an anti-climax this week, two years after its original deadline.

John McQuater, president of the Association of Personal Injury Lawyers, said: ‘In all my years of practice, I can rarely remember waiting so long for so little’.

Proposals include an extension of the Fatal Accidents Act 1976 to extend eligibility for bereavement damages to children under 18, and co-habitees who have lived together for at least two years.

However, McQuater said the long-awaited changes did not go far enough.

He said: ‘The government hasn’t understood that the current level of bereavement damages is seen as an insult by many people.’

McQuater added: ‘The concept that the defendant should pay for the care provided to injured people by public bodies, which was so welcome in the consultation, has been shelved, despite the fact that so many respondents favoured this approach.’

Leading personal injury lawyer David Marshall, managing partner at Anthony Gold, said: ‘They have had some of these papers for 15 years, so it is disappointing for the government to say it will consult further [on making defendants pay for care by public bodies].’