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I think most Deputies do choose low risk stock as part of a portfolio. Partly because over the last few years, guilts have been harder to come by. But in my view, what Claimants actually do after settlement or judgment should not be the only deciding factor.

Some will have little choice but to pursue a higher risk investment strategy because they didn't get full compensation e.g. someone with a 50% deduction for contrib. Even where compensation is on a 100% basis, there are often practical differences between what the court awards and what a Claimant needs.

An obvious example is where a larger property needs to be purchased, but the Claimant has a short life expectancy. The RvJ calculation simply doesn't cover the capital cost of the property, money is "borrowed" from other heads of loss and then a higher risk investment strategy is pursued to try and make up the difference.

Or perhaps the court didn't allow a particular item of significant expenditure as recoverable against the Defendant, but the family and Deputy feel it would improve the claimant's quality of life. Again, a choice could be made to take an investment risk.

And there will no doubt be some that received a full award of compensation, and actually the choice is to try and make as much as possible back from investment because well, money is money and people will often just want more of it, even if they have more than enough already (cough, Appleby, cough...). I can see how these Claimants will stick in some people's throat, though personally I wouldn't dream of trading given the injuries they've likely suffered.

In each case though, it's the Claimant's choice, and the Claimant (or their family) have to accept the consequences if that turns out to be a bad one.

What is being proposed is to force that risk on Claimants, *with nothing in return*.

Now it may be that the difference in risk between governmenet backed guilts and a managed low risk portoflio is so little that it would be unreasonable to expect Defendants to pay significantly extra in damages. But we should have an honest debate, and not blindly assume that just because some or even all claimants choose to take that risk, that the risk doesn't exist. After all, I doubt the insurers will be there to pay a bit extra if the stock market does collapse.