A NEWPORT father whose dead son's tissues were kept at the city's Royal Gwent Hospital without his knowledge has branded an offer of £2,000 compensation from health bosses "insulting".

The Welsh Health Legal Service are offering a total of £60,000 to settle 30 Welsh claims against various trusts including the Gwent NHS Trust.

The claims follow a High Court decision in March which ruled that hospitals acted unlawfully in retaining body parts allowing hundreds of families across the UK to seek compensation in a joint litigation.

But solicitiors have urged them to reject the offer saying it is less than that recommended by a High Court judge in March this year and that there may be many more Welsh claimants.

Shaun Macguire, 56, from Bettws,is among those involved in the legal action.

His son, Brendan, was just 36 hours old when he died in May 1974 after an unsuccessful operation at Newport's Royal Gwent Hospital to correct an intestinal problem.

Following the revelations about the Alder Hey and Bristol Royal Infirmary organ retention scandals in the late 1990s, Mr McGuire made inquiries to the hospital trust.

He discovered in 2002 that a post mortem examinationwas carried out on his son and tissue was retained from Brendan's liver, kidney and lungs. Mr McGuire said: "I will be rejecting the offer as I believe will other families. Our campaign is about getting answers and people to admit they were wrong and to publicly apologise.

"This offer is a disgrace and insulting to the families." Following the test case in March, Mr Justice Cage awarded £2,750 to Denise Shorter from Oxford for the psychological damage caused after a hospital removed organs from her stillborn daughter in 1992.

Families involved in the Alder Hey organ retention scandal were each offered £5,000 compensation.

Anne Louise Ferguson, from the Welsh Health Legal Services, said: "While the offer is still being considered I think it would be inappropriate to make any comment at this stage."