Certainly on the face of it he committed an offence in the eyes of CAA.
It would appear every effort was made to remain legal, by using an understudy who did not have the experience to carry out the task in hand.
I am sure that if the hunter had of died because the pilot refused to fly the mission because of an alleged medical problem, which obviously did not affect his flying ability,because the rescue was carried out successfully, then he would have been in an even darker place.
To expect CAA to use a bit of common sense would appear to be asking to much.