Colne Valley MP's plea on contaminated blood scandal inquiry
COLNE Valley MP Jason McCartney provoked a rare standing ovation in Parliament's public gallery today with an impassioned speech on why the Goverment should accept the recommendations of an inquiry into the contaminated blood scandal.
Mr McCartney was speaking during a Commons debate opened by Labour MP Geoffrey Robinson calling on ministers to accept and implement the recommendations of an independent inquiry into the scandal.
But the Government today ruled out awarding higher compensation payments to match those in the Irish Republic, as Lord Archer’s report recommended.
His inquiry was privately funded after successive governments refused to hold a public investigation.
Almost 5,000 people who suffered from blood disorders contracted hepatitis C and HIV after being given contaminated blood products. Around half of those infected with hepatitis C and almost three-quarters of those infected with both HIV and hepatitis C have since died.
Those infected have been campaigning for payments to be assessed in the same way as in the Irish Republic, where pay-outs are much higher.
Today, public health minister Anne Milton rejected calls to match those payments but said she would look again at people infected with hepatitis C.
She intervened in Mr Robinson’s speech, saying that the Government would be “reviewing certain aspects” of the payments.
Mr Robinson replied: “That’s my whole point - you will be reviewing. This has been going on several years already.
“Who can put his hand on his heart and honestly say anything will come out of the review more than we’ve had already? Nobody can who has any experience of this place and how it works.
“Today is the moment.”
Ms Milton told him she would report by Christmas because she was “acutely aware that campaigners on this issue have been left hanging for far too long”.
Mr Robinson said: “I think the statement is useless.”
He added: “Do you not realise that what’s said at that despatch box is what counts and what counts is what the Government is prepared to do. The statements about reviews we’ve had umpteen of.”
He urged ministers to meet victims, some of whom were watching the debate from the public gallery, to “see what reaction they get”.
“They want closure on it, they’re fed up with it... This Government had an opportunity to make a new start, to bring closure to this great human tragedy and they have refused to do so,” he said.
