Backbench Business — Contaminated Blood and Blood Products — 14 Oct 2010 at 16:00

The majority of MPs voted against calling on the Government to implement the recommendations of the Archer Report into contaminated blood and blood products.

These recommendations were:

• Recommendation 1 - A statutory committee to advise the Government on the management of haemophilia
• Recommendation 2 - Haemophilia patients and their partners to receive any tests recommended by the statutory committee
• Recommendation 3 - All blood donors to receive the same tests (recommended by the statutory committee)
• Recommendation 4 - Free prescriptions and free access to other services “not freely available under the NHS including...GP visits, counselling, physiotherapy, home nursing and support services” for those infected
• Recommendation 5 - Secure future of Haemophilia Society by adequate funding
• Recommendation 6 - Financial assistance should be increased and take the form of prescribed periodic payments.
• Recommendation 7 - Access to insurance by providing premiums or setting up separate scheme
• Recommendation 8 - A look back exercise to identify any others who may be infected

The Government published their response to the Archer Report's recommendations in February 2010.

The text of the rejected motion read:

• That this House
• recalls that the catastrophic problems of infected blood supplied by the NHS date back to the 1970s and 1980s, infecting 4,670 patients and causing what Lord Winston described as the worst treatment disaster in the history of the NHS;
• notes that successive administrations only very partially responded to this catastrophe by setting up and funding the MacFarlane Trust, the Skipton Fund and the Eileen Trust;
• regrets the past refusal to accept the principal recommendation of the Independent Public Inquiry into the supply of contaminated NHS blood to haemophilia patients, chaired by Lord Archer and established and financed by private initiative and funds, relating to compensation for the victims and set out in paragraph 6(h) of chapter 12 of the Archer Report;
• further notes that earlier this year the reasons for rejecting this recommendation were challenged successfully in the High Court, which quashed the decision;
• believes that this ruling constitutes an appropriate moment for the present Government, which bears no responsibility for the inadequate and misjudged policies of successive previous administrations, to extend an apology to the surviving 2,700 sufferers, their families and the bereaved; and
• calls on the Government to alleviate their intense hardship and suffering by accepting and implementing the recommendations of the Archer Report despite the intense financial pressure on the public purse at this time.

The decision to hold a debate on this subject had been made by the Backbench Business committee.

Debate in Parliament | Source |