Infected blood: Tory rebellion expected on payouts amendment
The government faces a rebellion with at least 30 Tories backing an amendment to extend interim payouts to more victims of the infected blood scandal.
Up to 30,000 people were given contaminated blood products in the 1970s and 80s. Thousands have died.
A Labour amendment will be brought on Monday calling for a new body to be set up to administer compensation. More than 100 MPs, including Tories Sir Robert Buckland, Sir Edward Leigh and David Davis, are backing the move.
In a letter sent to Chancellor Jeremy Hunt, shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves called the scandal "one of the most appalling tragedies in our country's recent history."
She added: "Blood infected with hepatitis C and HIV has stolen life, denied opportunities and harmed livelihoods."
She praised Theresa May, who set up the Infected Blood Inquiry when she was prime minister in 2017. But she warned: "For the victims, time matters. It is estimated that every four days someone affected by infected blood dies."
The chancellor, himself a former health secretary, told the inquiry in July that the government accepted the moral case for compensation. But he said no final decisions could be made before the inquiry publishes its findings - now expected in March next year.
In August 2022, the government agreed to make the first interim compensation payments of £100,000 each to about 4,000 surviving victims and bereaved widows.
But inquiry chairman Sir Brian Langstaff, said in April this year that the parents and children of victims should also receive compensation and also called for a full compensation scheme to be set up immediately.
The Commons Speaker will decide on Monday which amendments to the bill MPs will vote on. But the government has said it will not be supporting the amendment.
A Department of Health spokesperson said: "We are deeply sympathetic to the strength of feeling on this and understand the need for action. However, it would not be right to pre-empt the findings of the final report into infected blood."
Source: BBC News, 3 December 2023