15 July 2022: Burnham - B
Coming back to the issue of how letters from individuals were answered (or not), a letter was displayed mentioning how the officials were planning on simply not replying to any more communications from one correspondent. Mr Burnham did not want to comment on the official involved but saw it as an example of one very wrong way the Government of the UK treated its citizens. Again, the document contained assertions of there being no evidence of people being treated without them being told of any risks. Mr Burnham trailed, and then went to, the letter he had to hand from Oxford detailing the inadequacy of using chimps to confirm the efficacy of an anti-haemorrhagic treatment, and so needing to rely on using it with human subjects on a trial basis. It was recognised in the letter there were risks, but these risks were supplanted by the benefits to the patients – according to the writers. The witness read the letter as saying it was the plan to use people as guinea pigs, the justification being there would be benefits to them. He then referred back to the letter he sent to Dave Tonkin with the statement which the Oxford letter demonstrates as obviously wrong. Counsel also referred to another line in the letter which was signed off by the witness about being open to transparency. He still felt he meant that in good faith because he believed it, as would many of his colleagues believe in transparency as a way or operating, but it was hard for him to read in hindsight the letter since it had his name on it with those falsehoods included. A letter to Colette Wintle from Gillian Merron referred to lessons having been learned. The witness assumed Ms Merron was simply basing the response on the advice she had received from officials. He then referred to the matter of David Owen seeking to achieve self-sufficiency against receiving imported commercially-derived blood products. The whole issue of wrong information being given to Ministers was described by the witness as “serious”.
There had been a demonstration outside Mr Burnham’s constituency office which he was not expecting. He describes it as “a bit of a shock”. He had been caught up with the swine flu pandemic and the Mid-Staffs situation, so was not really thinking about much else. The demo started him off on paying attention to the matter of contaminated blood. He recalled going outside at the end of the demonstration and speaking to a few remaining people. He acknowledged that others assert that he did not come out. While not wishing to argue over it, he said that it was almost certainly why he replied directly to Mr Tonkin because Dave’s letter was handed to him in person on that occasion. If the letter had been sent by post, it would likely have been dealt with in the impersonal way he had described previously, and he would not even have seen it.
Subsequent briefings, when the witness began to give attention to the contaminated blood scandal, gave a breakdown of how the Government had come to its position on how to respond to the Archer Inquiry. It included all the same lines to explain away the course of events. Counsel referred to the Judicial Review (JR) initiated by Andrew March and asked why the witness had not been involved with such a significant legal matter. He agreed he should have been, while mentioning that there can be many JRs at any one time. However, this one ought to have been brought to him, he thinks. There were suggestions by officials that he should not meet Lord Archer, but he wanted to. This was part of the process of him becoming opened up to the whole contaminated blood matter. The witness recalls having a finger pointed in his face saying, “You will do something about this”. The point was made to him that it could not be allowed for a Labour Government not to act on the issue.
There had been a strong call for the payments scheme to be reviewed early. It came from a close colleague who had replaced Alf Morris as an MP. Mr Burnham got emotional as he related how Paul Goggins (now deceased) had said the contaminated blood scandal was as bad as Hillsborough, if not worse since it involved thousands of people. It resulted in bringing forward a consideration of reviewing Skipton and other aspects of financially-related matters such as insurance. The witness pointed out the obvious continuation of officials repeating the usual departmental lines, including the word “inadvertent” being used still.
He met a group of campaigners which had a significant impact on him. Paul Goggins said the witness should “do what you did with Hillsborough” and just meet the people. The meeting was held in January 2010, just after Mr Burnham’s 40th birthday, and was at the constituency office, not Westminster; partly by design and partly due to the very wintery weather. Despite the weather, he got to meet Helena and Fred Bates who were Paul’s constituents (permission had been granted to use their names). The witness recalled how the information on the fact that the Police had changed their evidence had allowed him to open up the Hillsborough matter, despite it having been considered a closed case in the view of Government. The news of the years between Fred being diagnosed with HBV according to his medical records (in the 1970s) but him only finding out about his infection during a meeting with a lawyer (in the 1990s) really affected Mr Burnham. It was like the Hillsborough altered evidence scenario, for him. He recognised the indignity of this couple’s situation having to almost beg for help just to live. That was “a massive moment” for the witness.
His initial thought was to set up something akin to the Hillsborough Independent Panel. He had set up that new model to overcome the Treasury saying an Inquiry would cost too much. Bishop James Jones was appointed as Chair. He regrets not pushing harder to set something up for contaminated blood. Labour was expecting to lose the forthcoming election. He only had six weeks to set up a review. Officials suggested options to fund a review that they knew he would not welcome, such as selling off the Blood Products Laboratory (BPL). He was being managed until he was out the door. In the face of this resistance, he opted for bringing forward the Skipton Review as a way of achieving something before the inevitable change of Government. There was still resistance to anything with a cost attached, with documents from the time mentioning how there had been a financial case for the Thalidomide situation, but not infected blood victims. At least these children of unmarried parents were consistent.
This writer highlights how the Independent Archer Inquiry appears to have eventually realised significant impact through Andy Burnham, and also the Infected Blood Inquiry itself. It is noted how little obvious impact the Penrose Inquiry has had relative to Archer. Of course, Penrose did produce access to many documents, but the lack of accountability or transformational recommendations leaves Penrose largely out in the cold (where he belongs).
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