Vaccine Damage Payment Scheme: Covid-19

Debate between Jim Shannon and Jeremy Wright

Tuesday 6th September 2022 Westminster Hall

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

It is always a pleasure to speak in such debates. I thank the right hon. and learned Member for Kenilworth and Southam (Sir Jeremy Wright) for putting forward and illustrating such a good case. It is always a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Central Ayrshire (Dr Whitford). She knows that I always look forward to her contributions, because I believe they are based on the evidence and facts that she knows. She expressed that very well in her contribution, which I thank her for.

For almost two years we have encouraged our constituents to be vaccinated against covid, as the right hon. and learned Member for Kenilworth and Southam, the hon. Member for Central Ayrshire and others have said, in order to do their bit to protect themselves and others. We have begun to see the impact that vaccines can have on individuals only recently. It is sad, unfortunate and devastating for families and friends who have seen the health of loved ones deteriorate or, sadly, pass away.

It is essential that we do our bit, through this debate, secured by the right hon. and learned Gentleman, to ensure the vaccine damage payment scheme is swift and accessible to those who deserve to take advantage of it. As others have said, there are not a great number of cases but they are very important. I know the Minister will respond in a positive fashion, and I look forward to hearing what she and the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne), will say.

We have all heard stories from friends, family or constituents about people who may have suffered negative impacts from the covid vaccine. I am glad to say there have not been many cases, but the number is still significant and those cases need to be addressed, which is what this debate is about. These people have suffered life-changing conditions because of their willingness to do their public duty. I was glad to have the vaccine and not to have had any side effects from it, and I am glad the vaccine was able to give me and millions of other people across this great United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland immunity to that awful disease.

Under the Vaccine Damage Payments Act 1979, first payments of the £120,000 lump sum went out in June, but many people have felt let down by the out-of-date scheme. Hundreds more people across the rest of the United Kingdom are awaiting assessments and decisions, including people in Northern Ireland. As of May this year, over 1,300 claims have been made but only 20 have been referred for medical assessment. That is not enough and it is too slow.

There is no doubt there have been issues with punctuality under the 1979 Act, and I understand the reasons for that. As always in this House, it is not about the reasons but the solutions. We look to the Minister to give us some encouragement as to where we are. Some applicants are waiting almost six months for assessments and decisions—six months! The scope allowed for qualification is to be over 60% disabled, either mentally or physically, due to adverse impacts of the covid vaccine. The Government have urged that it is not a compensation payment, but it is intended to ease the burdens caused by severe vaccine damage. Whatever the reasons and criteria, the request from the right hon. and learned Member for Kenilworth and Southam, and from others in the Chamber, is to get it done quickly and not to delay.

We have heard of instances where the AstraZeneca vaccine has impacted on a small group of people when it comes to clotting.

[Sir Jeremy Wright]

As ever, the hon. Gentleman is making a lot of sense. He will have heard me say that the Government have a choice: they can either reform the VDPS or they can deal properly with the cases that are going to come their way. Does the hon. Gentleman share my view that what we are looking at here for the Government is something of a burning platform? They will get those cases, and if they would rather litigate them in the full glare of publicity then that is an option—but they will perhaps be foolish to do so. Would it not be better if they dealt with those cases more quietly?

[Jim Shannon]

I thank the right hon. and learned Gentleman for his words of wisdom. Minister, there is an easy option sitting before us. I agree with the right hon. and learned Gentleman: in my book, I believe if we can do it the easy way then we should. Let us address the issue in a way that gives the Government less hassle, satisfies the needs and requests of our constituents, and ensures that we can move forward.

In terms of clotting, as of June this year there were 444 cases of blood clots out of 49 million doses of AstraZeneca given. There is still evidence that not all those were caused by the vaccine. Regardless of that, why should we not be speaking out on behalf of those who have been impacted? There is no amount of money in the world that can fill the void of loss—it cannot be measured in pounds and pennies—but we must do our best to ensure that the process of vaccine damage payments is timely and simple.

That is what we are asking for; I do not think we are asking for the world, but for something that can be done very easily—in my simplistic way of looking at things—by Government. They can do it in a way that can give succour right away and thus do away with the thoughts and process of litigation, which would be long, laborious and much more expensive.

Online Harms

Debate between Jim Shannon and Jeremy Wright

Thursday 19th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Wright]

I agree with my right hon. Friend, but I will be careful, Mr Deputy Speaker, in what I say about age verification, because I am conscious that a judicial review case is in progress on that subject. However, I agree that that is something that we could and should do, and not necessarily in direct conjunction with an online harms Bill.

Digital platforms should also recognise that a safer internet is, in the end, good for business. Their business model requires us to spend more and more time online, and we will do that only if we feel safe there. The platforms should recognise that Governments must act in that space, and that people of every country with internet access quite properly expect them to. We have operated for some time on the principle that what is unacceptable offline is unacceptable online. How can it be right that actions and behaviours that cause real harm and would be controlled and restricted in every other environment, whether broadcast media, print media or out on the street, are not restricted at all online?

I accept that freedom of speech online is important, but I cannot accept that the online world is somehow sacred space where regulation has no place regardless of what goes on there. Given the centrality of social media to modern political debate, should we rely on the platforms alone to decide which comments are acceptable and which are unacceptable, especially during election campaigns? I think not, and for me the case for online regulation is clear. However, it must be the right kind of regulation—regulation that gives innovation and invention room to grow, that allows developing enterprises to offer us life-enhancing services and create good jobs, but that requires those enterprises to take proper responsibility for their products and services, and for the consequences of their use. I believe that that balance is to be found in the proposed duty of care for online platforms, as set out in the Government’s White Paper of April last year.

I declare an interest as one of the Ministers who brought forward that White Paper at the time, and I pay tribute to all those in government and beyond, including the talented civil servants at the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, who worked so hard to complete it. This duty of care is for all online companies that deal with user-generated content to keep those who use their platforms as safe as they reasonably can.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

We have covered some important information. Does the right hon. and learned Gentleman agree that there needs to be a new social media regulator with the power to audit and impact social media algorithms to ensure that they do not cause harm? Such a regulator would enable that to happen.

[Jeremy Wright]

I agree that we need a regulator and will come on to exactly that point. The hon. Gentleman is entirely right, for reasons that I will outline in just a moment.

I recognise that what I am talking about is not the answer to every question in this area, but it would be a big step towards a safer online world if designed with sufficient ambition and implemented with sufficient determination. The duty of care should ask nothing unreasonable of the digital platforms. It would be unreasonable, for example, to suggest that every example of harmful content reaching a vulnerable user would automatically be a breach of the duty of care. Platforms should be obliged to put in place systems to protect their users that are as effective as they can be, not that achieve the impossible.

However, meeting that duty of care must mean doing more than is being done now. It should mean proactively scanning the horizon for those emerging harms that the platforms are best placed to see and designing mitigation for them, not waiting for terrible cases and news headlines to prompt action retrospectively. The duty of care should mean changing algorithms that prioritise the harmful and the hateful because they keep our attention longer and cause us to see more adverts. When a search engine asked about suicide shows a how-to guide on taking one’s own life long before it shows the number for the Samaritans, that is a design choice. The duty of care needs to require a different design choice to be made. When it comes to factual inquiries, the duty of care should expect the prioritisation of authoritative sources over scurrilous ones.

It is reasonable to expect these things of the online platforms. Doing what is reasonable to keep us safe must surely be the least we expect of those who create the world in which we now spend so much of our time. We should legislate to say so, and we should legislate to make sure that it happens. That means regulation, and as the hon. Gentleman suggests, it means a regulator—one that has the independence, the resources and the personnel to set and investigate our expectations of the online platforms. For the avoidance of doubt, our expectations should be higher than the platforms’ own terms and conditions. However, if the regulator we create is to be taken seriously by these huge multinational companies, it must also have the power to enforce our expectations. That means that it must have teeth and a range of sanctions, including individual director liability and site blocking in extreme cases.

We need an enforceable duty of care for online platforms to begin making the internet a safer place. Here is the good news for the Minister, who I know understands this agenda well. So often, such debates are intended to persuade the Government to change direction, to follow a different policy path. I am not asking the Government to do that, but rather to continue following the policy path they are already on—I just want them to move faster along that path. I am not pretending that it is an easy path. There will be complex and difficult judgments to be made and significant controversy in what will be groundbreaking and challenging legislation, but we have shied away from this challenge for far too long.

The reason for urgency is not only that, while we delay, lives continue to be ruined by online harms, sufficient though that is. It is also because we have a real opportunity and the obligation of global leadership here. The world has looked with interest at the prospectus we have set out on online harms regulation, and it now needs to see us follow through with action so that we can leverage our country’s well-deserved reputation for respecting innovation and the rule of law to set a global standard in a balanced and effective regulatory approach. We can only do that when the Government bring forward the online harms Bill for Parliament to consider and, yes, perhaps even to improve. We owe it to every preyed-upon child, every frightened parent and everyone abused, intimidated or deliberately misled online to act, and to act now.