Infected Blood Compensation Scheme

Lord Beamish Excerpts

Tuesday 21st May 2024 Commons Chamber

[John Glen]

I can certainly reassure my right hon. and learned Friend of that. Today’s announcements about compensation, and the documents that will flow through, will constitute substantive responses to meet the expectations of many in the communities, and I will consider the formalisation of those responses very carefully to bring clarity to the matter.

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)]

Could I put on record the thanks of, I think, all of us not only to the campaigners, but to my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Dame Diana Johnson)? As someone who campaigned for many years on postmasters, I know how lonely it is at times when you are taking on the state and no one believes you.

I welcome the Paymaster General’s announcement of a compensation scheme based on tariffs, but can I tell him, from my experience as a member of the Horizon Compensation Advisory Board, that the big work starts now in terms of agreeing the levels of those tariffs? Will the Government pay individual claimants’ legal bills, because they will need some legal advice on that? Could I also echo what the Father of the House, the hon. Member for Worthing West (Sir Peter Bottomley), said? A lot of money is going to be paid out to people. We will get unscrupulous individuals trying to prey on people. Can I suggest that we ensure that they get financial advice and support when those payments are made?

[John Glen]

Not for the first time, the right hon. Gentleman has made some wise points, and I am grateful to him for doing so. I accept much of what he has said about the concern surrounding tariffs, but these tariffs have not been set up with financial constraints; they have been set up with the input of a range of experts to reach a judgment on what would be appropriate versus what would be a legal entitlement. The assumptions behind those bandings—severity bandings, for instance—now need to be explained and scrutinised, and that is what is going to happen.

The right hon. Gentleman made a very reasonable point about claims by unscrupulous people; the question here is how we can put safeguards in place while expediting the claims of those who have qualified. He also made a reasonable point about the professional support of lawyers and financial advisers. That, too, is at the top of my mind as I learn from some of the other scandals with which I became familiar in my role as Economic Secretary to the Treasury. I will take those to heart in future.