Infected Blood Inquiry

Debate between Catherine West and David Lidington

Monday 2nd July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

Sir Brian has carried out a number of meetings with groups and with individuals across the country. He and his team have conducted a public consultation online, inviting letters, emails and telephone calls. He has demonstrated his commitment to take this matter forward rapidly and to do so taking very careful account of the views of survivors in particular. When I met Sir Brian, it was very clear to me that his involvement in the Bristol Royal Infirmary public inquiry of a few years ago had made a huge impression on him, and I know that he wants to apply the lessons that were learned in that inquiry to deliver the very best possible inquiry into the infected blood scandal.

[Catherine West (Hornsey and Wood Green) (Lab)]

Will the Minister reassure me that in the overall inquiry survivors will be able to make their own representations independently of third sector groups such as the Haemophilia Society? That is not to detract from the organisation’s work in any way; it is simply that some individuals may not always have had a 100% positive relationship with such groups, and may want their representations to be considered completely separately from those of the society or other third sector groups.

[Mr Lidington]

In his letter proposing the terms of reference, Sir Brian Langstaff said to me that different groups had different views on how the inquiry should best be approached, and he will want to ensure that everybody gets their fair say. Obviously it is for the inquiry, not for Ministers, to determine who should be accepted as core participants.

Carillion

Debate between Catherine West and David Lidington

Monday 15th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. I can well understand why apprentices would be worried at the moment. Carillion has 11 training centres across England, with about 1,200 apprentices who are also Carillion employees and who are mostly 16 to 18-year-olds. The Construction Industry Training Board has now agreed to become the training provider for those apprentices, and it will assist apprentices accordingly in finding new employment as rapidly as possible.

[Catherine West (Hornsey and Wood Green) (Lab)]

There are 1,200 16 to 18-year-old apprentices. May I suggest that the statement that the CITB is going to call together a taskforce does not match the urgency with which Members across the House have raised the issue of these young people, and the crucial question of their future in construction, which we desperately need to fix in advance of the Brexit debate?

[Mr Lidington]

The 1,200 apprentices obviously needed to be found both a training provider and an employer, and Carillion had been performing both those roles. The CITB has now stepped in and taken up the role of the training provider for all those young men and women. I assure the hon. Lady that the CITB is going to be extremely active—and will be pressed by Ministers to be very active—in ensuring that it reaches out to employers and finds spaces for those young men and women as rapidly as possible.