Contaminated Blood

Debate between Chris Stephens and Andy Burnham

Tuesday 25th April 2017 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham]

I think people have applied for documents, but many of those documents have been withheld. I will come on to that in a moment.

I was a Minister in the Department of Health just after the publication of the Archer report and the Government’s response to it. At the instigation of the late Paul Goggins, I sought to reopen the whole issue, and I encountered a lot of institutional resistance, if I may put it that way. I am myself standing here out of a sense of guilt—I wish that I had done more over the years—but having looked at it all and having pieced it all together, I think the documents that have been withheld would fill in some of the gaps I have described.

[Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP)]

I pay tribute to the right hon. Gentleman for the work he has done on this issue and many others. The third case he described is surely one of defamation. Does he not agree that all families affected must, if they have not done so already, access their medical records and those of family members who have passed away?

[Andy Burnham]

It is a case of at least defamation. A range of potential offences, such as misconduct in public office, could be considered. It remains the case that people have not had access to their full medical records. There are just so many examples of people saying that crucial pages are missing. They obviously cannot prove that, but I have put on the record things that I think are provable and are, in my view, criminal. This cannot be left there, and the Minister is going to have to answer that point directly when she responds.

--- Later in debate ---

[Andy Burnham]

I am very pleased to hear that. I hope that means a commitment in the election manifesto of the kind I have just called for.

[Chris Stephens]

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that there should be a Backbench Business debate on this issue when Parliament returns and before the summer recess, so that Back Benchers from all parties can pressure the Government to meet his demand?

[Andy Burnham]

I will not be here, but I make a plea to the hon. Gentleman, if he is returned—do not rule out Labour in Scotland, it is on the way back. I make a plea to everybody here in the Chamber today and to the candidates who may be coming here that they must act on this information. They cannot leave this where it is. Their conscience must tell them that they have to do something about it.

When the Government ruled out an inquiry into Orgreave, despite the existence of clear evidence of serious wrongdoing by the police, they did so on the basis that “nobody died”. I am afraid that that threadbare defence will not hold here. People have died—2,000 in all—and they have been the victims of both negligence and a cover-up. In its heart of hearts, this Parliament knows that to be true, and so the question is: what are we going to do about it?

I will end with a quote from an email I received from another victim, Roger Kirman, who became infected with Hepatitis C in 1978 but only found out by accident when having a hip replacement operation in 1994—this despite having raised his family in between. His brother George died from AIDS in 1991. He wrote:

“I have been fortunate to make it as far as I have but I have a real sense of anger against successive governments for their indifference to the plight of so many. Politicians should not be surprised at the loss of confidence in Parliament when candour is not forthcoming and they are seen as interested only in preserving their own position and the status quo.”

I suspect that Roger speaks for every single family affected by this scandal.

It has been an enormous privilege to serve my constituents in the House, and it is with real sadness that I prepare to leave, but in my 16 years here I have also had my eyes opened to its shortcomings. The simple fact that since Hillsborough I have been approached by so many justice campaigns—many of them from the 1970s and 1980s—tells me that this place has not been doing its job properly. Westminster will only begin to solve the political crisis we are living through when, in the face of evidence, it learns to act fearlessly and swiftly in pursuit of the truth and gives a voice to those of our fellow citizens who through no fault of their own have been left in the wilderness.

Collectively, we have failed the victims of contaminated blood. I do not exempt myself from this, and I wish to apologise to all those affected for coming so late to this issue in my speech tonight. I also apologise to you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for the length of my comments—but in a way I do not actually: the House should be delayed tonight on this matter. Truth and justice have been delayed for people, so the House should be delayed tonight, as it hears directly what they have been through. I hope that we have given a flavour of that tonight. I say to Members here and those who might follow: it is never too late to do the right thing. [Interruption.]

Agenda for Change: NHS Pay Restraint

Debate between Chris Stephens and Andy Burnham

Monday 30th January 2017 Westminster Hall

[Andy Burnham]

My hon. Friend makes two important points. The first was on the effect that Home Office immigration rules could have had on the nursing profession. I think the former Home Secretary, now the Prime Minister, made some changes in that regard.

My hon. Friend is right that there is a much bigger context here: the post-referendum climate. The Government have been absolutely wrong not to guarantee the status of EU nationals currently working in our national health service. I have an example from my constituency of a Polish community nurse, who every day gets up early to go on her local round delivering insulin to vulnerable patients who are diabetic and housebound. One morning she heard a cry of, “Go home!”, out of one of the bedroom windows opposite. What does that make that nurse feel like, and is she likely to stay when we are in this prolonged period of uncertainty in which this growing hostility is felt to be around? There is a real risk here. We cannot simultaneously refuse to give clarity to those tens of thousands of nurses from other parts of Europe who are currently working in our NHS and run down the good will of nurses who are UK nationals. In the end, something will give, and it will be patient care, if we operate policies of that kind.

Alongside that, there is the attack on nurse training. We have seen cuts to nurse training places over a number of years, so there is a shortage of nurses coming through. Many places are being and have been forced to recruit from overseas. In those circumstances, with everything else that I have described, including the downward pressure on headline pay, how can it possibly make sense to scrap the nursing bursary? Will that not just be another factor that adds to the growing sense of crisis in the profession? Every single piece of support that is there to develop the nursing profession is systematically being stripped away.

We have seen years of that approach and are beginning to see the consequences in the national health service. Labour, of course, did not get everything perfect—I am not saying that—but I can say with some pride that when I was a Minister in the Department of Health, we brought through a major programme of investment in the nursing workforce, through Agenda for Change. It was the subject of hard discussions, but in the end it was agreed between the trade unions and the Government of the day. We did have in the Department of Health a social partnership forum, which brought together NHS Employers, trade unions and the Government to iron out problems relating to the nursing workforce. We did massively increase the numbers in the nursing profession. We did ensure that they were properly rewarded and had proper access to training. My worry is that we are seeing some of that break down.

In the immediate aftermath of the financial crash, it was acceptable, it seems to me, to ask the nursing profession to make a contribution to deficit reduction, but here we are, six years on, expecting people who are out there today, working flat out to keep an NHS in crisis going, to take pay cuts for the privilege of doing so. At some point, that strategy begins just to fall apart, and the NHS falls apart with it. I say to the Minister that we are not far from that point now.

[Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP)]

Is there not a wider economic point that if we keep pay freezes in place for so long—six years—that ends up harming the private sector economy, because if 70p in every pound of public sector money ends up in the private sector economy, some of that is wages, including nurses’ pay?

[Andy Burnham]

Of course, and the point is very well made, but I will also say again that it does not help deficit reduction if nurses are being pushed into the grip of private staffing agencies as a consequence of pay policies. That is another way in which the Government’s short-sighted approach has not in the end produced benefits for the economy, as the hon. Gentleman says, nor helped us meet the target of deficit reduction, because so much money is being wasted every year.

I will conclude on that point. The voices that have been mobilised in support of the lobby of Parliament today are real voices, as we heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North. These people are the backbone of the national health service, the backbone of our communities and the backbone of our country. They have limits, though. Their limits are higher, but they do have limits, like everyone else. They feel taken for granted. Right now, the NHS cannot afford to lose the good will of the nursing profession. The Minister needs to listen carefully to what is being said today and he needs to make urgent representations, through the Secretary of State, to the Chancellor of the Exchequer in advance of the spring statement. A signal needs to be given to the nursing profession that the Government are listening and will take action, within the bounds of what is possible, to treat the nursing profession properly. I hope that, if nothing else, the Minister takes that message away from today.