Contaminated Blood and Blood Products

Mark Spencer Excerpts

Thursday 14th October 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Mark Spencer (Sherwood) (Con)]

I will be as brief as possible. I have heard the stories of my own constituents and I have also listened to many other similarly tragic stories, and that shows the magnitude of this problem throughout the country. I welcome the fact that Opposition Members recognise that this has been an issue for successive Governments, and that they regret that it was not tackled in the previous 13 years and we are therefore now left in the position of needing to try to solve this enormous problem.

I also want to thank the Front-Bench team for having taken this matter so seriously. It has looked into it and, for the first time, has committed to taking action. We now have a timetable in place, and we will know the direction we are going in by Christmas. That is an enormous step forward. I am grateful that we now at least have a plan and a direction, and I hope we can achieve the right outcome.