I have joined over 100 MPs and Peers from 10 political parties in writing to the Government, asking them to show the same urgency on infected blood compensation as they now have on the Post Office Horizon Scandal.

Justice for the infected blood victims is long overdue.

The letter from Diana Johnson MP and Alistair Burt reads:

We are delighted that the revelation of the circumstances of innocent sub-postmasters caught up in the post office Horizon scandal has resulted in a very quick set of decisions by the Government to acknowledge the pain and damage to lives of those directly affected, and that of their families. The move to speedy compensation in full is appropriate for such a significant state failure, the largest miscarriage of justice in UK history – covered up for so long. It has been life-changing for those involved.

We hope the same determination to compensate speedily, and in full, will now be applied to others who have also waited too long for rectification of another major state failure: namely the victims of the NHS Contaminated Blood Scandal. Some 30,000 were affected from tainted medical treatment in the 1970s and 1980s, of whom over 3,000 have lost their lives. Their stories of grief, lives destroyed and of fighting State obfuscation, secrecy and concealment, have also been recounted in a lengthy public inquiry over the past five years. We await the final report due in March, but the inquiry already produced its final recommendations on compensation in April 2023, calling for them to be enacted quickly.

However, in contrast to what we have seen this week, the Government last December opposed implementing these final recommendation on setting up an Independent Commission to oversee quick compensation. Ministers’ most recent statement said that they are still “working through the implications” of the amendment that was passed, and that a final decision on compensation must consider both the victims of the scandal and “the costs to the public sector”.

We trust the change in direction towards those affected by gross national injustices will be reflected positively towards those infected and affected by what is commonly regarded as the worst treatment disaster in the history of the NHS. They deserve no less.

Read about my meeting with two of my constituents who were impacted by the infected blood scandal here.

Read more about Diana Johnson and Alistair Burt’s letter here.