By Professor John Robertson
On May 17th, the head of the Scottish National Blood Transfusion Service (SNBTS) apologised to the thousands of victims in Scotland who were infected by HIV or Hepatitis C through NHS blood products.
While I understand why he made that apology on behalf of the SNBTS and the victims fully deserve an apology, even if it’s nearly 50 years late, it’s not really those working for the blood transfusion service, 50 years ago or now, who should be apologising.
According to the Guardian, the commercial blood product Koate, given to haemophiliacs across the UK in the 1970s and 1980s, to enable their blood to clot, was based on plasma from paid US prisoners, among whom it was known that drug use and sexual infections were rife. [i]
In the same report, we read that the drug producer, Bayer, were aware, at the very beginning, that because a single batch could contain plasma from 20 000 donors it was then very likely that the entire batch would be contaminated.
In August 1976, the Labour Government of Jim Callaghan and with the Secretary of State for Scotland, Willie Ross in the Cabinet, seeing the papers, the deal with Bayer was signed. A Labour health minister at the time, David Owen, had warned of the risks but was told in 1987, when he asked for them, that his papers had been shredded because of the risk of litigation. [ii]
Shockingly, we now know that one year before the Labour Government signed the deal, the World Health Organisation had warned of the risk of transmitting diseases when blood products were obtained from paid rather than from voluntary donors and urged (in block capital lettering), member states such as the UK, to enact effective legislation to protect the recipients of blood products. [iii]
In December 2015, ITV’s World in Action TV show did a special on the risks. According to the Guardian, in April 2024, despite the WHO warning and the TV broadcast, the deal was done by the Labour cabinet in August 1976, in part, to cut costs.[iv]
While some will point, justifiably, to the role played by Conservative Governments from 1979 to 1997 in perpetuating this practice and then in attempting to cover it up, it must be remembered that, in Scotland, Labour which was utterly dominant at national and local levels including on health boards, did nothing.
We see this most clearly in the case of Yorkhill Hospital in Glasgow where children continued to be treated with infected blood products for years, until 1984, after other parts of the country had begun to use heat treatments to remove risk. [v] Virtually every MP and councillor, in Glasgow, in those days, was Labour.
Then, in 2002, as a Labour/Lib Dem coalition governed a devolved Scotland, the Labour Scottish Health Minister, Malcolm Chisholm, was warned by the UK Labour Health Secretary, Alan Milburn, to avoid agreeing to compensation for haemophiliacs in Scotland, because of the inability of the UK Labour Government to meet these costs for the larger population affected in England. [vi]
The above reluctance of Labour to help those in dire need reminds us, all-too-clearly, of how Glasgow Council’s Labour administration did its utmost to avoid compensating its own women workers, who had for decades been denied fair pay, comparable to men in similar work and, in the last few weeks, of Sir Keir Starmer’s instructions to his Scottish MSPs not to support compensation for the WASPI women.
Vote for Labour at your peril.
[i] https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/apr/27/revealed-government-was-warned-of-infected-blood-risks-in-1970s
[ii] https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/apr/27/revealed-government-was-warned-of-infected-blood-risks-in-1970s
[iii] https://www.infectedbloodinquiry.org.uk/evidence/prse0003476-world-health-organization-assembly-resolution-utilization-and-supply-human
[iv] https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/apr/14/contaminated-blood-inquiry-uk-cheaper-minutes
[v] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-48850969
Talking-up Scotland 'Albatraz' 
LETS ALL MAKECSURE THIS TERRIBLE EPISODE IN LABOURS HISTORY
ISCSHOUTED FROMMEVERY ROOF TOP
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Deafening silence from Starmer and Labour including their Scottish branch officers!!! Maybe all hiding in the leaders bunker. Whenever there is bad Labour news they all go to ground to plot a deflection story usually SNPBAD!!!
Complicit Labour……….Labour liars!!!
Let’s get Scotland independent …..away from this Westminster apocalypse of scandal after scandal after scandal…..you know when they are guilty when they say nothing!!!
JB
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The reference in the main blog post to the intervention in the decision making of the then Scottish Executive by a Labour Secretary of State for Health, Alan Milburn MP is notable. Because of its significance, I take the liberty of expanding on this below.
From the BBC News website (28 July 2022): ‘Infected blood scandal: Malcolm Chisholm told to ‘tough it out’
The BBC reports (with my emphasis): ‘ Scotland’s former health minister was told by his Westminster counterpart to “tough it out” amid calls to compensate victims of the infected blood scandal, an inquiry has heard.
‘Malcolm Chisholm was warned in 2002 that handing payments to people with Hepatitis C would be a “grave mistake”.
And: ‘An email sent in November 2002 from the private secretary of then UK Health Secretary Alan Milburn reports on a phone conversation he had with Mr Chisholm. It states that Mr Chisholm “feels he has to offer something, probably around payments to people once they become seriously ill”.
‘Mr Milburn “was very clear that he thought this would be a grave mistake”, according to the email. The Labour minister is said to have warned the UK would be financially “scuppered and on a slippery slope to payments running into the millions across the UK”. Mr Chisholm, giving evidence to the inquiry on Thursday, described the email as an “accurate report”.
‘He (Chisholm) said he had to consider the UK government’s opinion on the matter due to doubts that the payments would fall within the remit of the Scottish Executive.
‘The former health minister said: “While we hoped it was a devolved matter we couldn’t be absolutely sure about it.‘
‘Hoped’ – is that a proper basis for the governance of Scotland?
‘Couldn’t be absolutely sure’ -is that a proper basis for the governance of Scotland?
Of course not but one that Unionist parties like Labour are content with. And remember ‘all roads do lead back to Westminster’ after all!
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A FEW FACTS ABOUT “SUNNY JIM” CALLAGHAN
Callaghan was appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer in October 1964. At that time, Prime Minister Harold Wilson’s Labour government faced a deficit of some £800 million. In today’s money that is £20,317,365,896.76.
While battling Britain’s economic woes as chancellor, Callaghan devalued the pound – a solution that would increase inflation rates and import costs.
In November 1967, Callaghan devalued the pound by roughly 14%, a controversial move seen by some as detrimental to Britain’s economy. His resignation as Chancellor soon followed.
From the mid to late 1970s, Britain’s economic situation worsened. Seeking to reduce inflation, remember it was “Sunny Jim” who increased inflation rates, Callaghan’s Labour government introduced sweeping wage restrictions to the public sector against the Unions advice. Mass strikes soon followed.
Throughout the winter of 1978 to 1979, Britain saw its biggest stoppage of labour since the 1926 General Strike. Without bin collections, refuse piled up on Britain’s streets and parks. Some 80,000 healthcare and education professionals marched on Parliament to demand change. This period of mass industrial action and public sector turmoil became known as the ‘Winter of Discontent’.
Britain’s ‘Winter of Discontent’ proved devastating for Callaghan’s political career. Support for Callaghan waned in the wake of the strikes, and in March 1979 a motion of no confidence was called by opposition ministers.
The motion passed against Callaghan, commencing 18 years of Conservative Party rule. Margaret Thatcher was made Prime Minister during the May 1979 General Election.
In 1999 he confessed in an interview “I think we are all re-evaluated as time goes by and I should not be the slightest bit surprised if there is another evaluation after I die and people come to the conclusion that I was the worst prime minister since Walpole.”
”SUNNY JIM” INDEED!!!
We then had illegal warmongering Blair.
Pension robbing “ we spent all the money” Broon
And now maybe Starmer.
What you see is what you get……the chaos of Labour in government!!!
As you say John “vote for Labour at your peril”
JB
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Sorry an correction..above rate of £800 million in 1964 would be about £16,486,006,464.79 according to an online converter. Whichever way you look at it, it is one hell of a deficit Labour ran up in 1964….couldn’t be trusted with the economy then and can’t be trusted with the economy now……one bad lot in another bad lot out….no “change” just the usual power mad egocentrism…..blue/red no difference!!!
JB
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