Sir Christopher Chope

I beg to move, That this House has considered the Government response to the Covid-19 Inquiry Module 4 Report. It is refreshing to see the Public Health Minister in this debate. If anybody will be empathetic on this topic it must be the right hon. Lady, as she has campaigned fearlessly on behalf of another group of victims: the victims of contaminated blood scandals. Although I do not want to overdo the comparison between the victims of contaminated blood and victims of vaccine damage, the responses of successive Governments to those tragedies have had a similar pattern: total denial of responsibility to start with, then recognition that people have suffered but not because of anything for which the Government were responsible, and then eventually conceding the cause and effect of the damage but still stalling on providing any effective redress. It is that stalling on which I wish to concentrate. The Hallett inquiry made clear recommendations in April this year. Recommendation 5 stated: “The UK government must reform the Vaccine Damage Payment Scheme as soon as possible. The reform should include as a minimum: increasing the £120,000 payment, at least in line with inflation to date; subsequently applying annual increases in line with inflation; introducing multiple levels of payment, commensurate with the degree of injury suffered; and any transitional arrangements necessary to provide for fairness between applicants to the existing scheme and applicants to the revised scheme.” The Government’s response, published earlier this month, is inadequate. That may be because the Minister has been in post for only three months; it may be because Government officials have not done the review work that for the last several years they have assured me and others that they were doing. We will hear from the Minister in due course. I hope she will be able to say that the Government agree to increase the £120,000 payment, that they will apply annual increases in line with inflation, that they will introduce multiple levels of payment, commensurate with the degree of injury, and so on.