“Hillsborough Law”

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Thursday 24th July 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

As I think I said in answer to an earlier question, the Government have been quite clear that, under the duty of candour, public officials will be bound by that duty, with criminal and professional consequences—the noble Lord is shaking his head. What I also said is that we think there needs to be a wider cultural change and there need to be other programmes put in place to achieve this. If I can provide more detail, I will happily write to the noble Lord, but I think that we are being very genuine and explicit in the ambition that we have set forth, that a duty of candour will be at the core of all public officials’ roles.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, we will shortly be hearing a Statement, yet again, on the infected blood compensation scheme. Last week, we heard about the continuing problems with the Post Office Horizon scheme. Both scandals were made much worse over decades because of the lack of candour by officials. In opposition, Labour—including the Minister, many of whose amendments on the duty of candour I signed—said that it would introduce that duty to prevent scandals such as these in the future. But the press are reporting that the delay is caused by officials watering down the details, including the level at which officials are bound by the duty of candour. Can the Minister confirm that there is no truth in this?

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

I think that is, if I may say so, a similar question to that from my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti. I have heard that the ongoing discussions are in fact reasonably positive, and we are very hopeful of reaching an agreement in the coming weeks and months. It is certainly not the intention to water down recommendations; however, it is our intention to come up with a workable Bill that forms part of a wider work programme. As I think I said in answer to the noble Lord, Lord Alton, we have also put in place this website where people can monitor how the Government are making progress on other recommendations on other scandals, such as the infected blood scandal and the Grenfell scandal.