Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, who his Department approached to advise on the membership of the Infected Blood Reference Group; how many (a) people and (b) organisations were invited to attend that group; how many (i) people and (ii) campaigners are members of that group; and if he will publish correspondence which invited members to join that group.

As stated in the 2017 document “Infected blood: Government Consultation on Special Category Mechanism and other support in England”, the Department brought together a diverse group of experts and stakeholders to help inform and shape the reforms set out in the Consultation. This was a light-touch informal group that met several times prior to the publication of the consultation and it was never intended to provide a report on the meetings or its members.