This morning, the UK Infected Blood Inquiry issued a press release confirming the publication date of the Final Report, set for Monday, May 20, 2024 at Church House, London.
Although originally expected to be released in March of this year, the Inquiry Chair Sir Brian Langstaff stated that the further delay was due to the amount of work required for the warning letter process and as a result he reluctantly had to extend the date to May. The full news article from the Inquiry can be found here.
Registration has also opened for participants who would like to attend the closing event on the day of publication and the link is available from within the Inquiry news article. The closing date to register for the closing event is the 28th January 2024.
Bill Wright, Co-Chair of Haemophilia Scotland, said the following on the delayed publication:
“I’m not entirely surprised at the further delay given just how damning the evidence is. Those criticised, when seeing the draft of what the Report will say about them, have under the law the right to respond.
It’s called Maxwellisation and in the case of the Penrose Report took over two years to complete. So a six months delay from the original plan of an autumn release is not surprising.
We continue in the meantime with our fellow charities to try and meet with the UK Government to make progress on compensation.”