Behind Local News Weekly: The infected blood story isn’t over. We’ll not stop until redress is received
Good morning,
Welcome to our weekly newsletter — a day late this week due to the bank holiday.
What a week last week was — journalism Twitter watched as the Manchester Mill went toe-to-toe with a businessman threatening legal action for an article it published (and didn’t blink first), regional journalists around the country covered the local implications of the infected blood scandal inquiry being published and, oh yes, a General Election was called.
We’ve got articles about all three topics and more in this week’s newsletter, with our main read authored by ChronicleLive reporter Sam Volpe, who has covered the infected blood scandal at first the Ham&High in London and latterly in the North East, where The Journal has campaigned for victims since 2000.
Thanks to Sam for writing such a powerful testimony about the important role local journalism continues to play.
As for the General Election, here’s hoping the experience of BelfastLive reporter James McCarthy doesn’t become the norm — local journalists kept away from the PM until the last minute when he chose to use the Titanic Quarter — really — as the backdrop for a photo stunt.
Here we go! Thanks for reading,
Behind Local News
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New on the site this week:
Tories off to a poor start when it comes to working with local journalists
BelfastLive journalist James McCarthy has lifted the curtain on what really went on during Rishi Sunak’s campaigning stop in Belfast which culminated in a rather awkward question about the Titanic.
Independent news websites team up hold week of events to raise profile
No News Is Bad News — it’s a mantra all journalists (hopefully) subscribe to. Now, an organisation set up to fight for the future of public interest news is aiming to do something about it.
Editor sees off legal threats — for now — as community rallies round with fact check
A publisher who called on his readers to help fact check allegations made in an article published by his newsletter after being threatened with legal action has described the response as truly extraordinary.’
NCTJ exams delayed so exam candidates can cover General Election
As journalists and politicians sought to understand the implications of Rishi Sunak’s July 4 election date, one group of reporters made a worrying realisation: It clashed with their senior exams.
NCTJ launches new qualification for newsroom managers and leaders
Created by journalists for journalists, the NCTJ Level 7 Leadership and Management for Journalists qualification is designed for editorial leaders in the early stages of their management career so they can manage and develop their teams effectively within the unique demands of a fast-paced, deadline-driven environment.
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Good news this week:
- It’s been the week for new newsletter launches. In Lancashire, The Lead UK has launched its first offering on Substack, written by Jamie Lopez.
- Meanwhile, the successful Edinburgh Minute newsletter has a sibling, The London Minute, with Michael MacLeod editing both titles and promising a daily ‘no noise’ briefing for the Capital.
- Congratulations to Liverpool Echo political editor Liam Thorp, who has made the shortlist for the Orwell Prize for journalism focusing on homelessness. He is joined by Unheard Voices, a project based in Greater Manchester where community journalists with experience of homelessness focus on topics surrounding homelessness.
- Congratulations too to Jennifer Williams, the former MEN political editor and now Northern correspondent for the FT, for picking up the regional prize at the annual Wincott Business Awards.
New jobs this week
Each week, we’ll share some of the latest jobs in local news which have been sent to us. If you have one to promote, please contact us here
- Overnight reporter — Reach PLC
- Local Democracy Reporter — EssexLive
- Multimedia Reporter — Wellington
- Local Democracy Reporter — Isle of Wight
- Reporter — Gloucestershire
- Local Democracy Reporter — Hull
- Reporter — Haddington
- Trainee Journalist — Edinburgh
- Trainee Journalist — Blackpool
- Defence Journalist — Portsmouth
The infected blood story isn’t over. We’ll not stop until redress is received
Carol Grayson, with husband Peter, worked with The Journal to launch the Bad Blood campaign in 2000
For 24 years, The Journal in Newcastle has fought alongside victims of the Infected Blood Scandal for justice. On the week a 2,400-page report of an inquiry into the NHS’s darkest hour was produced, Sam Volpe looks at what covering such a story has meant for him and the journalists who have gone before him…
The first thing about the infected blood story is that it is not, and never has been, our story. It is a story that belongs to those who have lived it — and those who have died.
It is also important to make clear here, too, that it is not over. And we’ll keep covering it at the Chronicle, Journal and ChronicleLive until every last recommendation is fulfilled and redress received.
The contaminated blood scandal — as I was first introduced to it — goes back 40 years. And even back then, at the time it was unfolding, those impacted were raising concerns to journalists about what was happening, and about what they were being told by the doctors they were supposed to trust.
Unfortunately, as Sir Brian Langstaff found this week, the attitude of “doctor knows best” was pervasive. That, perhaps, is where things started to go wrong, but I will leave judgements to those paid to give them.
Reporting on the scandal has been a privilege — and I’ve been lucky enough to work in the slipstream of a whole range of incredible journalists.
The Journal’s Bad Blood campaign began in August 2000, and even then the scale and horror of what had happened to so many people was clear. Other titles had written about it, but the work done by some of my predecessors in this job was truly campaigning, and brought what at the time seemed like real progress. (Though the idea that it would take 24 years for anything approaching justice would no doubt have shocked those involved.)
Journal reporter Louella Houldcroft put together a series of articles over several years that truly helped to pave the way for the inquiry. Her work with Carol Grayson and Peter Longstaff was old-fashioned, creative journalism with a real sense of purpose. Together they exposed the scale of death and the way Governments of the 1990s and 2000s had not wanted to know. Lord Owen broke his silence after decades in our pages — and himself went on to become a powerful voice in the fight for justice.
Pressure from the campaign played a role in pushing the Government to investigate — unfortunately that investigation became the “self-sufficiency report” which we knew even when it was, eventually, published was nothing but a whitewash.” (Hiding the truth,” Sir Brian Langstaff wrote.)
But people like Carol — following Peter’s heartbreaking death — kept going, and so did The Journal.
By its nature, the contaminated blood scandal has been thousands of local scandals dotted around the country (and the world). Telling it has been, in many ways, a distillation of what local news should be. Around the country a range of campaign groups and indefatigable campaigners have been its bedrock.
In my first job as a journalist, I had the fortune to be working for a title — the venerable Ham&High in North London — that also covered a hospital with a major haemophilia centre: The Royal Free Hospital. There too, there had been a history of campaigning journalism — led by Emma Youle — and being told a few months into my career that I’d be picking up such a delicate and emotionally charged story was a steep learning curve. Not long afterwards, the Infected Blood Inquiry began.
Over the last six years, thanks to the kindness and generosity of campaigners who were consistently happy to discuss the most harrowing things, I have been privileged to tell so many stories of the scandal. And as anyone who has so much as glanced at Sir Brian Langstaff’s 2,500-plus page report this week will know, there are so very many stories to tease out. I have written — I think — close to 100 of them.
When I arrived at ChronicleLive I had, through the articles I had previously written and the research I had done, been aware on some level of how much this subject mattered to the titles here, but I had not appreciated the scale, or the top-class nature of what Louella et al produced. Working with the likes of Carol and colleagues around the country they had the sort of impact every reporter dreams of.
And I have been delighted to be able to continue to cover what — as has been clear to many in the last few weeks and months — is one of the most powerful, poignant and simply important stories in this country. We’ve been lucky enough that those involved still trust us to tell it.
Covering the Inquiry’s final report in detail and with the right emphasis and prominence was always important to us in Newcastle. Institutional memory — and knowledge — of how important beginning the Bad Blood campaign in 2000 was remains strong. And simply put, we owe those who did that work to see things through.
It also goes without saying — around 100 haemophiliacs registered at the Newcastle Haemophilia Centre have died — we owe it to them, most of all.
So reporting live on the delivery of Sir Brian’s report was a no-brainer — and an intensely emotional day. As he invited attendees to give each other a standing I ovation I shed a private tear or two. I have spent years getting to know and care about some inspirational people — all of whom deserve so much better. Many aren’t here to see this, or are, and I write with a bitterness, “lucky” to be so. (Because of course they’re not lucky, they’ve lived through the most deplorable circumstances.) They do not have justice just yet, but we hope we’ve brought a detail-led, people-led attitude to our work this week that will help their fight along the way.
Our design teams have produced powerful front pages that remind us all of the vitality print can bring to a story, and I hope the people of the North East appreciate the prominence we have given this.
I fear scandals like this are not as rare as we would hope — see the Post Office Horizon nightmare, or the ongoing horror afflicted in some inpatient mental health settings, or when it comes to the damage done by epilepsy drugs like sodium valproate in pregnancy — and the lesson is a simple one: empower local papers to listen to the people who ring them up looking for somewhere to turn.
The Journal editor Graeme Whitfield said: “I can vividly remember first hearing in August 2000 from my then colleague Louella Houldcroft about a story she had on infected blood for the next day’s Journal.
“My first reaction was journalistic: that’s a hell of a story. I hope it wasn’t too long before the human response of realising what a scandal we were reporting on — and the human cost of that scandal.
“I was one of the many reporters who would meet Carol Grayson and Peter Longstaff after Louella left The Journal, as we kept reporting on infected blood. Speaking to them is as unforgettable as first hearing about their story.
“Sam Volpe is the latest to take up that reporting, both in the pages of The Journal and on our website, ChronicleLive. The emergence of our digital platforms has allowed us to tell the story in new ways, and it was crucial that we live blogged the publication of the inquiry report on Monday.
“I have written that this century has seen three great scandals in the UK: Hillsborough, the Post Office/Horizon affair, and infected blood.
“All three issues were united by years of indifference and cover-ups from the Government and other authorities, and all three have come to light at least in part because of the reporting of local journalists.”
