Gary James Webster & Others v Treloars Trust

Hearing date: 26 February 2025

Approved Judgment

This judgment was handed down remotely at 10.30am on 11 March 2025 by circulation to the parties or their representatives by e-mail and by release to the National Archives (see eg ).

SENIOR Master Cook

The application

This is the hearing of the Applicants' application for a Group Litigation Order [GLO]. The GLO is sought on behalf of a group of 63 prospective claimants who are either former pupils of Treloar's College who were infected with HIV and/or hepatitis by NHS blood products; or are people infected with such viruses by a former pupil; or are their estates or dependents.

The application is made by way of Part 23 application notice issued on 24 January 2022, at a point prior to the issue of any claim form, as is permitted by CPR 19.22 (1), which provides that a court may make a GLO where there are or are likely to be a number of claims giving rise to GLO issues.

The Court has been provided with the following evidence:

(i) Witness statement of Desmond Collins (1) dated 21 January 2022 on behalf of the applicants.

(ii) Witness statement of Natalie Wargent dated 17 February 2025 on behalf of the Respondent.

(iii) Witness statement of Desmond Collins (2) dated 21 February 2025 on behalf of the applicants.

The parties and the background to these potential claims

The Respondent is a charity which operates the Treloar School and College in Alton Hampshire [the College]. It is common ground that the College was established as the Lord Mayor Treloar Hospital and College in 1908. At its inception it was a hospital to treat children of both sexes up to the age of 12 who were suffering from tuberculosis disease of the bones or joints. The NHS took over running the hospital in 1948, acquiring 75% of the Trust's funds in the process. The institution continued until the hospital closed in 1994.

It is helpful at this stage to provide some context for what occurred at the college to give rise to these potential claims. The following is a summary of content from the final report of Sir Brian Langstaff Chairman of the Infected Blood Inquiry [the IBI Report] which was published on 20 May 2024, as set out in the Applicant's skeleton argument. This Inquiry was set up in 2018 to undertake a detailed investigation into the circumstances in which men, women and children treated by national Health Services in the United Kingdom were given infected blood and infected blood products, in particular since 1970.

“(ii) By the 1960s the school had attracted a number of haemophiliacs children, which increased to the extent that, by the late 1970s, the school came to house a haemophilia centre. A distinguishing feature of this centre was that the pupil cohort could reside in the haemophilia centre whilst they received treatment.

(iii) The novel position of the haemophilia centre meant that pupils could be treated with blood product and observed in a controlled environment. The amalgamation of these factors provided the Lord Mayor Treloar Trust the opportunity to conduct research on its pupils. The Trust successfully applied for a research grant to enable this in 1967, which resulted in the appointment of Dr Rainsford specifically to conduct research in 1968.

(iv) From this date the pupil cohort was used for research into the treatment of haemophilia and the treatment's effects. As a result, the vast majority of pupils who attended Treloar's in the 1970s and 1980s were infected with hepatitis and/or HIV.

(v) A sizable volume of research projects were conducted. subsequently. From 1970 to 1973 Dr Rainsford studied the incidence of hepatitis. The objective of this study was to find any pattern in the way in which “ antibodies and antigens to hepatitis correlated with clinical illness, the frequency of transfusion and the presence of antigens in the blood products with which they were being treated”.

(vi) In 1975, this study was followed by “a prospective study of hepatitis associated with the use of Factor 8 concentrates”. The objective of this particular study was to identify if commercial concentrates have a higher attack rate then domestic concentrates. To this end, pupils received injections drawn from one batch of product over a three-month period. The aim here was not to test how hepatitis infections could be limited, but rather to observe if one particular blood product caused more hepatitis than another.

(vii) As a result of this study, pupils were administered blood concentrates that infected them with hepatitis. Dr Kirk's conclusion was that there were no significant differences between treatments between the two products. Dr Craske encouraged further study into this. Dr Rainsford's research position was extended beyond 1975 and in each year if his tenure, further studies took place.

(viii) It is important to note at this juncture that the risk of hepatitis infection from treatment with blood plasma products was well known as early as 1968. Two significant and basic principles relating to the risk of blood products were known by the late 1960s:

a) It was understood that factor concentrates were manufactured from pools of plasma provided by a number of donors and that the larger the pool of plasma used for treatment, the greater the risk of contamination. To limit the risk of contamination, it was in the interests of the treating clinician to limit the number of batches administered to their patient; and

b) It was understood that pools of plasma drawn from a populace with a lower incidence rate of infection would carry significantly less likelihood of being contaminated than pools of plasma drawn from a populace that had a high incidence rate of infection. To limit the risk of contamination, it was in the interest of the treating clinician to use NHS concentrates rather than blood products manufactured in America.

(ix) From the early 1970s, trials were also conducted into distinguishing if “ a level of Factor 8 sufficient to provide for effective clotting was maintained in the bloodstream of a pupil with haemophilia, they would not suffer from crippling bleeds”. These were known as trials of prophylactic therapy. One of the trials required the pupils to be split into two groups, one of which would be provided with a placebo dose (with a very limited clotting effect) to test the medication's effect and the other with a high dose. The UKHCDO considered this trial to be too “ ethically problematic to conduct”; this is likely because it would deprive patients from blood products that would treat them. The views of the treating clinicians at Treloars were that it was “very doubtful that the trial would be ethically acceptable at a Haemophilia Centre”, however the trial could be conducted on the school's pupils.

(x) Another trial from the 1970s tested which of three dosage regimes addressed bleeds into the knee, elbow and ankle joints most effectively. It was to identify what might be the lowest effective dose of Factor 8. The key reasons for this trial were that:

a) The cost of Factor 8 threatened its continued provision; and

b) The growing evidence that hepatitis was a common consequence of transfusion.

(xi) Each of the surviving former pupils who were treated as test subjects have each consistently maintained that neither they, nor their parents were ever provided meaningful consultation. The pupils, nor their parents, were never afforded the opportunity to consent to their treatment. Evidence provided by the Inquiry implies that Treloars went as far as to mislead parents on the treatment their children were receiving.

(xii) There was no set-procedure for informing the pupils at Treloars of their infections despite liver function tests being carried out at regular periods on blood samples taken at the time that infusions of concentrate were given to the pupils. They were either informed in the mid to late 1980s, or they were never told by the school.”

It is important to note that the Inquiry considered evidence and looked at events which took place at the college in some detail. Sir Brian Langstaff referred to Treloar's as an exemplar which, “ both illustrates and highlights the nature of, and many of the reasons for, the national treatment disaster which was infected blood”. A full account of the evidence and findings can be found at Chapter 2.2 of the IBI report.

In October 2022 the parties agreed that this application would be adjourned to the first open date after 3 months from the date of publication of the final the IBI Report. This was an obvious and sensible step given the scope of the Inquiry and nature of the evidence it considered.

Further Developments

There are further developments which it is important to record and which are referenced in Ms Wargent's witness statement. In July 2021 HM Government commissioned Sir Robert Francis KC to undertake a study into how to compensate victims of infected blood. His subsequent Report included recommendations that the Government should create a framework of tariff-based compensation for eligible infected and affected persons broadly reflective of comparable rates of common law damages. He recommended that compensation awards be made under various heads, including: impact awards, social impact awards, care awards, autonomy awards, and financial loss awards. The autonomy award was intended to meet “ the demand for aggravated damages”.

An Infected Blood Inquiry Response Expert Group was established to help design the proposed scheme....