Primodos campaigners accuse government of ‘bullying and intimidation’ over legal demand
For nearly 50 years campaigners have fought for recognition that a pregnancy test drug called Primodos, given to them by their GPs, damaged babies in the womb.
Earlier this year High Court Judge Mrs Justice Yip ruled there was insufficient new evidence to support their claim, and the claimants did not have the funds nor legal representation to take their challenge further, after their solicitors dropped the case.
The case was struck out, leaving the claimants potentially liable for costs.
Now they have been sent a letter by lawyers representing the Department Of Health and drug manufacturer Bayer saying that, unless they commit to never making another claim, they will have to pay the legal bills of the lawyers used to block their joint action.
Marie Lyon, from the Association for Children Damaged by Hormone Pregnancy Tests, told Sky News: “It constitutes bullying and intimidation.
“They want us to sign a form to say we will never ever initiate any legal action in the future no matter what kind of evidence emerges.
“Otherwise, they will slap that £10m plus on our families. I am absolutely disgusted with our government – not only did they damage us initially, but now they are actually asking us to pay for it.”
The drug was given out by GPs to pregnant women in the 1960s and 70s but withdrawn from the market in 1978 after concerns were raised in the scientific community about an association between the drug and malformations.
However, the first attempted legal challenge against the manufacturers in 1982 failed.
In 2017, an Expert Working Group of the UK’s Commission on Human Medicines published a report concluding that the available scientific data did not support the existence of a causal relationship between the use of hormones in pregnancy and an increased incidence of congenital anomalies in babies.
However, the then prime minister, Theresa May felt the body of the report also contained evidence that there might be an association.
She commissioned an independent review, led by Baroness Cumberlege, not just to look at the drug but also the way in which it was regulated in the UK.
The findings of that report, published in July 2020, were highly critical of the regulatory system – and suggested Primodos should have been withdrawn from the UK market 10 years earlier than it was.
It found Hormone Pregnancy Tests caused “avoidable harm” and said the government should apologise and set up a system of redress.
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May 2023: Primodos families lose legal bid
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The government did apologise, but shortly after, the Department Of Health hired lawyers, sided with the German manufacturer, and ensured that a new the legal claim from families was struck out of the courts.
All this led to a debate in Parliament on Thursday where Mrs May told the House, that mothers wrongly felt guilty about taking the drug and damaging their babies.
She said: “This drug was given to them by their GPs, and I hope the minister will stand up this afternoon and say very clearly the women who took Primodos, whose children suffered, were at no fault whatsoever, and should not feel guilty at all. The fault lay with the NHS.”
Leader of the Liberal Democrats Ed Davey said: “This is in my view potentially one of the biggest cover-ups of a pharmaceutical outrage the world has ever seen.”
Jacob Rees-Mogg pointed to findings from a previous Sky News investigation saying: “This drug was used in South Korea, and in Germany, as an abortifacient.
“It was used to procure abortions. Well, what is a drug that will do that doing to a baby?”
Until now the government has said it has not been able to discuss issues of redress due to the legal claim against it.
The Minister for Women’s Health Maria Caulfield has offered to meet the families and in regard to the letter about legal costs said: “The letter that’s gone out to those taking part in court cases – I will look at that – because I don’t want to be in a position where people feel they cannot get justice simply because they cannot afford to do so.”
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Primodos: A Bitter Pill
The SNP’s Hannah Bardell blamed the failed legal action on the solicitors who pulled out of representing the claimants.
“They’ve been done over – and I am going to use my parliamentary privilege here – by a company called Pogust Goodhead,” she said.
“Now they approached the Primodos campaign, they approached them to take over the case, they then got cold feet and decided to drop the claimants and the victims when they didn’t fancy their chances of winning.
“Not only to compound that, they went on to withhold the documents that constituents like mine, Wilma Ord, had presented to them and given to them to pursue the case.
“That prevented the campaign from being able to find other legal representation and fundamentally has meant that the campaign was unsuccessful in court. That in my view is a hostile and odious move by any legal firm.”
When Sky News previously approached the legal firm with this allegation in April this year, Pogust Goodhead said: “We refute the suggestion that we are withholding information to damage this case.
“We are aware that the claimants have been provided with 1,256 pages of legal documents containing information which should assist with their search for legal representation and funding.
“We have not been notified that there is another law firm on the court record as acting for any of the individuals we represented. We are bound by a duty of confidentiality and must adhere to strict rules in relation to disclosure of any former client’s documentation.
“We poured extensive resources into this case because we care deeply about the injustice and harm caused to any victim of wrongdoing that has resulted in injury.”
The manufacturer Schering, now owned by Bayer, has always denied that their drug caused harm to babies in the womb and point to the findings of the 2017 Expert Working Group report.
It added: “Since the discontinuation of the legal action in 1982, Bayer maintains that no significant new scientific knowledge has been produced which would call into question the validity of the previous assessment of there being no link between the occurrence of such congenital anomalies.”
It has become almost impossible to book a driving test on the government website due to bots on the booking system, driving instructors have told Sky News.
The only official way to book a practical car driving test is through the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) website.
New test slots are released by the DVSA at 6am every Monday, but “no matter how fast I am, there’s nothing available”, said Aman Sanghera, a driving instructor based in west London.
Driving instructor Aman Sanghera wants ‘stronger oversight and regulation’ from the DVSA
When asked about the cause, she said: “All of the tests are taken by bots, they are definitely taking over the booking system.”
In this context, bots are automated software designed to mimic human behaviour and programmed to carry out actions like searching for and reserving driving test appointments on the official government website much faster than humans can.
Individuals and companies use bots to block-book driving test slots and then resell them at a profit, which is not illegal, although it is a violation of the DVSA’s terms of use.
Recent data shows the DVSA has closed over 800 business accounts for misuse of its booking service in the past two years.
It takes five months on average for a test in England – unless you pay a middleman
Ms Sanghera, who has been in the trade for over a decade, said the usage of bots started a few months ago “but is now getting out of hand”.
She said: “I’ve actually heard about driving instructors being approached by certain individuals to then take on their IDs to log in and to run this scam.
“I struggle to actually book a test for my students, which means that by the time my students are logging in, they’ve got no chance.”
Driving instructors can book driving tests on behalf of their pupils using a dedicated service, allowing them to bypass the general queue and potentially secure test slots more efficiently.
As a result, Ms Sanghera said students are “forced to go to third-party sites” to secure “the same test dates which are then available later on during the day at a premium rate of like £200-£300”.
She added: “Given that the DVSA is a government-regulated body, one would expect a more robust and fair system to ensure affordability and accessibility for all candidates.”
The long waiting lists and high demand for tests has led some to take advantage
The standard test fee is £62, offered by the DVSA, which is responsible for carrying out driving tests in Great Britain.
The biggest concern for the driving instructors Sky News has spoken to, including Ms Sanghera, is “the fact that students are being exploited”.
When Ahmed Ali struggled to find a practical test on the DVSA website, he turned to third-party sites – a decision he now regrets.
Ahmed Ali started looking for a test two years ago
He said: “I’ve spent about £650 on driving tests, and I’ve sat zero tests. I’ve given all this money to third-parties that look for cancellations so they could try to get you a faster test.”
But the 20-year-old said that despite making the payments, he “didn’t hear back from them again”, which is illegal.
“When you lose all that money, you get to a point where you can’t really afford to find another driving test,” he said.
“I just feel very frustrated because I’ve spent all this money, all this time into driving, and I haven’t sat a single driving test.”
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The DVSA urged applicants to only book tests via the official Gov.uk website and told Sky News it “deploys enhanced bot protection to help stop automated systems from buying up tests unfairly”.
“These applications, however, are constantly evolving and changing, and DVSA’s work on this is ongoing,” it said.
From Tuesday, the DVSA will require learner drivers to provide 10 full working days’ notice to change or cancel their car driving test without losing the test fee, up from the current three days.
Also part of the DVSA’s crackdown to reduce waiting times is a consultation expected to launch in spring 2025 “to streamline the driving test booking process” and “tighten terms and conditions”.
The last blast furnaces left operating in Britain could see their fate sealed within days, after their Chinese owners took the decision to cut off the crucial supply of ingredients keeping them running.
Jingye, the owner of British Steel in Scunthorpe, has, according to union representatives, cancelled future orders for the iron ore, coal and other raw materials needed to keep the furnaces running.
The upshot is that they may have to close next month – even sooner than the earliest date suggested for its closure.
Read more: Thousands of jobs at risk as British Steel consults unions over closure
The fate of the blast furnaces – the last two domestic sources of virgin steel, made from iron ore rather than recycled – is likely to be determined in a matter of days, with the Department for Business and Trade now actively pondering nationalisation.
The upshot is that even as Britain contends with a trade war across the Atlantic, it is now working against the clock to secure the future of steelmaking at Scunthorpe.
The talks between the government and Jingye broke down last week after the Chinese company, which bought British Steel out of receivership in 2020, rejected a £500m offer of public money to replace the existing furnaces with electric arc furnaces.
The sum is the same one it offered to Tata Steel, which has shut down the other remaining UK blast furnaces in Port Talbot and is planning to build electric furnaces – which have far lower carbon emissions.
These steel workers could soon be out of work
However, the owners argue that the amount is too little to justify extra investment at Scunthorpe, and said last week they were now consulting on the date of shutting both the blast furnaces and the attached steelworks.
Since British Steel is the main provider of steel rails to Network Rail – as well as other construction steels available from only a few sites in the world – the closure would leave the UK more reliant on imports for critical infrastructure sites.
However, since the site belongs to its Chinese owners, a decision to nationalise the site would involve radical steps government officials are wary of taking.
They also fear leaving taxpayers exposed to a potentially loss-making business for the long run.
The dilemma has been heightened by the sharp turn in geopolitical sentiment following Donald Trump’s return to the White House.
The incipient trade war and threatened cut in American support to Europe have sparked fresh calls for countries to act urgently to secure their own supplies of critical materials, especially those used for defence and infrastructure.
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Gareth Stace, head of UK Steel, the industry lobby group, said: “Talks seem to have broken down between government and British Steel.
“My advice to government is: please, Jonathan Reynolds, Business Secretary, get back round that negotiating table, thrash out a deal, and if a deal can’t be found in the next few days, then I fear for the very future of the sector, but also here for Scunthorpe steelworks.”
British Steel declined to comment.
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