Colin Smith carries a small suitcase into the dining room of their Newport home and lays it flat on the table in the centre of the room. He pops open both latches.
His wife Jan reaches inside and pulls out a sky blue child’s blanket. She holds it close to her face, closes her eyes and inhales deeply.
“It still smells of him,” she says, softly.
“This is the blanket he was wrapped in when he died.”
Their son, also called Colin, was just seven years old when he died in January 1990. His tiny body was ravaged by Hepatitis C and AIDS.
The suitcase, much like the one most families used to own in the 1980s, is just big enough to hold all the memories of their son’s short life.
Next to the blanket, are his favourite toys including a snow globe and lots of his artwork.
Image: Jan and Colin Smith look through the suitcase containing their son’s possessions
Jan explains that Collin, loved to paint and draw and that he was very talented.
“He was 13 pounds when he died. That’s nothing is it for a seven-year-old?” Jan asks.
The question goes unanswered as a momentary silence fills the room.
Colin was born with haemophilia. The treatment for his blood clotting disorder included a product called Factor VIII.
What his parents didn’t know was that the Factor VIIIwas made in America using blood farmed from prisoners, drug addicts and sex workers.
Jan can recall all the fine details of that day clearly. Especially the cold, matter-of-fact way the bombshell news was delivered by doctors treating Collin.
“We went to the hospital,” Jan says, and they called us out into a corridor, kids running around, parents, and just told us that Colin had become [infected with] HIV.”
By this time their beautiful little boy had become very sick.
Image: Colin Smith with his toys
‘You just couldn’t pick him up’
Colin senior is still haunted by the effect the virus had on his son’s body. ‘You could see every sinew and tendon in his body,” he said.
Jan said: “I think it was about ’89 that we realised because the weight loss was incredible. And we had him home for a little while, and you couldn’t just pick him up.
“We had to use a sheepskin because it hurt him. He would say: ‘Mum you’re hurting, it’s hurting’.”
Colin was treated by Professor Arthur Bloom, who died in 1992. But in the 1980s, he was one of the country’s leading haemophiliac specialists.
However, documents shown at the Infected Blood Inquiry prove Bloom’s research carried great risks and these were never explained to Colin’s parents.
Image: Professor Arthur Bloom, who died in 1992, was one of the country’s leading haemophiliac specialists
There is a record of the first time Colin went into hospital that shows that he had never been treated for his haemophilia at this point.
Previously untreated patients were known to be useful for research as their responses to new treatments could be tracked. Patients exactly like Colin.
Also shown to the Infected Blood Inquiry was a letter from Prof Bloom to a colleague after another visit by Colin to hospital saying he’s been given Factor VIII and acknowledging that even though this was the British version there was still a risk of Hepatitis but that “this is just something haemophiliacs have to accept”.
And a letter, dated 24 June 1983, from Prof Bloom to colleagues discusses the risk of AIDS. They accept that one possible case of AIDS has been reported.
Colin’s parents are convinced their son was being used in secret trials.
Image: Colin Smith
“I think Colin was just unlucky enough to be born at the right time. Newly diagnosed haemophiliac, never been treated,” his father explained.
“Which is what we were after, because as documentation states that they are cheaper than chimpanzees, you know. You treat a chimp once, you can follow these children throughout their lives. And that’s what was going on.
“And this was going on from the ’70s. Colin was born in 1982. Yet they still infected him. How do you justify that?”
His mother said that they trusted the doctors at the time and never questioned their son’s treatment. “Just when we think back – at the time no, we didn’t. But when we think back, it was just blood tests. Blood tests, blood tests, blood tests.”
Hate campaign
The threat of HIV and AIDs was only just emerging. And this ignorance drove a hate-fuelled campaign against all those impacted.
This stigma forced Colin and Jan to move home and be shunned by some of their own community. All while still caring for their dying son.
“It became public when he needed to start school, for nursery, and all the parents protested and said: ‘We’re not having an AIDS kid in this school’, because we’ve been known as the AIDS family. We had AIDS that were [written] on the house and you’re not talking little.
“Well, it was like six-foot letters ‘AIDS DEAD’, we had crosses scraped into the door. The phone calls in the middle of the night were not very nice. They were the worst.”
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As Colin’s condition deteriorated his parents decided to bring him home for what would be his last Christmas with the family. It was against the wishes of Prof Bloom.
Jan and Colin were told haemophiliacs with AIDS should die in hospital and be cremated quickly. But the family ignored the hospital.
“And you know what,” Jan says. “He asked for a bike. And we actually got him a bike. He never rode it, obviously because he was too ill. But he wanted a bike. And I’m not going to not get him a bike. Because they all have bikes. But Colin never, never even sat on one.”
Image: Colin Smith spent his last Christmas at home, against the wishes of Professor Bloom
That difficult decision to remove Colin from hospital to spend his last days with his family at home proved to be the right one.
“He was on my lap and he just got up to you, didn’t he?” Jan says looking at her husband. “He said: ‘I can’t see, daddy. I can’t see’. And then he just lay back. My hand was on his chest.
“And, you know, for a mother to actually feel the rise and fall of his chest. Waiting for it to stop. Because that’s what I was doing.
“I was waiting for it to stop. And then it stopped. And I just said: ‘I think he’s gone’. And I remember shaking him a little bit, but he’d gone.”
Image: Jan and Colin Smith speaking to Sky News
‘I want my son to have his name back’
On Monday, Sir Brian Langstaff will deliver the long-awaited report into the infected blood scandal.
It has taken campaigners like Jan and Colin decades to achieve this. They are clear on what this report must say and how the government must respond.
Colin senior lives with the guilt of not protecting his son. He wants accountability.
“I want justice to be served properly not hypothetically. Let’s see the people who did this, hopefully criminal charges. It is manslaughter at least. I gave my son over to his killers, you know, and I can’t get to grips with that,” he says.
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6:20
Blood scandal ‘the worst thing’
For Jan, it will be recognition for a lifetime of heartbreak and grieving.
“I want people to recognise my son. And I want to be able to go to the cemetery and say, we’ve done it. And you’ve done it. That’s what I want. And I want an apology.
“People say it’s the money, it’s not the money. And I can’t get that through to people. It’s not the money. I want recognition.
“I want my son to have his name back. His name is Colin John Smith. And that’s what I want people to remember.”
Sky News will have full coverage of the infected blood report on TV, online and on the Sky News app on Monday.
Close to its many restaurants, food delivery riders are congregating on their bikes.
The area is packed with shoppers and workers.
PC Paige Gartlan is approaching with other officers. She’s on the lookout for illegally modified e-bikes – and she knows she’ll find them here.
“You can physically tell by looking at the bike that it’s generally going to be illegal – the battery pack is taped on to the sides and generally the size of the motor that’s on the back wheel,” she explains.
Sky News has been invited on an operation by West Midlands Police to find these bikes and get them off the streets.
PC Gartlan has been hit by one before. She’s had to tackle a rider to the floor after he drove into her.
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Within minutes, she’s spotted a suspicious-looking bike. The rider makes a run for it – followed by plain-clothed officers.
PC Gartlan tests the bike – it’s showing a top speed of 52km/hr on the speedometer – just over 30mph.
Image: PC Paige Gartlan with a seized e-bike
The speed limit for e-bikes in the UK is 15.5mph when using electric power for assistance.
I look up the street and another two riders have been detained. In less than an hour, officers have confiscated four bikes – all were being ridden by fast food delivery drivers.
The commotion is attracting a lot of attention.
“They are dangerous,” Sandra, who has just finished work, tells me.
Image: Demoz had his bike taken by police
She’s stood watching the riders being questioned. She says she’s had near-misses herself and is worried for the safety of the elderly and children.
It’s not just West Midlands police officers here – immigration officials are carrying out checks too. They’re involved in a nationwide operation, which has seen more than 7,000 arrests in the last year – a 50% increase on last year.
Matthew Foster, the immigration enforcement lead officer for the West Midlands, tells me they’ve already found one individual who has entered the UK unlawfully.
“He’s been detained,” he says, “to affect his removal from the UK.”
Further down the street, police are loading illegally modified bikes on to a van – they’re destined to be crushed. One of them had belonged to Demoz.
He’s on his way home, carrying a big box with the logo of one of the main fast food delivery firms on it.
He tells me he used to have an illegal bike, but he thought his new one was legal.
“I make a mistake, I have to say sorry, I will do better for the future,” he says.
I get in touch with the big delivery firms; Deliveroo, Uber Eats, and Just Eat.
Their representatives say they constantly remind workers of their safety obligations, and that they’re all working closely with the government to increase security checks on riders.
As he leaves, Demoz, now bike-free, tells me he’s thinking of changing his job.
Watching pictures of Prince Harry in Angola this week took me back to 2019, when we were there for his first visit following in Princess Diana’s footsteps.
The pictures on Wednesday looked so similar; his effortless interactions with people who face the daily dangers of landmines, and his obvious passion to help a charity that he cares deeply about.
Of course so much has happened in the six years since then, but with other headlines this week, I couldn’t help but feel like we could be looking at the beginning of a reset for Harry.
It started last Saturday night, as the story emerged of a meeting between the King’s communications secretary, Harry’s new London-based head of PR, and Harry’s most senior aide in America.
The pictures of the get-together were being sold for thousands of pounds by the paper that ran them, just one indication of the global fascination about whether father and son may be on the road to reconciliation.
Neither side are willing to go there when you ask what exactly they talked about, although I suspect some of it was much more practical than about trying to mend this fractured relationship.
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Things like trying to avoid unnecessary negative stories, for example, the kind where Harry is accused of snubbing his father because they just happen to be doing jobs on the same day.
Image: Prince Harry meets landmine victim Sandra Tigica in Angola in 2019, who Princess Diana met on her visit to Angola in 1997
It’s tricky for Harry’s camp to avoid such a situation when they don’t have sight of the King’s diary.
There’s also been the chatter about who may, or may not, have leaked the meeting.
There has been speculation around why they were out on a balcony, and who spotted the photographer in the park.
But whether it was a leak, or just a really good spot from a journalist or photographer, it’s not a bad thing for either side that we’re now all talking about whether father and son may be close to patching things up.
It did however raise other questions, about what it means for Prince William and his relationship with his brother.
So far there have been no indications of any meeting between William’s team and that of his brother.
The feelings of William also, you may think, a consideration for the King.
Image: The King and Prince Harry in 2018. Pic: PA
The unexpected headlines around Harry just kept coming, as on Tuesday he popped up in Angola.
His second visit there, this time with no press pack in tow.
So why the surprise visit?
Harry has worked with the Halo Trust for some time, and it’s clearly still a priority for them to highlight the dangers faced by those living with the potential dangers of landmines in Angola.
But it also feels like part of a push to get Harry out on more public engagements.
I’ve been told that since moving away from the UK he has continued to have regular contact with those charities with which he’s maintained ties, but being on the phone or a video call, isn’t the same as physically being there in person.
We saw something similar with his trip to China with Travalyst earlier this year, some may argue not the best choice of destination, but another example of wanting to get him physically out on visits to reinforce publicly those connections with causes that matter so much to him.
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0:51
Prince Harry follows in Diana’s footsteps
For some months now it’s felt like Meghan has regained an element of control over how she wants to be seen.
Just look at her social media accounts and the success of her “As Ever” brand.
Whether Harry for the first time would step on to the social media scene with his own public account we wait to see, although the idea of his own commercial project is more likely, with suggestions something may be in the pipeline, we wait and see what.
After a constant flow of stories in recent months relating to court cases or his ongoing row with his family, this week has felt different.
A lot has been made about Harry and Meghan establishing a new “court” and what lies behind their decision to hire new people, five years after they stepped away from royal life.
There are of course elements of the recent past that it is impossible to erase, even Harry, in his recent interview talked of how he would “love reconciliation with my family” but added, “Of course, some members of my family will never forgive me for writing a book. Of course, they will never forgive me for… lots of things.”
But it does feel like their new team are tentatively attempting to push the reset button; getting Harry out on more engagements just one way they hope to focus our minds back on to what he has always done best.
The environment secretary has pledged to halve sewage pollution from water companies by 2030.
The target – which is compared to 2024 levels – is to be announced by Steve Reed on Sunday morning – when the Labour minister is also set to appear on Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips.
The government says it is the first time ministers have set a clear target to reduce sewage pollution.
The target is part of the government’s efforts to respond to record sewage spills and rising water bills.
Ministers are also aiming to cut phosphorus – which causes harmful algae blooms – in half by 2028.
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1:38
Why sewage outflows are discharging into rivers
Mr Reed said families had watched rivers, coastlines and lakes “suffer from record levels of pollution”.
“My pledge to you: the government will halve sewage pollution from water companies by the end of the decade,” he added.
The announcement comes ahead of the publication of the Independent Water Commission’s landmark review into the sector on Monday morning.
The commission was established by the UK and Welsh governments as part of their joint response to failures in the industry, but ministers have already said they’ll stop short of nationalising water companies.
On Friday, the Environment Agency published data which showed serious pollution incidents caused by water firms increased by 60% in England last year, compared with 2023.
Meanwhile, the watchdog has received a record £189m to support hundreds of enforcement officers for inspections and prosecutions.
“One of the largest infrastructure projects in England’s history will clean up our rivers, lakes and seas for good,” Mr Reed said.
But the Conservatives have accused the Labour government of having so far “simply copied previous Conservative government policy”.
“Labour’s water plans must also include credible proposals to improve the water system’s resilience to droughts, without placing an additional burden on bill payers and taxpayers,” shadow environment secretary Victoria Atkins added.
The Rivers Trust says sewage and wastewater discharges have taken place over the weekend, amid thunderstorms in parts of the UK.
Discharges take place to prevent the system from becoming overwhelmed, with storm overflows used to release extra wastewater and rainwater into rivers and seas.
Water company Southern Water said storm releases are part of the way sewage and drainage systems across the world protect homes, schools and hospitals from flooding.
Environment Secretary Steve Reed is due to appear on Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips at 8.30am on Sky News.