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A memo to the Minister for Health and Community Care set out the Government's position to date - "that there is no fault on the part of the NHS because patients received the best treatment available given the state of knowledge at the time" - and it set out an initial overview of the events in the mid 1980s.

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The Scottish Office's Health Care Policy Division wrote to an individual stating that the needs of people "whose condition results from inadvertent harm" were met from benefits available to the population in general.

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Sam Galbraith, Minister of State in the Scottish Office, wrote to Michael Martin MP referring to those infected with Hepatitis C as "sufferers, whose conditions have resulted from inadvertent harm".

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A draft reply from Susan Deacon to an MP asserted that "the risks of not receiving the transfusion were apparently deemed to outweigh the risk of any infection being transmitted" and the "resultant transmission of Hepatitis C was a tragic but inadvertent consequence of this balance of risks."

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Minutes from a meeting held on 30 May 2000 between Susan Deacon and ministers recorded the decisions made at the meeting. Susan Deacon was keen to "move on" with publication of the report on the Heat Treatment of Blood Products.

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A letter prepared on behalf of Susan Deacon to accompany the publication of the report on Heat Treatment of Blood Products repeated expressions of sympathy to those infected through blood products.

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Dr (later Professor) Aileen Keel was a senior medical officer in the SHHD during this time.

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In her written statement Professor Aileen Keel stated she had been against financial compensation for those infected with Hepatitis C describing it as a "dangerous precedent."

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In her written statement Professor Aileen Keel stated that she "regretted" the judgment of Mr Justice Burton had "forced" a move away from the principle of no negligence, no compensation.

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In oral evidence Professor Aileen Keel confirmed she carried out a weekly general haematology clinic with Dr (later Professor) Christopher Ludlam at Edinburgh Royal Infirmary.

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In oral evidence Professor Aileen Keel explained the basis for her view that the treatment provided had been the best available in light of medical knowledge at the time.

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In oral evidence Professor Aileen Keel acknowledged that the "best treatment available" line encompassed not only those infected through blood products but also those infected through transfusion, for whom the "very best efforts" of the PFC and BPL were irrelevant.

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Professor Aileen Keel stated in her oral evidence that "In 1984, there was only just the beginnings of the emergence of the possibility that that virus [ie AIDS] could be transmitted by blood products."

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Professor Aileen Keel's oral evidence in relation to non-A non-B Hepatitis was that "If we had known in 1984 what we now know about the impact of non-A, non-B hepatitis, then maybe the choice would have been to choose cryoprecipitate, but we didn't know that then."

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Professor Aileen Keel suggested in her oral evidence that the "untenability" of the no compensation position arose from the fact that there was an increasing degree of lobbying from organisations such as the Haemophilia Society.

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Professor Aileen Keel, when asked if the commercial concentrates given to the children at Yorkhill were the best available treatment in light of medical knowledge at the time, answered: "I suppose with hindsight the answer is no."

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Professor Aileen Keel told the Inquiry that she knew from her own clinical practice in Glasgow, doing clinics with Professor Lowe, that the practice there was to to inform patients of the result of a test if they were found to be HCV positive.

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In oral evidence, Professor Aileen Keel said that during an investigation into how people with haemophilia were infected with Hepatitis C, what was said by Professor Gordon Lowe in respect of a policy to inform patients that they were being tested and the results, was accepted at face value.

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In oral evidence, Professor Keel stated that the Advisory Committee on the Virological Safety of Blood ("ACVSB") had considered this issue over a number of years, on each occasion agreeing that ALT testing should not be introduced because of the poor specificity of the test.

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Professor Keel raised the issue of compensation following the draft report circulated by Christina Dora. During oral evidence Professor Keel said it was important to raise this as it was a material issue that had been discussed,.

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