Claire Souter

Comms professional and certified member of @IOIC_Scotland 🌟
Passionate about people, story-telling, pizza and Moana 🌸

[Claire Souter @ClaireSouter_]

On the day we find out when #ContaminatedBlood inquiry will launch its final report, thought it was worth sharing this again about my dad. Real people are dying every day, justice is needed now.

[Claire Souter @ClaireSouter_]

@NickTorfaen When do you intend to announce the details for the interim compensation for the deceased victims of infected blood? Announcing it with no timeline has caused even more stress and harm to the community. Please do the right thing.

[Claire Souter @ClaireSouter_]

@NickTorfaen When do you intend to announce the details for the interim compensation for the deceased victims of infected blood? Announcing it with no timeline has caused even more stress and harm to the community. Please do the right thing.

[Claire Souter @ClaireSouter_]

@NickTorfaen When do you intend to announce the details for the interim compensation for the deceased victims of infected blood? Announcing it with no timeline has caused even more stress and harm to the community. Please do the right thing.

[Claire Souter @ClaireSouter_]

@IBCA_UK I'd be happy to volunteer my services to read over your responses to help you get it right, as I am not sure you are grasping how much your comms are directly affecting mental health and making this process much more difficult. Please, for our sake and yours, try harder. 🖤

[Claire Souter @ClaireSouter_]

@IBCA_UK As a comms professional it is hard to sit back and watch these convoluted statements and responses when some honesty and empathy would make things so much easier for the community and the team.

[Claire Souter @ClaireSouter_]

@DezAndJax 👏👏👏👏

[Claire Souter @ClaireSouter_]

Please, please, please @BBC can we have a spin-off series on Brian and Melvyn? Nation's sweethearts 🤍🗺 #RaceAcrossTheWorld

[Sophy Ridge @SophyRidgeSky]

We'll be starting tonight's #PoliticsHub with a name. Colin John Smith.
He was named after his dad. Colin was born in Newport in 1982, so he would be around the same age as me if he was still alive.
But Colin was a victim of the infected blood scandal, and he died when he was just seven years old.
It feels really important that we start tonight’s programme with Colin, because there will be lots of time for the politics, but it’s Colin’s story I can’t get out of my head.
Colin had haemophilia, and his treatment involved a product called Factor VIII.
But Factor VIII was made in America using blood taken from prisoners and drug addicts.
They didn’t tell that to Colin’s parents at the time, of course. They thought they were doing the best they could for their little boy.
But that treatment infected Colin with HIV.
He became very ill. He lost weight. His parents couldn’t even pick him up without it hurting him. They tried to, though, using a sheepskin rug.
When he asked for a bike, they bought one for him. He couldn’t ride it, of course. He never even sat on it. But his friends all had bikes, so Colin had one too.
And there was a lot of stigma around aids at that time.
Other parents protested when it was time for Colin to start school, because they didn’t want a boy with Aids in the classroom.
Someone wrote “aids dead” in six foot letters on their house. There were phone calls in the middle of the night. “They were the worst,” according to Colin’s parents.
When he died, he was seven years old, and he weight just 13 pounds. 13 pounds.
His parents have a suitcase of his things. A sky blue blanket. A snow globe that he loved. And lots and lots of his artwork, because he loved to draw and paint.
So I want to start the programme with the name Colin John Smith, because that’s the name his parents want people to remember.

https://t.co/CAorYMk7S5

[Claire Souter @ClaireSouter_]

Thinking of all those victims, including my precious dad, who never got to see this day finally arrive.

[Kaya Burgess @kayaburgess]

Not often you get such total unanimity across front pages #tomorrowspaperstoday

[Rishi Sunak @RishiSunak]

On behalf of this and every Government stretching back to the 1970s, I am truly sorry.

[Shaun Lintern @ShaunLintern]

ITV will make a four-part TV series on the infected blood scandal, written by double BAFTA winner Peter Moffat.

[Claire Souter @ClaireSouter_]

@AvantiWestCoast Thanks. I received that email. I am looking to transfer the tickets to secure another train and therefore seats, it's a v long journey and travelling with two elderly passengers. Don't want to show up for a train where there may be no seats. Can you help?

[The Good Grief Trust @goodgrieftrust]

Take Them With You. 🧡’death need not stop life’

This is the last page in a new book ‘LOSS’.

A book of grief poems, to help stay afloat.
@Donna_ashworth
#Grief

[Claire Souter @ClaireSouter_]

👇😢

[The Haemophilia Society's Inquiry Team @HaemoSocUK_PI]

Jamie Dawson KC, speaking on behalf of 293 individual core participants, Haemophilia Scotland and the Scottish Infected Blood Forum, said 104 registrants with the Scottish Infected Blood Support Scheme had died since the Infected Blood Inquiry was announced in 2017.

[The Good Grief Trust @goodgrieftrust]

‘Love came first’ @Donna_ashworth 🧡

[Claire Souter @ClaireSouter_]

🖤

[The Good Grief Trust @goodgrieftrust]

This is one of our most popular posts this week 🧡🌲🧡🌲#norules #nojudgement Do it your way.

[Claire Souter @ClaireSouter_]

I have always loved Christmas, my mum + dad always made it so magical for us. Trying to keep that magic alive this year, despite one very important person missing. It's not easy, and my heart breaks a wee bit more every day, but I feel him everywhere 🖤