Walter Ralston was a fit athletic man.

He loved swimming and hill walking and played for Partick Thistle.

He started his working life as a welder in the shipyards and rose through the ranks to manage the training of all the apprentices in Govan.

Then in 1988 he required major surgery to remove a blockage in his bile duct and part of his liver was removed. The operation was carried out at Glasgow Royal Infirmary.

Mr Ralston, 52, was never able to work again.

His daughter, Kim Murray, says: "What we did not know at that time was that he had been infected with the Hepatitis C virus."

In fact, she says, her father did not even realise that he had received a blood transfusion during the surgery. Only 20 years later, when he was referred to the Beatson West of Scotland Oncology Centre with shadows on his liver, did he discover that he had the infection.

Mrs Murray said, while her father was stoical, he always knew something else was wrong with him. He suffered rashes, bloating in his abdomen, episodes of tiredness and eye problems. He kept diaries recording his symptoms and these were handed over as evidence to the Penrose Public Inquiry team.

He died six months after he was told about his diagnosis.

Like many of the patients infected with contaminated blood, Mrs Murray said the quality of her father's life was badly affected. "He still tried to swim, tried to play golf, but he would come home and have to lie down," she said.

"He kept saying 'it is not my age.' He could not work out what it was."

She understands the anger which erupted in the room where the Penrose report was published. She too felt it was a "whitewash" when she first read the findings.

Delays in screening blood donations in Scotland are described as "unfortunate" in the report. Mrs Murray said she would describe it as a tragedy. Reliance on a study which played down the risks of Hepatitis C is also considered "unfortunate" by Penrose. Mrs Murray said: "It was a human disaster."

Even if the doctor: patient relationship was different in the 1980s, Mrs Murray believes not testing her father for Hepatitis C in the wake of his operation "went below the acceptable standards for the era."

She wants to see full compensation for those people who are still living with infections, but notes it will not make any difference to her family. "My mum just misses my dad," she said. "Nothing will bring him back and that is what upsets her."

Other patients have different, but equally powerful stories. Haemophilia patient Robert Mackie, who has AIDS and Hepatitis C, has lost three relatives with haemophilia and good friends to the same illnesses.

Stephen Wheatley, a haemophiliac infected with Hepatitis C through a transfusion, has had to give up his job as a building manager and walks with a stick.

His wife Donna said her husband was devastated by the outcome of the public inquiry.

In words that apply to many, she said: "We expected more and we didn't get it, we didn't get it at all."