Milburn in MMR jam

The MMR controversy took a new twist today when a former childhood friend of Health Secretary Alan Milburn threatened to invoice him for the cost of giving single jabs to her toddler son.

Mother Michelle McFadden-Jewers, who used to borrow records by The Jam from Mr Milburn as a teenager, said she would "charge" him a total of £340 because of her anger at not being offered a choice of inoculations on the NHS.

Mrs McFadden-Jewers, 36, vowed to "embarrass" the Government into a change of policy. She described ministers' attitudes to MMR as "very patronising" and demanded: "Do they think parents are imbeciles?" Her father, Alec McFadden, a veteran Left-wing union activist, was best man at Mr Milburn's first wedding, 20 years ago, in the North-East. He claimed the Health Secretary had been a babysitter for Michelle.

Mrs McFadden-Jewers, who has had no contact with Mr Milburn in recent years, said today she had given the combined MMR vaccine - which some campaigners fear may be linked to autism - to her older son Jacob, seven, which gave him flu-like symptoms and a lump the size of a golf ball in his leg which did not go away for a year.

Benjamin, 14 months, will be given three separate jabs, each costing £80, with a further charge of £100 for a blood test. Each bill will be sent to Mr Milburn.

Labour voter Mrs McFadden-Jewers, a council officer from Gateshead, said today: "I am not expecting them to knock on the door with the money, but I want an explanation. They should offer parents a choice. This is our children's lives we are talking about.

"You feel blackmailed into having MMR. You are made to feel like a terrible mother if you don't let your children have it."