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From: Jane MacLeod <jane.macleodI_
To: Patrick Bourke <patrick.bourk¢
Ce: Mark Underwood 1 <mark.underwood I
<rodric.williams~ GRO r
>, Rodric Williams
Subject: Re: Subject to Legal Privilege: Tim/Minister
Date: Fri, 8 Jul 2016 15:36:57 +0000
Importance: Normal
Thanks
I think Tom W needs to be aware of the proposal given Laura's earlier email to him.
Tf Laura thinks we should brief BIS on the litigation, then fine, although frankly they should be trying to
distance themselves from it, and any briefing must be verbal. Suggest Andy Parsons should be involved in
any such briefing as well as Rod.
Jane MacLeod
General Counsel
The Post Office.
Sent from my iPad
On 8 Jul 2016, at 13:58, Patrick Bourke <patrick.bourk Z
Jane
As promised, I spoke to Laura Thompson about any developments she might have to report on how best to
communicate the shift in focus to the litigation and away from the review. This follows her catch up with BNR
yesterday and an exchange between Richard and Tim.
The necessary shift towards the litigation was raised with her at yesterday's meeting with other matters ina
general catch up. Perhaps inevitably, she expressed a wish to hear about this from TP direct at their meeting on
19/7, to better understand the reasons underpinning the legal advice from TRQC, and more generally get his take
on the way forward.
I did not sense there was a likelihood of challenge as such and that actually what is being sought at that meeting
is a) a sense of ‘involvement on the part of BNR rather than simply being the recipient of a notification; and b)
some reassurance thatthe business remains across this issue. This chimes with what BIS have previously
suggested works for BNR. She did apparently ask whether we had made an assessment of the chances of success
of the claims against us but Laura told her it was too early which must fortuitously be right.
The suggestion is that a decision on whether or not a letter should be sent to confirm the move could be taken
at, or in the light of, that meeting.
Laura reports Tim as having been relaxed about the choreography when speaking or emailing with Richard, and I
think it's therefore ok to assume proceeding as above would 'suit' all parties.
Separately, Laura has suggested that it might be useful for a briefing meeting to take place between PO legal (inc
as necessary external) and one of the BIS lawyers. I think they are just wanting to gain as much visibility of where
things stand which is understandable, though we are, of course, independent of BIS.
With that in mind, I said that I could see there might be value in this but that a useful precursor to any meeting
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might involve a conversation between, eg, Rod and the BIS lawyer so that we might at least know the ground
they'd like to cover and take a view from there.
If you agree on both, can I suggest that Rod (and Andy P) and Mark work ona short brief for the TP/BNR meeting
which can feed into whoever is pulling it all together (suspect Mike Granville); and that Rod email Laura so that
an introduction can be made to the relevant BIS lawyer ?
Do you want to copy Tom W into this exchange at this stage ?
Best wishes
Patrick
Sent from my Windows Phone
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