POL00102596
POL00102596
The Rt Hon James Arbuthnot MP
House of Commons
London
SW1A OAA
24 February 2015
Dow Somer,
Thank you for your fetter of 8" December 2014 and subsequent letters of 13" January 2015
and 22" January 2015.
You should have received a letter from Mark Davies, Post Office Director of Communications
and Corporate Affairs, also dated 13°" January 2015 which addressed most of the points in
your letter of 8" December. I asked Mark to reply to you so that he could also offer you a
personal meeting with him and Post Office representatives to discuss Post Office’s
investigation of Mrs Hamilton’s case and that of your other constituent in the Scheme. That
offer remains open: 1 do hope you will take it up, as you will then be fully informed of alt
details of the investigations. We have made the same offer to all MPs who spoke in the
Westminster Hall debate that have constituents with cases in the Scheme.
You also asked a number of questions in your letter of the 38" December 2014.
You asked about the Statute of Limitation. Limitation periods strike a balance between
giving claimants enough time to bring a court claim (typically six years) and protecting
defendants from old claims (where evidence is stale or no longer available). As the Scheme
does not affect anybody's legal rights, there is no reason why Post Office Limited should not
be able to use a limitation defence where appropriate, bearing in mind that ultimately it is
something a court will rule on.
With regards to your question about retention of data, I can assure you as I have done when
we have spoken about this twice previously, once in the presence of Alan Bates of the JFSA,
that Post Office has gone to great lengths to trace information relating to cases in the
Scheme, even those that are very old and we have no plans to destroy that information, all
of which is being provided to Second Sight and applicants as part of the process of the
Scheme.
www. postoffice.couk
POL00102596
POL00102596
You asked if I would agree to Second Sight meeting with MPs. lam content for Post Office
to organise a briefing on the Scheme for MPs, perhaps via the All Party Parliamentary Post
Office Group, that Second Sight could attend. I have asked my team to pick this up.
lam sorry that you have decided to withdraw your support for the Scheme. The success of
the Scheme rests on the commitment of all parties involved to act in good faith. I firmly
believe Post Office has done so.
Y i
Chief Executive
www.postoffice.co.uk