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In her oral evidence to the Inquiry, Dr Rowena Jecock confirmed that the Department of Health did not have sight of the Archer Inquiry report before publication.

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Dr Rowena Jecock, the head of blood policy within the Department of Health, sent a note to the Minister of State for Public Health, Dawn Primarolo, summarising the report's recommendations and setting out the policy team's "Initial Reactions" to each of them.

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Dr Rowena Jecock asked for input from colleagues across the Department of Health, the Department of Work and Pensions, the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency, and officials in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland on the recommendations of the Archer Inquiry.

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Dr Rowena Jecock strongly recommended that there should be no immediate commitment to a timetable for response to the Archer Inquiry report, and that the necessary consultation, costing of options, and decision time "may require three months." Dawn Primarolo also annotated the note, commenting: "This report is poor I think", referring to Dr Jecock's report and not to the Archer report itself.

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The Minister's Assistant Private Secretary, Morven Smith, suggested that a reasonable one-off additional payment for the Macfarlane Trust would be between £7.5-8 million.

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In a note to Morven Smith, Dawn Primarolo wrote "It is clearly not acceptable in such tragic & unique circumstances for DH [the Department of Health] to claim no liability and no more money to Trust."

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A note from Dawn Primarolo's Private Secretary documenting a discussion between them, recorded "Proper Report ASAP", "what's in place 2 never happen again?" and "much clearer how much + why fund."

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In a note to Dr Rowena Jecock, Morven Smith wrote that the Minister of State for Public Health "has seen this report and is very concerned about the contamination of NHS blood and blood products during the 1970s and 1980s. She is particularly concerned about how this issue has been handled. The Minister feels that it is clearly not acceptable in such tragic and unique circumstance for DH [Department of Health] to claim no liability and to give no more money to the Trusts."

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In a memo, Dr Rowena Jecock wrote regarding the Archer report that "We do not accept all his criticisms, but official documents do show problems at various times in the development of UK capabilities for manufacture of blood products" and acknowledged the judgment in A and Others v National Blood Authority commenting that "the UK could have introduced screening or surrogate tests for hepatitis C earlier than it did."

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The Minister of State for Public Health annotated a note regarding the Archer Inquiry report with the comment "What about more money?"

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Morven Smith sent emails containing further follow-up questions on the Minister's behalf on the Archer report.

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Dawn Primarolo met officials from the Health Protection team working on blood policy, following which the team were tasked with providing further information and analysis in order to formulate a response to the Archer report.

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An early day motion had been tabled for 3 March 2009 by Edward O'Hara MP regarding the Archer report.

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Baroness Glenys Thornton, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health in the Lords, answered a parliamentary question from Lord Alf Morris about when the Government expected to respond to the Archer report.

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It was suggested that the Government would respond to the Archer report when they had given the report the consideration it deserved.

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Dawn Primarolo had answered a Parliamentary Question regarding compensation for people with haemophilia who had been infected.

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A briefing had been given by Dr Rowena Jecock ahead of the planned meeting between Lord Archer, Dawn Primarolo and Alan Johnson.

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An email from Penelope Irwin had asked ministers for further advice regarding the different schemes and any alternatives to adopting Lord Archer's recommendations and to reassess financial relief for those affected.

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Lord Morris had made an amendment to the Health Bill to establish a committee as Lord Archer had recommended.

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A memo from Dr Jecock to Alan Johnson and Dawn Primarolo stated that the proposed amendment by Lord Morris, to establish a committee as Lord Archer had recommended, had been withdrawn.

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