Department of Health
MEDICINES CONTROL AGENCY
Market Towers 1 Nine Elms Lane London SW8 5NQ
Telephone 0171-273 0600
Facsimile 0171- 273 0737 .
6 July 1998

Dear Mr Medawar,

Thank you for your letter of 27 June in which you ask the Agency to confirm that it "unreservedly withdraws its refusal to disclose [the information sought] on the grounds of Exemption 13 ... " I am afraid I can give you no such confirmation. The Agency's position remains as set out in Dr Wood's letters of December 1997 and 23 January 1998 and the letters of 1 April and 27 May from Dr Jones.

Although you have said that you do not intend to appeal against the Agency's decision, I would again remind you that you have the right to ask an MP to refer your complaint to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration. It is, of course, for you to decide whether you wish to pursue that course of action.

Yours sincerely
Roy Alder
Head of Executive Support

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Mr Roy Alder, Head of Executive Support
Medicines Control Agency
Market Towers, 1 Nine Elms Lane
London SW8 5NQ 6 July 1998

Dear Mr Alder,

Thank you for your fax sent earlier today.

I hope there hasn't been any misunderstanding, but I wondered because you wrote, "Although you have said you do not intend to appeal against the Agency's decision …". In my letter of 27 June, I said I would undertake not to pursue this request "subject to the MCA confirming, within the week, that it unreservedly withdraws its refusal to disclose on the grounds of Exemption 13." As you said in your Fax, the Agency is standing by its refusal to disclose on these grounds, so that offer no longer applies. There's no need to acknowledge this note.

Yours sincerely, 

Charles Medawar
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