| INTRODUCTION
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JL | Thank you for coming in. This is [the notetaker] who will take a note of our discussion and show it to you so you can be satisfied as to its accuracy. The note will not be verbatim but it will be reasonably full.
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| You have my letter of 6 August which sets out the procedure and gives you the main areas I wanted us to cover. Other matters may arise during the course of the interview. Are you content for me to go ahead?
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JS | Yes.
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| EVENT ITEMS
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JL | Can we start first with the complaint about your media package and claims for event items? As I understand it, you signed off your media package claims, including for entertainment items for eight months, using the same bills for three months. You have readily accepted that you should not have claimed for the event items, and you have apologised. Is that a fair summary?
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JS | Yes.
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JL | You said you shouldn't have claimed for these items. Why was that?
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JS | I accept that I have breached the rules. It was acceptable to claim for telephone, broadband and television inasmuch as access to news channels is necessary for parliamentary duties. The entertainment items were not used by me, but even if they had been they don't come within the category of things necessary for parliamentary duties.
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JL | Could you explain how you came to make this mistake eight times?
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JS | Let me show you an example of a Virgin Media bill. You have a summary on the front sheet. Behind it on the second sheet are the detailsthings that would have been justifiablealthough I have repaid some of these and the event items.
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JL | Did you look at the detailed sheet when it was included with your claim?
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JS | No, I didn't look at the claim carefully enough.
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JL | The amounts you claimed changed each month. Did you notice that?
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JS | No. I may have thought that some costs might vary, such as phone costs - but I don't think I noticed it or thought about it at the time.
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JL | What thoughts have you had on how to avoid such mistakes in future?
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JS | I am not claiming anything at the moment. But I am ensuring that I am more careful with future claims, for example with the office costs from the Incidental Expenses Provision.
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JL | Could I ask about your decision to pay back some of your media package claims? As I understand it, you decided to pay back £400 of the £553 you claimed for your media packageeverything except the basic broadband package.
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JS | As you say, this repayment went beyond the entertainment items. Basic broadband is about £25 per month. I paid back more than simply cutting back to the broadband. I wanted to pay back anything relating to the television. I didn't want arguments about the package including CBBC that my children watch.
It was a mistake, I rectified it as soon as I became aware of it. If I was trying to pull a fast one I doubt I would have chosen anything as personally embarrassing.
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JL | Thank you. Can we now therefore move on to your arrangements for your home in London?
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| ARRANGEMENTS IN LONDON
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JL | Could we start with your living arrangements in London, which you have helpfully covered in your letter of 24 February to me? Could you give me a fuller description of the accommodation and how you and your sister share it?
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JS | My letter explains how we got there. When I was elected in 1997 I had an arrangement with my sister that I would share with her and her partner in London. From 1997 to 1999, the first two years, Redditch was my main home and I claimed for London as my additional home. Throughout my period as an MP except for a period of about two years when my sister worked outside London and I had maternity leave, we have shared. We have lived in three different places.
We decided early on that we didn't want to move the children from Redditch to London. We actually had a conversation when I said that I am going to spend more of my time in London. We decided to separate the family home from my main home.
Then in 1999 when I became a Minister I had to claim London as my main home, until February 2004.
The living arrangements are that we have always just shared the house. One of the things that makes me angry is the interpretation of how we live. It is my home in London. There was a short period when I had a flat, but I didn't like it and it didn't feel like home.
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| It is a very nice three bedroom Victorian town house. One bedroom is mine, one is for my sister and her partner and there is one for the children. Downstairs there is a lounge, another reception room and a big kitchen and dining areaall of which we share. And there is a garden at the back.
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JL | Do you have a separate study?
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JS | No, I work on the kitchen table. I like people around me.
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JL | Our work on the diary did not identify many weekends or nights when your husband and your children joined you in your London home. Is that right?
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JS | Often at the weekends when I am in London the kids are with me. I would agree that this is not frequentlyit has happened less as they have grown up. My husband comes more often; he comes once a fortnight during the week to see me.
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JL | Is it right to conclude from this that your family life is not based in your London home?
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JS | My children are based in Redditchmy family is based in Redditch. What we explicitly did was to separate my family life from my work life. This is difficult for people to understand and because of this I checked up with the Fees Office.
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JL | So is your principal use of the London home for your parliamentary business?
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JS | I would say that the key element has been for Ministerial business. When I became a Minister in 1999, London had to be your main home. In 2004 when I had to think about it I realised that if you are a Minister most of your life is your work and most of your time you spend where your work is. I thought, should I change? but decided that something needed to qualitatively change to justify a change of designation. I didn't think it likely that I would spend less time in London. Nothing big enough had changed.
London is my home for parliamentary/ministerial duties.
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JL | You said that there is a third bedroom partly so that your children can have a room to sleep in when they come up for school holidays and for weekends. How does that work?
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JS | When they come up that is where they sleep. It is one of the reasons why we movedso that we could have somewhere proper for them to stay. But they don't leave things there. Twice a month [another child] stays in it.
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JL | Do you use the house for entertaining?
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JS | Not very much. If I entertain I am more likely to do it at a restaurant. But famouslyif you read the mediaI have entertained some of my colleagues there. I also have friends who come and stay. We spent Christmas there and New Year. The kids bring their friends
my son brought a friend.
It is more than visiting a sister or the children visiting an aunt. They wouldn't have to ask permission or to be invited.
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JL | But you don't entertain very frequently?
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JS | In terms of frequency this happens every couple of months.
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JL | What happens to your sister and partner when you entertain?
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JS | Sometimes they go out; sometimes they join in; sometimes they are in the front room watching television while we eat.
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JL | You pay a rent, contribute to bills such as utilities and cleaning, you buy the TV licence, you have bought fixtures, fittings and furniture throughout the house, and you paid £1,000 as a share of having a new boiler. Is that right?
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JS | Yes.
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JL | Whose name are the utility bills in? How are they split between you and your sister?
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JS | They are probably in my sister's name. Arrangements are slightly informal. Her partner pays for a cleaner. I give money on top of my £700 for example occasionally to get repairs done. I say "I'll get this lot done. I'll do one lot, you do another."
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JL | What fixtures, fittings and furniture have you bought for the home?
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JS | I have bought two beds, a TV, washing machine, crockery, cutlery, two duvets and pillows, chairs; I have paid for decoration, towels, a chest of drawers, a boiler and repairs.
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JL | Who decides how the main rooms are decorated and painted?
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JS | Me and my sister. She is more artistic, so she would decideexcept for my bedroom . But I am consulted.
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JL | What are the council tax arrangements?
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JS | I believe my sister pays. I haven't contributed.
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JL | I see that you only reported the change in your main home to your current London address in March this year (11 months after you moved). Paragraph 3.11.1 of the Green Book says that it is the Member's responsibility to tell the Fees Office if your main home changes. Paragraph 3.12.1 asks you to inform the Department promptly. How did you come to overlook that requirement?
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JS | I failed in my responsibility. When we moved I didn't change my designation. I accept that I breached that rule.
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JL | How would your husband and children describe your London home in terms of whose home it is?
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JS | I think they would just call it London. They don't identify whose home it is. They just think of it as London.
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| ARRANGEMENTS IN REDDITCH
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JL | Can we now turn to your arrangements in Redditch? Can you describe the accommodation to me?
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JS | We have a lounge and dining room and a large kitchen. We have four bedrooms, and one bathroom (just as we do in London) but the garden is bigger in Redditch than in London. There is a drive and a garage. It is a nice large detached four bedroom house.
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JL | Your claims come under the headings of mortgage interest, utility bills, Council Tax, phone and telecommunications, service and maintenance, repairs and cleaning. Are there ACA items which you could claim but don't in fact claim for?
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JS | Over the period that is what I have claimed for, but I haven't claimed for every month in every category. I haven't claimed for food or subsistence.
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JL | How do you decide what to claim for?
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JS | We always claim for mortgage interest and council tax and utilities although not always the whole utility bills. We claim for telephone, maintenance and cleaning. But the costs are greater than the maximum of the allowance. It is a matter of choosing what to claim for when we reach the ceiling.
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JL | Who chooses the furniture and decoration?
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JS | My husbandbut I am consulted, similar to in London.
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JL | You claim for the full Council Tax from your ACA. Why do that if you don't live there yourself?
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JS | It never crossed my mind to apply for a discount. It would be weird to take money from my constituents to make a saving for the mass of taxpayers. It never crossed my mind to do this. I always thought that the single person discount was for if there was one person in a home. I think of myself as living there.
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JL | Would your constituents, if asked, and knowing what you have told me, see you as having your main home in Redditch or in London?
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JS | That is quite interesting. Some think that the Home Secretary is in London the whole time. If I meet them on a Saturday they would say "Have you come down from London today?" They think I live in London.
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JL | But if they had the information we have been discussing today?
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JS | Probably quite a few would say your main home is where your children are. That is precisely why I checked with the Fees Office.
But if you are Home Secretary you do and should spend most of your time in London. I was making claims on the basis of my individual circumstances, not my family circumstances.
I honestly don't knowit depends on how they were thinking about me.
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| THE GREEN BOOK: DEFINITIONS
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JL | I would like now to turn to the rules in the Green Book. The first statement is that the location of your main home is normally a matter of fact. What do you say to the suggestion that it's a simple matter of fact that your main home is in Redditch?
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JS | I don't necessarily think that is the case. The most important thing from 1999 until June this year has been my Ministerial role and my Ministerial work. The default position is that I am doing my Ministerial work; that I am in London and working.
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JL | How much were you influenced in your decision about your main home by your judgement about where you were going to be spending your nights?
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JS | I knew the definition was about nights. I didn't count up, except to think "Where do I have to be?" I thought timewise the demands on me were to be in London. But I didn't count up the nights.
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JL | Did you take account of the fact that on becoming Home Secretary and had a driver you could now get back to Redditch more easily?
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JS | Yes, once I became Home Secretary and had protection and had a car it became easier to get back to Redditch. If I needed to be in London for 9am I could not manage before. But I could when I had the driver.
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JL | Would you agree that as soon as you could manage the travelling, there was a pull to spend more time with the family?
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JS | Yes, anybody would do that. When I could I travelled to Redditch to spend the night there.
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JL | You know that the Ministerial requirement about assuming your main home was London was abolished in 2004. So could you explain more fully than you did in your letter of 26 March why you said it influenced you in counting London as your main home? Why did you make the assumption that it was necessary to have a significant change rather than reverting back to your original designation?
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JS | I believed the change related more to Ministers with no real base in London, for whom the old rule was clearly wrong. I thought about what determined my home. And I thought about my likely overnight stays in the year, as a Minister based in London.
If I had changed designation when the rule was lifted I would have been asked why. Was it to save me money?
It was not just inertia. It seemed to me that you needed a justification to change. If asked the question, would I really have said that as Home Secretary I spent more time in Redditch than in London?
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JL | But the test is based on nights. You spent more nights in Redditch over the last two years.
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JS | It changed in the last year [2008-09]. I could not have known in advance.
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JL | Do you accept that it was starting to change earlier?
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JS | I agree it changed.
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JL | As a matter of principle do you accept that you were not bound to identify London as your main home?
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JS | Well, having gone through the process I considered it would be more difficult to justify having my homes the other way round.
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JL | Do you accept that the rule says "normally" , and the position on overnight stays does allow for exceptions?
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JS | I remember your report on Ed Balls and Yvette Cooper. The number of nights is a reasonable test.
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JL | At the same time the exception enabled Members to take account of their personal circumstances.
To recap, just to make sure I have got this right: your decision was not based on the number of nights but on your personal circumstances and your living arrangements. Even after you were spending more nights in Redditch, you still thought of your London home as your main home.
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JS | I was living with my sister. That is why my arrangements have attracted criticism.
I had the opportunity to share with my sister. I wasn't just renting a room. We have a close relationship.
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JL | After you became Home Secretary in 2007 did you consider that you were likely to spend more time in Redditch than in London?
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JS | Based on looking forward, I made my best judgement on the basis of where I expected to stay. But I didn't count up the nights, and I couldn't plan for unexpected events.
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JL | You will have considered the likely balance of stays between London and Redditch, and all your personal circumstances, with your family in Redditch and, as you said in a statement earlier this year, you are a close knit family. Is that not just the sort of circumstances which suggest you should have seen yourself as an exception to the general rule on overnight stays and located your main home in Redditch?
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JS | My sister is part of my close knit family.
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JL | Haven't you also said that your "nuclear" family is close knit?
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JS | I like to think so, although looking back I realise in practice I have spent a lot of time away from them as a result of my ministerial duties.
I didn't question the designation when I became Home Secretary. If I was aware of it I might have thought about changing my designation. But I would have to have thought about it carefully.
I would have to have thought carefully about where I would spend my nights as Home Secretary and the difference in where I spent the nights. I wasn't in Redditch as much as I had been.
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JL | Were you aware that since becoming Home Secretary your pattern of overnight stays was changing in favour of your constituency home?
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JS | London was where I was most of the time.
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JL | Once you had to base your identification of your main home on the facts rather than the ministerial presumption, were you still right to identify your main home as London? The number of nights spent there grew smaller once you became Home Secretary.
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JS | At the time when I became Home Secretary something qualitative would have had to happen to make me change the designation. Nothing did happen.
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JL | Had you been aware, would you have considered changing the designation of your main home from London to the constituency?
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JS | I felt that I was spending much more time in London. I wanted somewhere that felt like a home.
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JL | But the police figures showed something different, with more nights spent in the constituency. Between the police figures and the diary estimates there is a big difference. Why do you think there is such a big difference?
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JS | The police figures were collected for a different purpose. I believe the combination of my Ministerial and personal diaries are likely to be more accurate.
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JL | The police figures are collected because they need to pay staff accurately, to show who is on duty when. With your figures we had to make certain assumptions.
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JS | There were likely to have been similar issues with the police figures. There could be some double counting. The figures were kept for the purposes of accountancy not to identify police officers' locations. They were accurate enough to show how many staff they had on protection teams at any point but not necessarily where they were allocated.
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JL | The definition of a main home changed significantly in April 2009. The number of nights is no longer the test. It is for the Member to decide with no qualifying criteria. Have you reconsidered the designation of your main home in the light of this change in the rules?
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JS | No, for the same reason that applied in 2004. There would need to have been a qualitative change in my circumstances.[2]
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| CONSULTING THE DFA
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JL | May I turn to the telephone conversation your husband had with the Fees Office on 18 June 2007, recorded briefly in the file note I sent you on 21 May. Is this a reasonable summary?
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JS | Yes.
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JL | Do you accept that this suggests you had doubts in your mind??
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