A scandal dating back to the 1990s recently gained the nationwide attention it deserves, but only after ITV aired a four-part drama series- Mr. Bates vs the Post Office: The Real Story- from 1 to 4 January 2024. The growing public anger that followed generated a petition for Paula Vennells, former Post Office Chief Executive (2012-2019) to be stripped of her CBE, awarded for “services to the Post Office and charity” in 2019, attracting a million signatures within the first four days. Her continued retention of this honour was the reason why the aforementioned Alan Bates turned down an offer of OBE in the 2024 New Year’s Honours. On 7 January 2024, a hitherto somewhat reticent Prime Minister Rishi Sunak confirmed an “appalling miscarriage of justice” while appearing on BBC current affairs programme Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg.
The scandal refers to Post Office Limited’s prosecution, between 1999 and 2015, of 736 branch managers (sub-postmasters) of the publicly-owned “nationwide network of branches offering a range of postal, Government and financial services”, on the grounds of false accounting, fraud, and theft. Software provided by Japanese tech company Fujitsu Services led to accounting errors and unexplained shortfalls in money reserves, in turn leading to victimisation of some unfortunate Post Office branch managers. Many were crippled financially, bankrupted, hounded by bailiffs, and even jailed for alleged crimes they did not commit, while four victims were driven to suicide by unbearable stress. Reputations were lost, homes repossessed, and marriages broke down. The entire sorry episode is now being described as the biggest miscarriage of justice in British history.
The Post Office remains a national institution, with its origins in the General Post Office (GPO), established by Charles II in 1660. The UK’s largest retail network currently operates 11,759 outlets, as of November 2023, ranging from large city-centre outlets to much smaller village post offices, within community shops and pubs. Post Office Ltd has ensured that 99.7 per cent of all residents live within three miles of a post office. Around 99 per cent of all post offices are run by franchisees or independent business people referred to as Sub-postmasters. The remaining one per cent are Crown post offices, run by Post Office Ltd, which was created by the Postal Services Act 2000 as part of Royal Mail Holdings plc. The Postal Services Act 2011 later split Post Office Ltd, which remains in public ownership, from Royal Mail Group, which was privatised as of 1 April 2012.
According to a Private Eye special report, the Horizon IT system originated in a Private Finance Initiative (PFI) contract in May 1996 between the Post Office Ltd and Fujitsu Services to create a swipe-card system for payment of benefits and pensions from Post Office counters. Europe’s “largest non-military contract” subsequently provided for the design, installation, and provision of ongoing IT managed services through April 2005. Horizon’s software was originally developed by British firm International Computers Limited (ICL), which was taken over by Fujitsu. The initial roll-out was confined to a pilot scheme in the north-east of England. Horizon is described by Fujitsu Services as “the most advanced and secure electronic banking and retail network in Europe”. Following a contract with Fujitsu in 1999, the financial software found use in the Post Office’s new electronic system for all counter transactions, accounting, and stocktaking operations, in place of existing paper-based systems. A contract extension in January 2003 allowed for provision of a new range of services through 2010.
From an early stage, some sub-postmasters were inexplicably losing money, only to be forced by the terms of their contracts to make up for any shortfall from their own pockets, irrespective of the circumstances. One of the early victims was Alan Bates, who moved with his partner Suzanne in 1998 to Craig-y-Don, near Llandudno in north Wales, to run the Wool Shop, a shop and Post Office branch. Other high-profile cases include those of Seema Misra who was sentenced in 2010 to 15 months in prison, while pregnant with her second child, for stealing £74,000 from her branch in West Byfleet, Surrey, and Vipinchandra Patel, who was accused of stealing £75,000 from his branch in Horspath, Oxfordshire, and sentenced in June 2011 to 18 weeks in prison. To date, 93 people have had their convictions quashed, including 39 at a single ruling by the Court of Appeal in 23 April 2021. Only 20 people have agreed “full and final settlements”. In a further 54 cases, the conviction has either been upheld, permission to appeal denied, or the appellant has withdrawn from the process.
The Justice for Subpostmasters Alliance Group was formed in 2009, hoping to launch a group action against Post Office Ltd. The group won a major victory in the High Court in 2019, with Alan Bates as lead claimant, backed by a legal team headed by James Hartley, Partner and National Head of Dispute Resolution at national law firm Freeths. In December 2019, the Post Office agreed to pay £57.7 million in compensation to the 555 claimants, who received a share of the £12 million that remained after legal fees were paid. Following the High Court ruling, other claimants were referred to the independent Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC), which in turn sent 47 of these cases to the Court of Appeal. The Post Office set up a separate Historic Shortfall Scheme, excluding those who were part of the High Court settlement, under which compensation has been offered to 2, 417 current or former sub-postmasters.
Simultaneously with the victim activists, Nick Wallis, a freelance journalist, broadcaster, and co-author of the Private Eye special report ‘Justice Lost in the Post’, took up the cudgels on behalf of affected sub-postmasters in 2010, reportedly after speaking to a taxi driver whose wife was in prison at the time for a crime she did not commit. His book, The Great Post Office Scandal (2021), his Radio 4 series, his involvement with three BBC Panorama programmes, and his role as series consultant to Mr Bates vs the Post Office, have helped ensure that the scandal has remained in the public domain, with a tsunami of interest after the most recent ITV programme.
Official fact-seeking falls under the remit of the Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry, an ongoing public inquiry chaired by retired high court judge Sir Wyn Williams, which was established in non-statutory form in September 2020 and converted into a statutory inquiry on 1 June 2021.
Even as the facts continue to emerge, the question remains as to where blame is to be apportioned. Paula Vennells is the most prominent corporate figure so far to be singled out for public approbation, but many others are also culpable, whether through deliberate cover-ups, inertia, or over-zealous private prosecutions of sub-postmasters. The numbers of those whose actions, or inaction, contributed to the scandal are likely to include several Post Office executives, investigators, and lawyers, as well as ministers with responsibility for overseeing the organisation. No blame seems to have fallen the way of Bracknell-based Fujitsu Services, which continues to secure lucrative government contracts and even had its contract for Horizon Data Centre Operations and Central Network Services extended for an additional year from April 2023, pending transfer of services to a new cloud provider.
It is to be hoped that the government will see it fit to overturn all unjust convictions of sub-postmasters en masse, as soon as possible, and to recompense all who have been left out of pocket also as a priority. The process of ascertaining who is responsible, determining what punishment is appropriate, and deciding what lessons will be learnt will proceed at the usual snail’s pace, in common with recent investigations into other major British scandals. As usual, small folks have been unjustly victimised, while those with deep pockets continue to evade the consequences of their confirmed lapses with impunity.
Ashis Banerjee
PS: Paula Vennells handed back her CBE, with immediate effect