Chief Vennells accused of misleading Government
FORMER Post Office boss Paula Vennells faces claims she misled the Government by insisting there was no evidence subpostmasters had been wrongfully convicted.
A leaked letter, obtained by ITV News, shows she told then Post Office Minister Jo Swinson in 2015 that “the Post Office has found no reason to conclude that any prosecution was unsafe”.
This was despite the Post Office being told in 2014 of problems in at least 26 cases by a law firm it hired itself.
In the same letter, Ms Vennells also told Ms Swinson that “no evidence has been found through these investigations of any systemwide issues with Horizon”, the faulty IT software that ruined the lives of hundreds of Post Office workers.
FLAWS
Flaws in the system made it look like money was missing from branches, with subpostmasters wrongly blamed.
Leaked recordings last week suggested that Ms Vennells was told about potential issues with Horizon by independent investigators from Second Sight in 2013. Also, tapes obtained by Channel 4 suggest she was also warned in 2013 that branch accounts could be accessed remotely by staff at Fujitsu, the firm that developed the software.
Former Liberal Democrat leader Ms Swinson said the letter shows Ms Vennells “misled” the Government and the secret recordings “were at odds with what I was being told”.
Ms Vennells faced separate claims that she misled MPs on whether the software could be accessed remotely during a hearing in 2015. The Commons Business and Trade Committee are deliberating whether to sanction her for potentially misleading Parliament.
In a statement, Ms Vennells said: “I continue to support and focus on co-operating with the Inquiry. I am truly sorry for the devastation caused to the sub-postmasters, whose lives were torn apart by being wrongly prosecuted.”
A Post Office spokesman said: “We are deeply sorry for the suffering caused to victims and their loved ones and remain fully focused on getting to the truth of what happened and supporting the statutory Public Inquiry.”