Post Office scandal: how might justice be delivered to those affected?
The ITV drama Mr Bates vs the Post Office has brought the Post Office scandal back under the spotlight and also drawn attention to how justice can be delivered to those affected. Here the Guardian outlines some of the remedies suggested by campaigners and experts:
1) Quash all convictions relating to the Horizon IT system
The Horizon compensation advisory board, an independent body set up to oversee compensation related to the Post Office scandal, has renewed its call for all Post Office-driven convictions in the relevant period to be collectively overturned.
The board’s chair, Prof Chris Hodges, wrote last month to the lord chancellor, Alex Chalk, advising such an approach and, on Monday, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that such an outcome could be achieved through an act of parliament.
Proponents believe that the alternative, of individuals having to go through the Criminal Cases Review Commission, is too cumbersome given the magnitude of the scandal. Despite the number of unsafe convictions numbering more than 700, only 93 people have had their convictions quashed to date.
Some victims and lawyers have expressed concern that such an approach could lead to guilty people also being exonerated and amount to political interference in the judicial system. In his letter to Chalk, Hodges said “it would be worth acquitting a few guilty people (who have already been punished) in order to deliver justice to the majority”. He has also suggested the judiciary would not mind given the unique circumstances.
2) Give compensation to all affected
Despite three different compensation schemes that have been set up since the scandal came to light, many of those affected have not been compensated, prompting criticism of the Post
Office and government.
Last November, ministers promised that every branch owner-operator whose wrongful conviction had been overturned would receive £600,000 in compensation from the government but less has been paid out than expected because fewer people than anticipated have brought and won appeals.
Hodges, emeritus professor of justice systems at Oxford University, told the BBC’s Today programme that everyone entitled should receive compensation but it was dependent on all convictions being quashed and both of those things should be possible with “people having to do as little as possible”.
3) Prosecute those to blame
As further damning evidence has emerged from the public inquiry into the scandal, it has added to frustration that no one has yet been held accountable.
When overturning 39 convictions at the court of appeal in 2021, Lord Justice Holroyde said the Post Office, which brought the prosecutions itself, “knew that there were serious issues about the reliability of Horizon” and that there were failures of investigation and disclosure so egregious as to constitute “an affront to the conscience of the court”.
The Metropolitan police have been investigating for years two former experts at Horizon supplier Fujitsu, who were witnesses in the trials of Post Office workers, on suspicion of perjury and perverting the course of justice. On Friday, in the wake of the screening of Mr Bates vs the Post Office, police confirmed for the first time that it was also investigating the Post Office. Kevan Jones MP, who sits on the Horizon compensation advisory board, told ITV’s Good Morning Britain that evidence heard in public suggested “umpteen charges … could be laid against a number of individuals”.
4) Strip Paula Vennells of her CBE
When Vennells, the former Post Office chief executive, left her role after seven years in 2019, she had made £5m and been awarded a CBE for “services to the Post Office and to charity”. Just 10 months later, the Post Office reached a settlement with 555 workers over the problems with the Fujitsu-developed IT system, admitting it “got things wrong”.
A petition calling for her to lose her CBE has attracted more than 1m signatures and, on Monday, Rishi Sunak’s spokesperson said the prime minister would “strongly support” the honours forfeiture committee if it decided to look at revoking her honour.