by The Post Office Horizon scandal is the biggest miscarriage of justice of our time, and I feel so sorry for the families whose lives have been ruined. As one of the Ministers over the 20 years of this scandal, including my time as Minister responsible for postal affairs, I am sorry that I did not see through the lies of the Post Office – and that it took me five months to meet Alan Bates, Mr Young. a man who has done so much to find it.
The Post Office is owned by the government but not run by it, so the official advice I was given when I first became a minister in May 2010 was to meet with Bates. He wrote again begging me to reconsider, and I met him there in October. But he shouldn’t have to wait. When Bates told me his concerns about Horizon, I took them very seriously and took them to the Post Office. What I got back were divine assurances – the same lies we now know they were telling the sub-masters, journalists, parliament and courts.
Since then, the innocence of the sub-masters has been proven. The extent and nature of their terrible suffering has taken center stage and I have certainly thought about whether and how things could have been different. In fact, I was deeply moved by the Horizon scandal – and I’m sure former ministers from all parties feel the same way. It was heartbreaking to hear that so many sub-masters have had their lives ruined by the actions of the Post Office and Fujitsu.
We can now see how the Post Office tricked and bullied men and women into giving fake receipts. So many served jail time, lost their businesses and homes, for something they didn’t do. They have spent years waiting for justice, and some have died waiting. It is a black mark on our nation, our government and to a large extent the Post Office.
So how did we get here? It’s hard not to conclude that this was a large-scale conspiracy, and it was only revealed when a brave whistleblower came forward from within Fujitsu itself in 2015. But thanks to that whistleblower, the high court will finally rule in 2019 that the Post. The Office said there was no remote access to the submaster’s local Horizon system, and they said how robust the Horizon system was. I and other ministers from all three parties may have been concerned, I may have spoken to brave people like Bates and James Arbuthnot, but without a whistleblower we didn’t have the proof from the inside to break the Post Office wall of lies. deletion.
We have a broken system. A system that puts large institutions such as the Post Office at arm’s length from our elected representatives, and makes them almost a law. Close enough to rubber stamping, but still out of proper scrutiny.
It might surprise you that even though the Post Office is owned by the government, there are no Ts or ministers on their board. Instead, one civil servant sits on the table. Lord Forsyth, a Conservative for life, was right to argue last month that the problem is a system where ministers who are theoretically responsible for bodies at arm’s length are “unable to execute responsibility”.
That’s a big part of how the Post Office could get away with it for so long. How could they keep the flaws with Horizon hidden for years. How could they prosecute hundreds of innocent sub-masters. How could they threaten the BBC’s Panorama program in an attempt to delay the whistleblower’s testimony. How could they remain lying on the high court as late as 2019.
We owe it to the victims of this horrific scandal not only to overturn their convictions and pay fair compensation – although we must do so – but also to prevent it from happening again. That should be the focus of the government now. But as with many other scandals – from Windrush to Hillsborough and multiple health scandals such as Primodos and contaminated blood products – governments have done the bare minimum, leaving victims fighting for years for compensation and nowhere to go. tackle the major systemic changes of these scandals. demand.
I fear that the Horizon Office Post scandal will also miss the opportunity to make major systemic changes. There is already a sense that some in the Conservative party are trying to exploit this human tragedy for their own narrow interests in this election year by using their power and their friends in the media to criticize themselves forward to political rivals – and using this scandal. as part of their bid to stay in power.
Over the last ten years this type of politics has been on the rise. The Trumpification of the right of the Conservative party. Mindless attacks from some dutiful Tory columnists. The paid ads spreading disinformation and fake news.
The sub-masters deserve much better. That starts with overturning their convictions now – more than four years after the high court freed them – and compensating them properly and quickly – without leaving it to the Post Office’s complicated, slow and inadequate schemes.
In the coming weeks and months, I will be traveling the country. If you want to talk about the Post Office scandal or the many other failures and crises we face – from the NHS to the cost of living – I’m ready to listen. Together we will change the system.
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