by Paula Vennells should be banned from working for the Church of England following the Post Office submasters scandal, the Archbishop of Canterbury has suggested.
Ms Vennells, who was chief executive of the Post Office from 2012 to 2019, has held four senior advisory posts within the Church and was reportedly shortlisted to become Bishop of London in 2017.
She took on the advisory roles after the Horizon scandal emerged and the Post Office agreed to pay £58 million in compensation in 2019.
More than 700 sub-masters were prosecuted between 1999 and 2015 after faulty Horizon accounting software suggested they had stolen money.
The ITV drama Mr Bates vs the Post Office aired earlier this year the scandal ended, but fewer than 100 convictions have so far been overturned in what has been described as the most widespread miscarriage of justice in British history .
The Reverend Justin Welby, who Church sources claimed was “given” to Mr Vennells as Bishop of London, admitted that “questions should be raised about the inappropriateness” of Ms Vennells seniority in the Church in his first comments from her work. came to light last month.
“As has been said more generally about Paula Vennells involvement with various committees and working groups in the Church of England, by 2019 and 2020, it is clear that more questions should have been asked about the appropriateness of that involvement when there was still more to come. light on the Horizon scandal,” he said in a written response to a question submitted to the General Synod, the Church’s legislative body.
“We recognize this and will have to think about it.”
Meanwhile Lord Cameron has said the government he led should “deeply regret” the Post Office scandal.
Speaking to the BBC during a visit to Brazil for the G20 meeting, the former prime minister described “the appalling way” post office branch managers were treated.
He told the broadcaster: “I’ve made it clear many times before, I think anyone who’s been in government for 15, 20 years or more would regret what’s happened.
“That’s why it’s so important that we have the public inquiry, that we get to the bottom of what happened, and crucially we get that compensation money out for the people who suffered.”
Lord Cameron was prime minister between 2010 and 2016, a period that took up more than a third of the time the prosecutions took place.
The Foreign Secretary’s comments come a day after a BBC report suggested his government was aware that the Post Office had collapsed an investigation that may have helped undercover postmasters.
A 2016 investigation was reportedly commissioned to look into why the cash accounts of certain branch managers were accessed and remotely altered.
However, it was brought to an abrupt end when sub-postmasters launched legal action.
The BBC report said there was no suggestion the then prime minister knew personally about the investigation or that it had been called off.
He has claimed in previous interviews that he “doesn’t remember” receiving the personal news about the Horizon scandal.
Church sources claimed Ms Vennells made a four-person shortlist in 2017 to become Bishop of London, the Church’s third most senior post after Archbishops of Canterbury and York, despite never having worked as a vicar, district dean or junior bishop. .
The Church refused to “confirm or deny” those claims.
In the Archbishop’s 2018 book Reimagining Britain, Foundations for Hope, he praised Ms Vennells for “shaping my thinking over the years”.
She was ordained a priest in 2006 and served as part-time assistant minister at St Owen’s in Bromham, Beds, until April 2021, when she retired from active ministry after the Court of Appeal overturned the convictions of 33 sub-postmasters. void.
Mr. Vennells’ license to officiate was revoked, the most severe penalty in the Church’s powers. She has been backed by Alan Smith, the Bishop of St Albans, who said she should not be judged on the ITV drama which is “a bit like The Crown where it is different from the truth”.
The Archbishop’s comments came amid a series of questions Anglicans asked Mr Vennells, who resigned as CBE last month, ahead of this week’s Synod, which will meet from 23 February to 27 February.
His senior roles within the church included providing ethical investment advice to its Ethical Investment Advisory Group (EIAG) between January 2019 and April 2021 and joining the Archbishops’ Coordinating Group for the pandemic in March 2020.
‘pleased with its suitability’
Alan Smith – not the Bishop of St Albans but the vice-chairman of the EIAG – admitted in response to one question that the EIAG was “aware” of the allegations against Ms Vennells when he appointed her but remained “satisfied with her suitability”. on the Council. “the basis of what was known then”.
She also undertook a review of the Church buildings in the spring of 2019 and discussed this in February 2020 with the board of Church Commissioners, who manage the Church’s assets.
In the review, Ms Vennells said she had been told by some within the Church that she needed to close 1,000 churches to balance her books, a claim now backed by Canon Dr Flora Winfield, the third most senior Church Commissioner.
“I don’t know how they arrived at this figure,” she said. “It is not recognized or endorsed by the Commissioners of the Church as a body.”
The Archbishop’s comments follow allegations by Kemi Badenoch, the Business Secretary, that Henry Staunton, the former chairman of the Post Office, lied when he claimed a senior civil servant had told him to delay compensation payments to under-masters jobs so that the Tories could “rush in. ” the next election.
The Church of England and Ms Vennells have been contacted for comment.
