Morning
If you didn’t get a chance to watching Surviving the Post Office last night, you can read my review here:
and/or watch it on iPlayer here. There is an accompanying podcast series, which features extended interviews with the interviewees in the TV documentary. Listen to it here.
The Blue Baroness
Today, Baroness Neville-Rolfe gives evidence at the Inquiry. She was Post Office minister in 2015 and instructed Tim Parker, the Post Office chair to investigate the Horizon issue.
This became the Chairman’s Report aka Swift Review engineered (by the then Post Office General Counsel Jane MacLeod) to be a report so secret, that BNR was not shown a copy. Nor was it given to the Post Office board.
Given the Post Office tried to stop the government seeing Second Sight’s final report into the Horizon scandal, I think the Inquiry and hopefully the Met Police will be building up a clear picture of where the conspiracy to pervert the course of justice was taking place. I only hope their investigation takes in Richard Callard, the UKGI board member, who appears to be up to his neck in it, along with the Post Office executive team.
Eleanor Shaikh has written a short tweet thread about BNR’s engagement with this scandal here.
I’ve updated my Jo Swinson blog post to add some “notes and quotes” at the bottom of the piece.
Where are the letters? Where is the compensation?
Former Subpostmaster and campaigner Chris Head has been doing his best to keep the pressure on the new government to deliver proper compensation. You can read his open letter to the new Post Office minister Justin Madders here.
Chris has also sent a separate letter to the government asking where are the “exoneration letters” – documents giving those whose convictions were quashed on the last day of the last parliament written proof of their innocence.
In this letter Chris writes:
“Just wanted to clarify regarding the letters for those who have had their convictions overturned. The projected date was that everyone covered by the legislation would receive the letters before the end of July, and therefore be able to access the compensation they are due either by way of the Fixed Sum Award of £600,000 or by way of a fully assessed claim.“On Thursday during the debate Minister Justin Madders in response to a question said letters would be going out by the end of July if they haven’t been received already.
“This gave the impression some may have already been sent. It is my understanding from a respected source that no letters have yet been sent. Can you clarify first of all, if any letters have been sent and if not when that process is expected to begin and be completed? I understand with the election things may have been delayed somewhat but this process was supposed to be well underway prior to the election date Itself. At the end of this month both legal representatives and individuals will be reaching out to their MP’s or the Department directly querying what is happening with the letters unless some kind of urgent announcement is made.
“I am inundated on a daily basis from a number of people who feel like they have been forgotten and kept in the dark as we rapidly approach the end of July.”
If you missed the debate, you can read it in Hansard here, or you can watch it here, kindly clipped out by Chris and posted on twitter.
Apologies
With apologies I am not going to view or attend the Inquiry today as I have a family commitment. The same sadly applies for Friday. I plan to be in harness on Wednesday and Thursday. Don’t forget you can watch along live every day on the Post Office Inquiry YouTube channel here, and the transcripts usually go up on the Inquiry website at some point the following day (though Swinson’s took a while to arrive).
Your next newsletter will probably be sent on Thursday morning.
Very best
Nick