Boris wants people held to account
I haven’t had any real chance to gather my thoughts today, so apologies if this reads like a stream of consciousness. Live-tweeting turns your brain to mush.
It’s very hard to then turn that mush into something capable of assembling a decent report on the day’s events. I tried. The result can be found here.
Yesterday I got quite emotional hearing Ben Gordon QC talk about Dawn O’Connell’s treatment at the hands of the Post Office – today, just for a moment, as Sam Stein QC was telling the court what happened to Peter Holmes – and his widow’s wish that one day his innocence would be proved – he had a little wobble. These are hard-bitten criminal lawyers who have dealt with crimes of the worst kind. It’s the thing that gets me when I meet so many Subpostmasters. They are the very best of us. And we, as a society, did this to them. No wonder so many people are angry.
Live tweets from court today can be found here on one simple web page. Wobble not included.
PM wades in once more
Speaking of angry, Lucy Allan MP is livid about the Post Office Horizon scandal and furious on behalf of her constituent Tracy Felstead (who I had a nice chat with in the Royal Courts of Justice Great Hall this morning). Ms Allan has been a tireless campaigner for Ms Felstead and has worked very hard to get this story aired in parliament. Today she cornered Boris Johnson in Prime Minsters’ Questions and asked him if:
“in order for justice to be truly done, that those responsible for this failure and its cover up, they must be held to account. Does he agree that heads should roll?”
The key part of the PM’s answer was:
“Yes – we do want to make sure that the right people are held to account for what happens.”
This is an important response. I hope it is wielded successfully.
Annual report and accounts
The Post Office released its annual report today. It was due in September last year but the Post Office got an extension until the end of March. Read it here.
I had a bit to say about it here. Don’t read if you don’t like bad language.
Nick Read, the Post Office CEO talks a good talk, but he’s got a supertanker to turn round. I also think that so long as he and the government stand firm to deny proper compensation to the High Court claimants (who forced the Post Office to confront its monstrous failings) he has no credibility.
Keeping tabs on my movements
I am going to try to get the transcripts online to all three days of the Court of Appeal hearings before tomorrow but I can’t promise. I also have to go to Court 71 for 10am tomorrow as the Johnny Depp v NGN application to appeal judgment is being handed down.
I think I was the first journalist in the world to break the result of his libel trial loss (like anyone cared) so I am going to see if I can get lightning to strike twice.
As soon as I’ve done that I’ll be back in court 4, tweeting tomorrow’s Post Office proceedings – three Subpostmasters are hoping to persuade the court that they should have their convictions quashed despite fierce resistance from the Post Office.
You can follow every twist and turn on twitter here (it’s just a website – you don’t need to log in or anything) and I will put up another report tomorrow evening.
Thanks to everyone who very kindly made a donation today. I really appreciate it. Welcome aboard. It’s not usually this hectic.
Yours
Nick