Morning
I went to the Inquiry yesterday. I saw Andy Dunks give evidence. If I were a betting man I would put a small amount of money on him facing criminal charges by September next year.
He’s the most obvious choice within Fujitsu, possibly including Gareth Jenkins.
Judge for yourself with my report on yesterday’s evidence from Dunks here, called:
It does make me wonder why Dunks’ colleague, Penny Thomas, who seemed to do exactly the same job as Dunks, has not been called to give evidence. Hopefully her witness statement (if she’s submitted one, if she’s still traceable/with us) will be published at the end of this phase of the Inquiry.
Flinders files
Karl Flinders from Computer Weekly has also filed on Dunks. Man of mystery is that Karl Flinders – you never see him at the Inquiry, but he manages to produce more stuff than I do.
The Inquiry room was relatively empty again yesterday, though former Subpostmaster Jasvinder Barang is here all week, being very chipper. Jasvinder was one of the first people to get her conviction quashed back in December 2020, and she always brings good vibes to the Inquiry. Former Subpostmasters Mark Kelly and Jo Hamilton were also in attendance.
Correspondence
Since January, the number of people receiving this newsletter and reading the Post Office Scandal blog posts has increased a great deal. I am deeply thankful to every single person who reads what I write. Each newsletter and blog post triggers a flurry of correspondence, for which I am also immensely grateful. I do apologise if I have failed to reply to you. Inquiry days are horrible.
They often involve getting up between 5am and 6am, depending on domestic duties, writing a newsletter whilst trying to make it to London for 0945 (a journey I’ve never managed in less than 75 minutes each way, door-to-door), spending five hours live-tweeting and then trying to pull it all together after each hearing finishes into something like a coherent blog post for the Post Office Scandal Website.
I don’t always succeed in this, but when I do, my days are around 14 hours long, which makes doing much else other than eating and sleeping quite difficult. It was my wedding anniversary yesterday, which had me trying to cook a romantic dinner (well, as romantic as a dinner can be with a 13yo in tow) whilst error-correcting the report on Andy Dunks’ evidence for the website.
All this is a very roundabout way of apologising for not responding to any emails or messages you have sent me to correct, comment on, approve or otherwise engage with any of my output.
I do appreciate them, and I’m sorry I don’t have the time to respond in kind. Soon this phase will be over, then we’ll have phase 7 in September and then I can start a new, and hopefully less time-consuming project. I’m certainly not going to make a specialism out of covering inquiries. They are gruelling. But. In. The. Meantime…
He’s Just Ken
Former Post Office non-executive director Ken McCall gives evidence to the Inquiry today. NEDs (or indeed SIDs – senior independent directors, which is what Ken became) are supposed to provide scrutiny of executive board members – bringing their own vast experience to bear on matters and hold the execs’ feet to the fire.
McCall was in post from 2016 to 2022 and in terms of output, appears to have been as effective as a chocolate fireguard, but as we have discovered, if the majority of people running a company are determined to trash it, trash it they will.
It’ll be interesting to hear what McCall has to say about his tenure, and I very much hope Flora Page asks him some questions today so that in my report tonight I can use the sub-heading Paging McCall.
Have a lovely day – apparently from tomorrow those of us in the South East of England are going to get a two day summer. Shades, slap and shirt sleeves at the ready…
Best
Nick