G’mornin’ – early doors in Aldwych

I had a 4.30am alarm call this morning so I could be driven to London to spend two minutes on television at 6.30am on BBC1 explaining the significance of Angela van den Bogerd to a breakfast audience.

The Hatchet Lady is giving evidence at the Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry over the course of the next two days, and I am very much looking forward to hearing what she has to say, or mumble, if my experience of watching her give evidence during two High Court trials is anything to go by.

If you’d like a trip down memory lane, here is some light reading:

AvdB trial 1 Day 1 write-up – the Contract Whisperer

AvdB trial 1 Day 2 write-up – Angela attempts to mislead the High Court at least once

AvdB trial 2 Day 1 write-up – Into the Horizone

AvdB trial 2 Day 2 write-up – the £5000 question

What Angela Did – Mr Justice Fraser’s views on AvdB’s evidence in the first trial

What Angela Did Next – Mr Justice Fraser on Angela’s evidence in trial 2

Aujard’s resignation and evidence

Here’s my write-up of Chris Aujard’s evidence yesterday and a curious addendum brought to my attention this morning – why did Chris Aujard resign as General Counsel of five companies the day before he gave evidence to the public inquiry? Mr Aujard is currently not a director of a single UK company. On Monday he was the director of six. His insurers must be told.

Yesterday the biggest news line to come from Aujard’s evidence was the revelation that Paula Vennells was keen to keep prosecuting Subpostmasters after he had strongly advised against it. Find out why here.

Incidentally, whilst Susan Crichton was giving evidence yesterday there was a fire alarm test. This was expected and we all sat tight, as instructed, and waited patiently for it to finish.

Unfortunately for him, Chris Aujard chose that exact moment to try to enter the building to give his evidence to the Inquiry, and was refused, leading to ITV News’ Dan Hewitt chasing Aujard around, trying to get some answers out of him. Aujard was not amused. Watch it here.

Other takes on Aujard’s evidence:

Ex-Post Office boss “opposed stopping prosecutions” – BBC

Post Office chief Vennells knew about IT remote access says former General Counsel – C4

Post Office scandal exposes ethical dilemmas of general counsel – FT

Ex-Post Office boss Paul Vennells ‘wanted to continue prosecuting subpostmasters despite concerns’ – Daily Mirror

Subpostmaster Survey

I got a message from Richard Moorhead’s team at the University of Exeter yesterday and as they very kindly turned out in force to see Wendy Buffrey on stage last week, I am very happy to help out with their request below.

If you are a former Subpostmaster, Post Office manager or assistant affected by the Horizon Scandal, please consider filling out their survey:

“that focuses on the ‘ripple-effect’ of harms that have spanned out from those directly impacted by the scandal to affect their families – especially, the children (over the age of 18) and partners (including former partners) of former subpostmasters and other employees affected by the scandal.

“This survey is a follow-up study to one that was organised and carried out in 2020 by Dr Bethany Growns and colleagues, whilst working on this project. The first survey was reported in the paper: “The Post Office Scandal in the United Kingdom: Mental health and social experiences of wrongly convicted and wrongly accused individuals“ “We feel it is important to acknowledge, centre, and bring to the fore the harms that have been inflicted upon those close to the former-subpostmasters and mistresses and other post office workers affected by this scandal – those who could be classed as ‘secondary victims’.” The survey link is here: https://exe.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_06g67bv90BLsFEi “The survey includes detailed information about this study, including a proper explanation of the research prior to them consenting to proceed. All responses are completely anonymised.” Feel free to forward the above link or this entire email to anyone you think might want to fill the survey out. If you have any queries, email postofficeproject@exeter.ac.uk

Thanks

A massive thanks to everyone who has signed up to the newsletter over the past 24 hours. There have been some substantial donations which I hope to repay over the coming weeks with some decent content.

Don’t forget you can also sign up for free to get my blog posts as they drop by putting your email into the relevant box on the postofficescandal.uk website. Your donations power that website, and the journalism on it, which keeps it free at the point of access for everyone to read, so I’m really grateful.

Right. I’m going in.

Nick

PS Mr (now Lord) Justice Fraser just walked past whilst I was taking the photo of Mark and Wendy above. He looked tanned and happy. “Stop getting into fights!” he said, pointing at my cast, before walking off. I was momentarily tongue-tied, which doesn’t happen very often…

Post Office Scandal – The Inside Story

In April and May 2024, I’ll be visiting various theatres in towns around England.

At each venue I’ll be joined by a former Subpostmaster (apart from Walton when Second Sight’s Ian Henderson will be in the chair). There will be plenty of opportunity to ask questions and learn even more about the scandal.

All the dates and box office links are here. Please do have a look, see if there’s a venue near you, and if you fancy it, book a couple of tickets. Please also feel free to forward this newsletter to your friends who may live near a venue!

I’ll be around after each show in the foyer or bar and look forward to saying hello if you can make it.