It’s all too easy to get the measure of Alwen Lyons OBE. She sees herself as a Good Person who spent a lifetime serving and defending a Good Company. Unfortunately that company was the Post Office. Lyons was there during the prosecution spree, she was there at the height of the cover-up, and seems to either have been in denial, grievously mistaken or simply lying about what she knew.

In 2013, Ian Henderson from Second Sight was engaged in an independent investigation of the Post Office Horizon IT system and the Post Office’s associated business functions. Forgive me for quoting from my own book, but here is how I characterised a significant interaction Henderson had with Lyons:

By this stage Second Sight were having bi-weekly meetings with various Post Office execs. On this occasion, Henderson met Susan Crichton and Simon Baker. After the meeting, he wandered into the corridor where he bumped into Lesley Sewell, the Post Office’s Chief Information Officer and Alwen Lyons, the Company Secretary. Lyons had joined the Post Office in 1984 as a graduate trainee and was, in Henderson’s words, a ‘furiously loyal, old-fashioned company retainer.’ Her father was a Subpostmaster from the East End of London who had risen to become General Secretary of the National Federation of Subpostmasters. Lyons was the living embodiment of the Post Office culture, and had the ear of the board.

The three got chatting. Henderson mentioned what Gareth Jenkins had told him about remote access. ‘Instantly, Alwen Lyons said, “No that’s completely wrong. There is no question of remote access. It’s impossible. We know it can’t happen.”’

Henderson admits being momentarily thrown. This was, in his words, a ‘conflict of evidence.’ Instead of asking if Lyons was suggesting a Horizon system architect at Fujitsu was living in cloud-cuckoo land, Henderson let the two women change the subject. He subsequently told me his normal practice when faced with a situation like this was to seek further evidence before challenging what he was being told. But the force of Alwen Lyons’ response left him in no doubt there was something going on.

‘I remember thinking “Christ. If we push this, we’re going to get sacked.” It was that serious. I think that was when Jenkins’ cards were marked, and he was regarded as potentially dangerous.’

Mane issue

On leaving the Post Office in 2017, Lyons studiously avoided any mention of the Subpostmasters’ campaign for justice, nor the ongoing Bates v Post Office group litigation, which would leave the Post Office’s reputation and finances in tatters. Instead she told her adoring followers on the Post Office corporate web pages:

In 2011, I helped to negotiate the separation of Post Office and Royal Mail, which was really challenging and daunting. I was then appointed as Company Secretary and worked to introduce the independent Post Office Board. As Company Secretary, I work with the Chairman and the CEO to make sure we have the good governance in place to get the best out of the Board.

Finally, I’m most proud of the work I’ve done around gender equality and more recently LGBT+ support. Thirteen years ago, there were no women on the Board or on the Executive Team and very few in senior positions, so I set up SWAN (Senior Women’s Action Network), to give women in the business more confidence to become future leaders. Now women can look up and see female role models.

Alwen Lyons worked for a Chairman who withheld the Swift Review from the Post Office board. That’s not good governance.

Gong hound

Four months after leaving the Post Office, Lyons was awarded an OBE in the 2018 New Year’s Honours list. This was picked up by Sussex World (Lyons lives in Worthing), who reported her as saying:

“It’s been amazing to get recognition. It was such a surprise. I was doing something I really believed in.”

On her 33 years at the Post Office, Lyons told the paper: “When I said ‘We need to change things’, they listened… It’s a fantastic organisation to have worked for. There are so many different jobs you can do and opportunities. I liked the people I worked with, all the teams I worked with and for.”

But something seems to have been troubling Lyons’ conscience. “We still have to check that we are doing the right thing for all people,” she told Sussex World. “I think it sometimes feels like it is getting tougher.”

Lyons retired to spend more time doing charitable works and riding horses. Just how worthy a person she really is may become a little clearer once she has been questioned at the Post Office Inquiry today.

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