Boss at heart of the Post Office IT scandal made ‘palpably false’ statement
Scandal-hit post chief’s ‘falsehoods’ to minister: Boss at heart of the Post Office IT scandal made ‘palpably false’ statement over miscarriages of justice fears, inquiry hears
Paula Vennells told minister there was nothing to suggest miscarriages of justice Hundreds of postmasters were wrongly accused of stealing from tills over 15 years Scandal expected to cost taxpayer £250 million in legal fees and compensation
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The boss at the heart of the Post Office IT scandal made a ‘palpably false’ statement when she told a minister there was nothing to suggest there had been miscarriages of justice.
Over 15 years, hundreds of postmasters were wrongly convicted, bankrupted or driven out of their jobs after being accused of stealing from their tills.
Following a decade-long fight for justice, a judge ruled that computer glitches were to blame for the ‘missing’ money, and dozens of victims overturned their convictions for theft and fraud.
The scandal is expected to cost the taxpayer in excess of £250 million in legal fees and compensation.
Yesterday, a law professor told the first open hearing of a public inquiry into the scandal of fresh evidence suggesting Paula Vennells, who was chief executive between 2012 and 2019, made false statements to MPs and a minister after evidence of miscarriages of justice came to light.
The 62-year-old mother-of-two, who is also an ordained priest, has been accused of covering up the scandal and spending more than £30 million of taxpayers’ money fighting her former staff in court to conceal the truth.
Yesterday, a law professor told the first open hearing of a public inquiry into the scandal of fresh evidence suggesting Paula Vennells, (pictured) who was chief executive between 2012 and 2019, made false statements to MPs and a minister after evidence of miscarriages of justice came to light
The inquiry was told that she wrote to a government minister in June 2015 to say that ‘we have found nothing to suggest that, in criminal cases, any conviction is unsafe’.
Richard Moorhead, a professor of law and professional ethics at the University of Exeter, told the inquiry: ‘That statement was palpably false, whether Mrs Vennells knew it or not.’
The letter to Tory MP George Freeman, then a parliamentary under-secretary at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, was sent two years after the Post Office was handed a report revealing one of its IT experts may have misled ‘many’ criminal trials by failing to tell them about computer bugs.
Mrs Vennells made similar comments to a select committee in February 2015, telling them there was ‘no evidence’ that any postmaster had suffered a miscarriage of justice.
The inquiry was told that she wrote to MP George Freeman (pictured) in June 2015 to say that ‘we have found nothing to suggest that, in criminal cases, any conviction is unsafe’
Her involvement in the scandal has sparked calls for her to be stripped of her CBE, which was awarded for services to charity and the Post Office. Mrs Vennells walked away in 2019 with £4.9 million in pay and bonuses, and into jobs in the NHS and the Cabinet Office, from which she has now resigned. The Daily Mail has led the way in exposing the scandal as part of the Save Our Post Offices campaign.
Yesterday, the hearing in London was told that postmasters had suffered ‘enormous psychological toll’ and the ‘shame and humiliation of arrest and prosecution’. The Post Office said it had ‘implemented fundamental reforms to ensure that such events of the past could never happen again’ and was ‘participating fully in the inquiry’. But it faced criticism for failing to release private correspondence between managers and their legal advisers, which it claims is protected by legal privilege.
Mrs Vennells declined to comment last night.
