Post Office (Horizon System) Offences Bill (Instructions)

Debate between Chris Stephens and Marion Fellows

Monday 29th April 2024 Commons Chamber

[Marion Fellows]

I thank my hon. and learned Friend for making that point. The body responsible for bringing miscarriages of justice before the court of appeal in Scotland is the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission, which is not under the spell of the Lord Advocate. That argument is spurious to say the least.

[Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP)]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. Is she aware of the evidence given by Professor James Chalmers of the University of Glasgow to the Justice Committee a couple of weeks ago? He was asked this very question, and he said that in his view, it was better that the legislation goes through this place with legislative consent motions in the Scottish Parliament, because it is tied directly to the UK compensation scheme for this area.

[Marion Fellows]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. Yes, I am very aware that the regius professor of law at the University of Glasgow made that very point to the Justice Committee. There has been widespread disquiet; I think the Chair of that Committee, the hon. and learned Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill), would agree that no one in the legal profession really wants this Bill. It is breaking all precedent, but for a really good reason.

Postmasters have suffered. Robert Thomson, the postmaster who was going to be sitting in the Gallery, was convicted in 2006 while his mother was still alive. He is the man who had to talk to his sons and tell them, “I might not be here tomorrow.” He did not go to prison, but he could not get a job that gave him the income that he had when he was a postmaster. He has been in penury, his life has been turned upside down, and his children have suffered enormously. That is the case for so many sub-postmasters across the United Kingdom: they did nothing wrong, yet people were pointing at them in the street and whispering. Another sub-postmaster who was going to be in the Gallery watching us all today had to move back to his hometown because, five years later, he heard people in the supermarket saying, “There’s the guy who stole from the Post Office.” This kind of thing never leaves those victims—they will carry it to their dying day. Robert Thomson’s mother died before her son spent two years going through the Scottish courts to be exonerated.

Every time I have been in this place when any legal issue comes up, I am told that this Parliament is sovereign. Well, prove it: put the provisions of this Bill into Scotland-wide use as well. [Interruption.] Members can stand at the back, smile and snigger, but I mean it—it is absolutely disgraceful that you are saying to Scottish sub-postmasters who were convicted that they cannot get justice at the same time as their English, Welsh and Northern Irish counterparts. This is a Westminster problem. Westminster must and should sort it out, and it is easily done. Ask for a legislative consent motion, and you will get it. The Scottish Parliament will put a Bill through to exonerate these postmasters, but it cannot do it—it cannot mirror exactly what is done in this place—until this Bill has gone through all of its stages.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Chris Stephens and Marion Fellows

Thursday 8th September 2022 Commons Chamber

[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)]

1. What recent assessment he has made of the impact of rising costs on (a) food producers and (b) the cost of food for consumers.

[Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP)]

14. What recent assessment he has made of the impact of rising costs on (a) food producers and (b) the cost of food for consumers.