Horizon Settlement: Future Governance of Post Office Ltd

Karl Turner Excerpts

Thursday 19th March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Karl Turner (Kingston upon Hull East) (Lab)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Mr Jones) on securing this debate and on moving the motion. We have had discussions over the years about this case, which is a massive scandal, the likes of which I have not seen before.

Before my election to this House in 2010, I prosecuted and defended in criminal proceedings from my local chambers in Hull and, prior to that, I worked with a firm of criminal solicitors. It was there that I met Janet Skinner, who is a constituent of my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Dame Diana Johnson). Janet Skinner was prosecuted by the Post Office for dishonesty—theft, fraud and other related offences. I took Janet Skinner’s instructions. It was a very brief encounter, from memory. It was probably a conference that would have lasted no more than 20 minutes, but I remember her instructions and, indeed, she has reminded me of them since. She could not understand why she was being accused of dishonesty. When she explained the situation to me, it was clear that what she had committed, if anything, was the offence of false accounting. Why? Because when her books did not balance, she would ring the helpline and it would tell her—and other sub-postmasters and mistresses—off the record, “You just need to make the books balance.” Effectively, they were told to make up numbers. The helpline said, “Put the information in, then you can close the system down for the night and trade the next day.” That was utterly disgusting.

My analogy is that it is like being trapped in a burning building. You ring the emergency services, you explain the situation and you are advised to smash a window to escape the building. Once you have, you are eventually prosecuted for criminal damage. That is the scenario. It is not a perfect analogy, certainly not for a criminal lawyer, because there is an inbuilt defence in criminal damage of reasonable excuse.

Janet Skinner was of good character, with no previous convictions. She reminded me recently that she had never even had so much as a parking ticket to her name. But if she had sat down with a probation officer for pre-sentence report, it was clear it would not be a good one. Why? Because she would have said, “I didn’t do anything.” When she was asked if she was sorry, she would have said, “No, I am not sorry because I do not think I have done anything wrong.” I did not represent her at the sentencing hearing as it happens, but when she was sentenced, the judge would have questioned whether she was likely to commit further offences because she had admitted no culpability whatever and she was not sorry. She was not sorry because she had done nothing wrong. We now know that she should not have been investigated, she should not have been interviewed and she certainly should not have been prosecuted. We now know that she should not have pleaded guilty to false accounting and that she certainly should not have gone to prison for nine months.

Since I have been involved in representing victims of this scandal, I have been contacted by other sub-postmasters, and a few days ago I received some startling documents. In 2006, a sub-postmaster was prosecuted. I have documents showing discussions between lawyers within the Post Office conceding that there was no theft, no dishonesty, no fraud and no false accounting in this case, yet she was prosecuted. It is utterly disgusting. When this person found out that these documents existed, because they had been leaked to her, she asked the Post Office whether they would produce the documents to the Criminal Cases Review Commission and she was met with aggression the likes of which I have never seen. She was told that these documents were privileged and that if they were leaked she could be in serious trouble. There was bullying, aggression, and constant lies from the very beginning—lie after lie after lie.

I have read Mr Justice Fraser’s judgment—it is a pleasure to read—and to someone reading the judgment it is clear that lies were constantly told. I am prepared to accept that Ministers and Government officials were misled from the very top of the Post Office and Fujitsu. What do we do now to put matters right?

[Duncan Baker (North Norfolk) (Con)]

Does this not underline the simple fact in all of this, that the Post Office’s only consideration in all of this was to protect itself at the cost of the total injustice that so many people faced?

[Karl Turner]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. I have described this as the most grotesque version of predatory capitalism I have ever seen. Why? Because £1 billion was invested and senior officials in the Post Office and Fujitsu did everything they possibly could to protect themselves. They knew. Let us be absolutely clear about that. They knew that there were victims who might go to prison—or who had already gone, at that point. It is utterly disgusting.

[Lucy Allan]

I, too, have a constituent in exactly the situation the hon. Gentleman has described, who was 18 years old and was sent to Holloway for six months, accused of theft and failing to apologise to the grannies she was supposed to have stolen from. She has not had her name cleared. She has been waiting five years for the Criminal Cases Review Commission to do that.

[Karl Turner]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right. These sub-postmasters were respected in the community. The Post Office is a respected organisation that we should all be incredibly proud of, but that was part of the problem. The Post Office was believed. The lies that Ministers, officials and everyone else were told along the line were believed as well. That is why only a judge-led inquiry can possibly sort this out. We need to know who knew what, what they knew, when they knew it and why they acted as they did.

I want to say something briefly about one of those senior people in the Post Office, Paula Vennells. I do not know Paula Vennells but I do know that she apparently earned something in the region of £5 million over a six-year period. I believe wholeheartedly that she would have had a very good inkling of what was going on at the time. This is utterly scandalous and a judge will be the person who can get to the bottom of it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Scully]

That is why the CCRC is looking at those cases and will therefore be able to refer them to the Court of Appeal accordingly. That option is now available, which would not normally be available without the CCRC looking at those cases.

I look forward to speaking at the Select Committee hearing that is due to be held on 24 March, covid-19 notwithstanding. The Government continue to proactively challenge the Post Office to restore and strengthen its relationship with postmasters and to deliver the terms of the settlement. On Monday, I met the Post Office’s chair and CEO to seek assurance on the steps being taken. Alongside my officials, I will work to make sure that we hold them and their governance to account.

In terms of future governance, the Post Office is a large, complex and diverse business, so it is important that it is allowed the commercial freedom to compete in the challenging markets it operates in. It must, however, be accountable to the Government for its decisions, as we have heard. Following the litigation and the subsequent settlement, the Government will monitor the Post Office closely to ensure that it delivers on its commitments to improving the organisational relationship with postmasters.

[Karl Turner]

Will the Minister give way?

[Paul Scully]

I will not, because I am running out of time. I stress that the Government have robust mechanisms in place to maintain oversight of the Post Office, and they are regularly reviewed. I have regular meetings with its chief executive officer and chair, and the Government have increased the frequency of wider shareholder meetings to make sure that, among other things, the actions arising out of the litigation can be tracked. UK Government Investments, as the shareholder representative for the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, challenges the Post Office on its corporate governance and strategy, and on its stewardship of financial and other resources on behalf of shareholders, as well as holding a non-executive seat on Post Office Ltd’s board.

The Department also recently expanded the BEIS Post Office policy team, which works closely with UKGI to hold the Post Office to account at official level. We have a new framework document that makes sure that the responsibilities and accountabilities of the Post Office, BEIS and UKGI are clearly defined. We will publish that soon. It includes an open and transparent information-sharing agreement between the Government and the Post Office.

I will meet the Communication Workers Union, which has been referred to, at the end of the month to understand the views of postmasters—I look forward to that—and will be tracking progress at the highest levels of the Post Office in quarterly ministerial meetings with the CEO, Nick Read. Governance arrangements between the Government and all its arm’s length bodies are kept under regular review. In the light of developments in the Post Office, the Government have considered and addressed all those arrangements.

The right hon. Member for North Durham talked about the Post Office’s right to prosecute. This was a private prosecution; individuals and companies can bring such prosecutions—they are not limited to the Post Office. There is, however, a continuing duty to disclose material information that comes to light that might relate to the safety of any conviction, so the CCRC and those convicted will be able to take up that information.

I will write to the right hon. Member for North Durham with more detail about the Post Office serious case review team to which he referred. BEIS has pressed management on the issues around past prosecutions of postmasters, instigated a review of the Post Office’s handling of that in 2015, and supported the Second Sight mediation scheme. The chair committed to the review in 2015, but it took all the litigation for all the facts to come to light. The suspense account was referred to; Nick Read wrote to Lord Arbuthnot recently on the subject, and we will monitor it closely. On the CCRC and the convictions that the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah) talked about, there is a meeting on 24 March to consider those cases further.

To conclude, I reassure the House that the Government are working hand in hand with post offices, the Post Office, postmasters and other stakeholders to ensure that there is follow-through on the lessons learned from the litigation and the steps to be taken following the settlement. I look forward to sharing with Members as soon as possible further details of the review on the issue promised by the Prime Minister. I will leave a minute for the right hon. Member for North Durham, but I thank all postmasters—those impacted by the litigation and those not—for the value that they add in providing an exceptional service to communities, people and businesses across the UK, and for their contribution to this case. I thank hon. Members once again for their contributions to this excellent debate, and for their interest in the Post Office.