Post Office Horizon: Redress

Debate between Liam Byrne and Jonathan Reynolds

Monday 9th September 2024 Commons Chamber

[Liam Byrne (Birmingham Hodge Hill and Solihull North) (Lab)]

I add my congratulations to Sir Alan Bates and Lady Suzanne on what looked like a very happy day.

I welcome what the Secretary of State has set out for the House this afternoon. When our Select Committee reported back in March, we said that trust in the Post Office was fundamentally broken and that the appeals scheme needed to be independent. This is an important step in that direction, but sub-postmasters have told me this morning that there is still a problem with the time it takes to get offers back when an offer is contested. The claimant’s lawyers have a fixed amount of time to put in a claim; when that claim is contested, it is taking far too long for Addleshaws, in particular, to come back and provide a second offer. What comfort can sub-postmasters take from the Secretary of State’s announcement today? This whole House agrees that justice delayed is justice denied.

[Jonathan Reynolds]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend, who will, I hope, see his work as Chair of the Select Committee reflected in this announcement—specifically, that we are setting the target to issue initial offers to 90% of claims within 40 working days of receiving a full claim. On the point of how that is defined, a full claim is one where, following legal assessment, it is deemed that it does not require any further evidence to assess the claim further. Once that is in, the targets, which his Select Committee rightly called for to make sure redress is delivered at speed, are part of this process.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Liam Byrne and Jonathan Reynolds

Thursday 5th September 2024 Commons Chamber

[Liam Byrne (Birmingham Hodge Hill and Solihull North) (Lab)]

What thought has the Secretary of State given to attending the Williams inquiry? The Post Office scandal is unfinished business. It is now vital that we not only learn the lessons, but accelerate redress for the innocent and, crucially, punish the guilty fast.

[Jonathan Reynolds]

I am very grateful to my right hon. Friend for that question. As a new Secretary of State, the inquiry and the whole issue has affected deeply how I believe accountability and power should be considered in the roles we have as Ministers. It comes on the back of what we heard about Grenfell yesterday, and what we have heard about Bloody Sunday and Hillsborough. I believe that, although this is essentially a legacy issue, it is exactly the agenda that we have on coming into these jobs. The future of the Post Office must be linked to the inquiry not just in terms of redress, but in how the business model works better for sub-postmasters. I do not believe that this has been put into the public domain yet, but I have received a request to attend the inquiry. I will, of course, do so, and believe it is an essential way to put across what we will take from that inquiry and our plans for long-term reform in the future.

Post Office (Horizon System) Offences Bill

Debate between Liam Byrne and Jonathan Reynolds

2nd reading
Wednesday 20th March 2024 Commons Chamber

[Jonathan Reynolds]

I will say something specifically about the territorial extent of the Bill, but the straightforward answer is yes, there are circumstances here to which we should listen. I hope the hon. Member will not mind me saying this, but when all political parties in Northern Ireland are in agreement on something, it is usually worth listening and understanding why that might be the case. I will address specifically how we might deal with that matter later in my remarks.

[Liam Byrne]

The shadow Secretary of State is making a brilliant speech. Does he agree that we might want to reflect on measures to de-risk the speed of paying compensation? It is important that we overturn convictions, but it is also right that we accelerate compensation. Just because the Department is running the scheme is not necessarily a guarantee that payments will flow quickly. This morning, the Business and Trade Committee crunched the data on the GLO scheme, and unfortunately it would appear that 14% of offers have taken more than 14 days, 4% have taken more than 80 days, and 2% have taken more than 100 days. We obviously need to get the measures right, and there are lots of issues at play, but de-risking the speed of compensation sounds like something we should reflect on.

[Jonathan Reynolds]

I thank my right hon. Friend for those remarks and for all the work the Select Committee has done to assist this process. He is right to say that while it is one thing to pass the Bill, what everyone wants is for it to be a route to speedy compensation as soon as possible. I welcome some of the changes we have seen, such as the optional £600,000 up-front payment available to people to get through some of the complexity of the cases. When the Select Committee published its report, it looked at the recommendation to include in the Bill deadlines for the Government to pay compensation, but we have since received useful information about how binding limits might restrict the most complex cases in an undesirable way. In his closing remarks, will the postal affairs Minister undertake on behalf of the Government to reflect on that point, because everyone will want to be able to say, “We care, and we have pushed forward the need for compensation payments to flow smoothly.”