Postmasters with Overturned Convictions: Settlement Funds

Mark Pawsey Excerpts

Wednesday 15th December 2021 Commons Chamber

[Paul Scully]

I appreciate my hon. Friend’s words and, yes, the Post Office must do that, and it is. Nick Read, the chief executive, has come a long way to give the Post Office that future by resetting the relationship with postmasters and sub-postmasters. There is clearly more to do, but we will best provide that future by giving sub-postmasters the confidence and trust they need by righting the wrongs of the past.

[Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con)]

In a Select Committee evidence session in 2019 we heard from postmasters affected by the Horizon debacle, and we heard harrowing accounts of small family enterprises—often a husband and wife—working through the night to go through the books to find losses that did not exist because the computer system did not work. I welcome the interim compensation payments that the Minister has announced today. Will he say a bit more about the Government’s role? In their response to the Committee’s report, the Government acknowledged their own responsibility

“to have visibility of and challenge Post Office Ltd’s major operational and strategic decisions to ensure the sustainability of the network is maintained and that good corporate governance and financial stewardship practices are upheld.”

On that basis, does he believe the Government should have grasped the situation earlier and acted more decisively? What improvements are being made to make certain that postmasters are never again placed in this position?

[Paul Scully]

First, I believe we now have robust monitoring not just of the compensation schemes but of the future relationship with the Post Office and postmasters. That is exactly what Sir Wyn Williams’s inquiry is there to find out—not just the Post Office’s role, but the Government’s role. If we have fallen short of expectations, I expect to put my hands up and say we got it wrong.