Post Office Horizon: Compensation and Legislation

Mark Pawsey Excerpts

Monday 26th February 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con)]

I commend the Minister and the Secretary of State for the firm and consistent approach the Government are taking to getting justice for the affected sub-postmasters. We heard earlier about precedent. The Minister will know that many of us have concerns about precedent in bringing forward special legislation in this case, although we know, of course, that many hundreds of innocent sub-postmasters have suffered the most serious miscarriage of justice. The Minister just said that the scale and circumstances of the Post Office’s actions in this case rightly require an exceptional response. Will he set out how using that mechanism will ensure that the people we are bothered about, the sub-postmasters, benefit speedily and accurately from those measures?

[Kevin Hollinrake]

I thank my hon. Friend for his point and for his work on the Select Committee. He is right that we will take those steps very carefully and very much as a last resort. He concluded his question on exactly the right point. This is about sub-postmasters and the speed of overturning those convictions: the speed to justice. We looked at doing that through other means, but did not feel that they would achieve the same level of speed. He may be aware that hundreds of people have passed away—there was a report in the newspapers over the weekend—waiting for compensation and justice. That is just not acceptable. We made the difficult decision to deal with this situation in this particular way. As we have often described it, this is the least-worst option but it is still the right option.