Post Office: Horizon Compensation

Viscount Stansgate Excerpts

Thursday 30th June 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

I can give my noble friend a very quick answer to that: yes, I can give him that assurance. Once again, I pay tribute to the work he has done in exposing this scandal.

[Viscount Stansgate (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating the Statement and apologise for briefly having left the Chamber while he was making it. I pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot, and others for the work they have done in bringing this scandal to public attention. My question arises in the light of the previous one, and it is about the public inquiry. Can the Minister tell the House how long it might take, for the obvious reason that the sooner it is completed, whatever its outcome, the sooner we can be reassured that a scandal of this kind can never happen again?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

If my noble friend is talking about the GLO legal action, of course the costs of that were funded and the lawyers were not paid by the litigants; a lot of the compensation went to pay the legal fees, which is part of the problem with the GLO scheme.

[Viscount Stansgate (Lab)]

I hope the House will allow me the flexibility to take advantage of the fact that we have a few moments left in this exchange. Will the terms of reference of the inquiry—forgive me for not knowing the detail of them—encompass the role of the judiciary, which after all succeeded in sentencing an enormous number of postmasters to prison? Will it be a feature of the inquiry when it is held to investigate how that was possible?

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

The inquiry can cover all relevant matters. Of course, the role of the judiciary is being examined in the cases proceeding through the courts at the moment and in the convictions being overturned. I am sure that all those members of the judiciary still in their posts will pay close attention to those cases. To be fair, they can adjudge a case only on the evidence that is presented to them, but I am sure that they will want to take careful account of any technical evidence that was given in the various cases and perhaps treat it with a bit more scepticism in future.