The Post Office scandal inquiry has heard from a “chorus of cowards” and a “parade of liars, bullies, amnesiacs and arrogant individuals”, lawyers for victims have said in a call for criminal prosecutions during a hearing in London.
In their closing statements at the latest phase of the inquiry, the legal representatives of hundreds of post office operators whose lives were ruined rounded on the men and women who had given evidence in recent weeks.
Those criticised ranged from the European boss of Fujitsu, Paul Patterson, with his vague promises of compensation, to the middle-ranking Post Office staff who privately discussed shredding damning evidence and the incompetent investigators who were said to have bullied their targets for financial gain.
More than 900 branch managers were pursued by the Post Office between 1999 and 2015 after the Horizon accounting software built by Fujitsu made it look as though money was missing from their branches.
Evidence has been heard that it was known from the start that Horizon was riddled with bugs and defects but that this was kept from the post office operators being prosecuted and from the courts, with the brand’s reputation and financial considerations taking priority over justice.
A “whitewash” report was commissioned by the Post Office to hide the truth, while its investigators “hounded and harassed and in some cases drove decent and honest men and women to their graves”, said Sam Stein KC, who is representing the largest number of victims.
Stein added that the only consolation was that the Metropolitan police were closely monitoring the hearing, which has been running since 2021 and will resume for a fifth session of hearings in July.
“Phase four has pulled back the curtain on the decades of the great Post Office cock-up and covering up,” Stein said of the evidence that victims had been disliked and disdained by their employers “because, and I quote from a Post Office investigator, they are ‘all crooks’”.
Addressing the retired high court judge Sir Wyn Williams, who is chairing the inquiry, Stein said: “The Post Office knew that the Horizon system was defective but still sought to bring prosecutions of subpostmasters, bring civil actions against postmasters and refuse to investigate these issues because the subpostmasters might catch on to the truth.
“We have seen a parade of liars, bullies, amnesiacs and arrogant individuals give evidence before you,” he said, with “subpostmasters treated as subhumans” and as an “expendable cash resource”.
Stein added: “It has been noteworthy, we say, that for every witness who has been brazen about their behaviour, there have been others who have chosen to plead amnesia …
“We know of course, that the inquiry can’t make any findings as to criminal or civil liability. Our clients take some small comfort in the fact that the Metropolitan police and Solicitors Regulation Authority have followed the hearings closely.”
About 80% of the victims of the Post Office and Fujitsu were yet to come forward, the inquiry heard.
Stein said those convicted, made bankrupt or forced to refund the Post Office for paper shortfalls should claim compensation. “We suggest that there is nothing to fear any more from the Post Office,” he said. “They’ve been discredited, they cannot hurt you any more.”
Tim Moloney KC, representing 76 post office operators wrongly convicted on the basis of Horizon records, said the inquiry must ask whether those responsible at the Post Office and Fujitsu and in government “did not, could not or would not hear any warning that Horizon lacked integrity because their ears were stuffed with cash”.
Post Office investigators had financial and career incentives to push through successful prosecutions, the inquiry has heard, while Fujitsu was said to be looking to defend its government contracts. The Post Office is also believed to have financially benefited from falsely “recovering” funds from post office operators where in reality there had been no shortfall.
Maloney said that despite the obvious injustice, “proposals for an independent external review in March 2010 was shut down following contact between several senior managers including the head of criminal law, the head of security and head of product and practicality”.
He called for the witness statements heard at the inquiry to be the start of a “rigorous criminal investigation” and for compensation to be paid swiftly to those whose lives had been ruined. “Tragically, postmasters continue to die before any offer of proper, full and final compensation,” he said.
The inquiry will resume in spring with evidence from the former Post Office chief executive Paula Vennells and the current Liberal Democrat leader, Ed Davey, who was postal affairs minister between 2010 and 2012.
