CCRC Decision on 44 Post Office Prosecutions

(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy if he will make a statement on the 44 Post Office prosecutions overturned by the CCRC.

I appreciate the urgent question. The Government recognise that the Horizon dispute has had a hugely damaging effect on the lives of affected postmasters and their families, and its repercussions are still being felt today. I have spoken to a number of postmasters who have been affected by this ordeal.

On 2 October, the Post Office formally responded to the Court of Appeal and Southwark Crown court regarding convicted postmasters whose cases were referred by the Criminal Cases Review Commission. The Post Office has stated that it will not oppose 44 out of the 47 cases. The Post Office also sincerely apologised to postmasters for historical failings and underlined its commitment to delivering a fundamental review of the businesses and to resetting its relationship with postmasters, to ensure that this never happens again.

This decision by the Post Office is an important milestone for postmasters whose convictions are part of this appeals process. Friday’s announcement was not, however, the end of that process. It is now for the courts to decide whether the convictions should be overturned. It would not therefore be appropriate for the Government to comment on these cases until that process is complete.

The Post Office continues to co-operate fully with the CCRC and is in the process of reviewing about 900 historical prosecutions. Should it find any new information that may cast doubt on the safety of a conviction, it has confirmed that it will disclose that information to the person who is convicted. We will continue to monitor the work of the Post Office closely. In addition, I am pleased that the Government last week launched an inquiry, chaired by retired High Court judge Sir Wyn Williams, which will gather relevant available evidence to provide a public summary of the failings that occurred in relation to Horizon and assess whether lessons have been learned and concrete changes have taken place, or at least are under way, at the Post Office.

I had high hopes for the Minister when he was appointed, but unfortunately he is reverting to type, like all his predecessors I have had to deal with over the last eight years. The hon. Member for North West Leicestershire (Andrew Bridgen), Lord Arbuthnot and I have been campaigning on this issue for nearly nine years, and I know that many other Members across the House have individual cases and have been involved in this. It is six years since the three of us met the CCRC, and I am pleased that Friday’s announcement made it clear that the Post Office would not pursue 44 of the cases. But those are simple words, and they belie the agony and torment of these individuals and of hundreds of other individuals who have lost their livelihoods, their good names and, in some cases, their freedom. In other cases, people have lost their lives.

I am sorry, Minister, but what you have said today is not good enough. I cannot get over the fact that this scandal—that is what it is—is still being treated as somehow an issue of the Post Office. The Government are the single shareholder in the Post Office; they are the ones who can actually make some changes, so I would like to ask them some direct questions.

First, as the single shareholder, were the Government involved in the decision not to take forward these prosecutions, in the same way they were involved with the £100 million they spent in defending the civil case last year? Secondly, in terms of the convictions that have been overturned, the Minister said in June that there would be a process in place for compensation. Will he announce a compensation process, or will these people have to pursue cases through the court for compensation? Can I also ask where we are at with the historic compensation process? I understand that 2,000 claims have been made, but not a penny has yet been paid out.

Finally, can I put this issue to the Minister? I am sorry, but the review he has announced is not good enough. It may have a retired judge at its head, but he does not have the powers to summon witnesses and cross-examine them. A full public inquiry is needed. Without that, we will not get to the truth of what is, as I have already said, a national scandal.

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for those points, and I will try to deal with them directly. The decision to prosecute postmasters was an operational matter for the Post Office, and the Government are not involved in operational decisions. However, in hindsight, knowing what we know now, it is clear that different conclusions could and should have been reached by the Post Office, and that is why the inquiry is there to look at the lessons.

The right hon. Gentleman asked about a route for compensation, should postmasters who have been convicted have their convictions overturned. There are processes in place for them to receive compensation if appropriate, and that includes a statutory scheme under section 133 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988.

In terms of the latest update on the historical shortfall scheme, the Post Office launched the scheme on 1 May to allow postmasters who were not part of the group litigation to have issues with shortfalls recorded in Horizon investigated and addressed. The window for applications formally closed on 14 August, but late applications are being considered by the Post Office on a case-by-case basis. There have been over 2,200 claims, and the independent panel advising the Post Office on the scheme is now assessing those.

The right hon. Gentleman talked about the inquiry. A judge-led inquiry is very much what was asked for. We have Sir Wyn Williams, a former judge, at the head of that. He will be an independent chair; he will be able to ask the questions, push back at the Government and the Post Office, and get evidence. The reason it is an inquiry rather than a review is that, reflecting on the way its remit was worded, I have always wanted it to be a backward-looking review that enabled evidence to be sought, rather than to be done on just a desktop basis. We have clarified that in the written statement, and I believe this is the inquiry—albeit on a non-statutory basis—that will actually get the answers, and do it in a quick way that hopefully satisfies the sub-postmasters and gets the answers they want.

Almost 20 years ago, Telford resident Tracy Felstead—then a 19-year-old post office clerk—was wrongly convicted and jailed because of a glitch in the Post Office computer system. Last week, the Post Office finally conceded defeat in the long-running battle between David and Goliath. How did a respectable organisation such as the Post Office, a major software company such as for Fujitsu, the great and the good in the civil service, and Ministers from all parties fall prey to groupthink on such a grand scale, so that, despite this computer error occurring across the country, it was assumed that the only possible explanation was that all sub-postmasters affected were dishonest? What action will my hon. Friend take to ensure the Post Office and Fujitsu are properly held to account, and will he commit to determining who knew what and when during this shameful saga?

My hon. Friend is absolutely right that we need to get to the bottom of who knew what and when. That is why I am determined that, under Sir Wyn Williams’s chairmanship, we can seek evidence to complement what is already available from Mr Justice Fraser’s findings by speaking to the Post Office and Fujitsu, which have agreed to comply fully with this inquiry. I also hope that sub-postmasters will, through conversation with Sir Wyn Williams, agree to get involved so that they can share their evidence and stories and so that we can get to the bottom of this, exactly as my hon. Friend says.

The Post Office Horizon scandal may well be the largest miscarriage of justice in our history, with 900 prosecutions, innocent people bankrupted and imprisoned, careers ruined, families destroyed, reputations smashed and lives lost. I pay tribute to the Justice For Subpostmasters Alliance and all who campaigned with them, including Members on all sides of the House, and particularly my right hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Mr Jones), who secured this urgent question.

For decades, the Post Office denied all wrongdoing, imposing huge stress and legal fees on the victims and spending tens of millions of pounds in the process. Friday’s announcement is a welcome relief for so many, but can the Minister tell us why, as its only shareholder, the Government allowed the Post Office to continue to oppose the appeals for so long? Far from it being merely an operational matter, as the Minister has said, will he admit that this represents a gross failure of oversight, and will he tell us how much this has cost the Post Office and, ultimately, the taxpayer? What is the estimated cost of the compensation that will now need to be paid to those prosecuted, and what of those who were pursued, harassed and bankrupted, but not ultimately prosecuted? It is right that the Government have finally announced a judge-led inquiry into this scandal, which Labour called for months ago, but despite this House having expressed its concerns forcefully, the terms of reference deliberately exclude compensation. Will the Minister amend the terms of reference to include compensation and deliver true justice for the victims?

A miscarriage of justice on this scale undermines confidence in the justice system. Is it right that the Post Office has the power of independent prosecution, and is the Minister reviewing it? The victims need justice, not more unanswered questions. The taxpayer needs to know just how much this failure of oversight has, and will, cost. Finally, the Government need to take responsibility for this debacle and ensure nothing like it can ever happen again.

I thank the hon. Lady for her question—there were a number of questions in that. In terms of the Government’s involvement, as I say, the Post Office’s decisions are operational decisions for it and its board. What happened when—whether there was any Government involvement in terms of the Government shareholder, the board’s appointee, as well as the Post Office—will come up in the independent inquiry, and it is right that they are questioned so that we find out what happened and when.

On the issue of compensation, if the sub-postmasters get involved in this inquiry and share their evidence, they will be able to share their stories and the losses that they have made, both directly and indirectly. However, an inquiry cannot direct compensation; ultimately, that has to be done through the courts.

It is clearly not this very good Minister’s fault, but it is clear, is it not, that a monstrous injustice by the state has been visited upon these poor postmasters and postmistresses, leaving us all, I would hope, extremely uneasy? By refusing to allow the inquiry even to consider the compensation that they should be given, are not the Government, who own, fund and direct the Post Office, in danger of making an already truly dreadful situation even worse?

I thank my right hon. Friend for those personal comments. We are constituency MPs as well, so we can all, I hope, share the horror when we hear the stories of those people, who could easily have been constituents of mine. In terms of compensation, as I say, there are avenues open to those who have been wrongfully prosecuted, there is reason for people to be able to talk about their losses, and it is then for Sir Wyn Williams to present his findings when he concludes the independent inquiry.

During this pandemic, the post office network has shown what a valuable community asset it is. Cases being reviewed in Scotland and the rest of the UK should result in financial compensation to all those innocent people who suffered as a result of the Horizon scandal. I pay tribute to all who have worked for justice in these cases. Will the Minister commit today to ensuring that the costs do not put the post office network at further financial risks? Also, does he still not understand that a non-statutory review is not an independent inquiry, as was promised by the Prime Minister?

In terms of the post office network, it is up to the Post Office to work out how best to compensate people, and it will be looking at that in due course. We will continue to work with the new chief executive, Nick Read, who is looking to put the future relationship with postmasters on a sure footing. In terms of an independent inquiry, this is the judge-led inquiry that has been asked for, albeit on a non-statutory footing. It is judge-led and it is backward looking, in terms of taking evidence from all those involved. When the hon. Lady sees the findings at the end, I hope she will see that, although perhaps not everybody will get everything they want, we will get answers about who knew what, when.

May I congratulate the right hon. Member for North Durham (Mr Jones) on securing this urgent question? The Minister is well aware of my long-term interest in this topic, which has been a running sore for far too long. How confident is he that the review that he announced last week will gain the support and participation of all the stakeholders involved in this issue, and will it be able to hold to account and hold responsible those who allowed this gross miscarriage of justice to occur? If it cannot do the first of those, what confidence can he have that it will ensure that this intolerable situation will never ever be repeated?

My hon. Friend makes an incredibly good point. It is important, first, that Sir Wyn Williams engages with the sub-postmasters, led by Alan Bates, as part of the group litigation, to explain how he intends to investigate and take evidence, and I hope that they would therefore engage. I have talked about the fact that the Post Office and Fujitsu are ready to comply fully with the investigation, but if there are important people with important evidence that is not coming out, for whatever reason, there are mechanisms available to the chairman, Sir Wyn Williams, to look at that further and to re-evaluate.

Two post offices in my constituency are threatened with closure because of the difficulty of recruiting new sub-postmasters or sub-postmistresses. What impact does the Minister think the appalling case of Horizon has had on recruitment? Is he anxious about the future of post offices, particularly rural ones but even those in urban constituencies such as mine? What is the Department doing to work with the Post Office on this issue?

Yes, I am anxious, because it is important that we keep the network up at the target level we set of 11,500. The hon. Lady is right that some of the difficulty is due to the situation gone by; some of it is due to the ongoing complexity of the Horizon system and resource availability. I am glad that the chief executive, Nick Read, comes from a business where he is used to dealing with people as stakeholders, not just as employees, so engaging in a more positive future relationship with postmasters. She is right to talk about rural and urban areas. In London, although clearly we do not want to lose post offices, it is relatively easy compared with some rural areas to get to the next post office, but that is not an excuse to diminish the network in London.

In his previous response, the Minister said he is anxious about the future of the network. I welcome the statement that the Post Office wants to reset the relationship with sub-postmasters, but if he is anxious, what measures is he going to take to make sure that that actually happens? He says that he expects compensation from the Post Office “in due course”, but will he put a timescale on that?

On compensation, it depends on the situation of the people involved. Those who have been wrongfully convicted have recourse through the courts. I have regular contact with Nick Read, the chief executive, and other members of the board to make sure that we look at post office closures, as reported to me by MPs and from updates, and increase and improve recruitment of postmasters, which will be achieved through a better future relationship.