Former Post Office boss Paula Vennells has reportedly admitted that her evidence from 2012 was incorrect in the long-running Post Office Scandal Inquiry.
Earlier this year ITV’s Mr Bates vs The Post Office thrust the Post Office Scandal firmly back into the public consciousness and spotlight. Many viewers were left wondering where the real people were now, including former Post Office chief executive Paula Vennells. In the months that have followed, those involved in the scandal have continued to be questioned in the long-running Post Office Scandal Inquiry and Vennells has now made a tearful admission. According to the BBC, this was the first time Vennells has spoken publicly in almost a decade and she reportedly admitted that evidence she gave back in 2012 was not correct.
Questioned in front of a room of sub-postmasters and post-mistresses, Vennells was asked by the Inquiry’s Lead Counsel Jason Beer about the evidence she previously gave to MPs. At the time she had reportedly told them that every case concerning the Horizon IT system brought against sub-postmasters had been successful.
After Mr Beer listed several cases that hadn’t been, Vennells is said to have replied "I fully accept now, that the Post Office - excuse me", before breaking off, crying.
She allegedly continued, "The Post Office knew that. I completely accept it. Personally, I didn't know that, and I'm incredibly sorry that it happened to those people and to so many others."
The BBC went on to report that Vennells broke down in tears four times throughout the day and also apologised multiple times. She was Chief Executive of the Post Office between 2012 and 2019, when the sub-postmasters were still being prosecuted. Despite evidence of wrongful convictions, the organisation was continuing to deny that faults with the Horizon IT system were to blame for the money seemingly going missing.
More than 900 people who were running post offices were prosecuted between 1999 and 2015 after the faulty computer system made it appear as though there were shortfalls in accounts. Whilst questioning Vennells, Mr Beer is said to have asked how she could not have known about what was going on.
In response she said, "This is a situation that is so complex, it is a question I have asked myself as well. I have learned some things that I did not know as a result of the inquiry and I imagine that we will go through some of the detail of that. I wish I had known."
Mr Beer also asked the former Post Office Chief Executive whether she thought she was the "unluckiest" CE in the UK. This was in light of her witness statements claiming that she wasn’t given information about Horizon, hadn’t been given assurances about the IT system by members of Post Office staff and didn’t see certain documents.
"I was given much information, and as the inquiry has heard, there was information that I wasn't given, and others didn't receive," she declared.
During the questioning, Vennells apparently went on to describe herself as being "very affected" by the human impact statements given by those affected by the shocking scandal. She specifically apologised to Alan Bates, who has tirelessly campaigned for justice for those affected by the scandal and was an important figure in the real story behind Mr Bates vs the Post Office. She is also understood to have apologised to forensic accountants Second Sight who were fired by the Post Office after finding bugs in Horizon, as well as to Lord Arbuthnot who has also been a vehement campaigner.
The independent public inquiry into the Horizon IT scandal was launched in September 2020 and this became a statutory inquiry in June 2021, following a request from Sir Wyn Williams, the Chair of the Inquiry.
