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Post Office’s Jane MacLeod “significant individual” in criminal investigation
Read More…: Post Office’s Jane MacLeod “significant individual” in criminal investigationThe detectives running the investigation into possible criminal activity at the Post Office have indicated that former Post Office General Counsel, Jane MacLeod, is a “significant individual” to their criminal investigation. Operation Olympos is a long-running police investigation formed in the wake of the Bates v Post Office civil litigation. It used to be headed up by the Metropolitan Police, but since 2024 it has been led by the National Police Chiefs Council. The inference about MacLeod was made during an NPCC remote briefing for victims of the scandal which was held yesterday and hosted by Commander Stephen Clayman and…
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More info is revealed about Project Brisbane
Read More…: More info is revealed about Project BrisbaneI am once more grateful to Eleanor Shaikh and Matthew Somerville for bringing important information into the public domain. Matthew runs the “Dracos” Inquiry website which mirrors the Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry website whilst making every document on it searchable. There is a manual element to Matthew’s work, which involves scanning the Inquiry website for new uploads. Over the weekend Matthew ran his first full scan since January and found 4,000 new documents had been uploaded to the official site. Eleanor Shaikh immediately started searching for more mentions of the mysterious 2020 report known as Project Brisbane, compiled by…
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Another Compensation Scheme Gets Another Appeal Mechanism
Read More…: Another Compensation Scheme Gets Another Appeal MechanismA new appeal mechanism for applicants to the (now closed) Post Office Horizon Shortfall Scheme (HSS) has been announced by the government. This follows a direct recommendation from the Chair of the Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry in July last year. The HSS was first announced in 2020. In those days it was called the Historical Shortfall Scheme. It was ill-conceived and beset with disaster from off. More here. In March 2024, the government announced that applicants to the HSS could accept a £75,000 fixed award, rather than wait to have their compensation claim assessed. The way the £75,000 was…
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Project Brisbane – a report the Post Office is desperate to keep secret
Read More…: Project Brisbane – a report the Post Office is desperate to keep secretIn January 2022 the researcher Eleanor Shaikh was poring over some written evidence submitted by the Business Department (then known as BEIS) to the Business Select Committee in March 2020. In an annex to the evidence, there was a timeline. One line of the timeline read: “September 2015: The Post Office Minister commissions POL’s new Chair to undertake a review of POL’s Horizon system and handling of postmaster issues. Support is provided by a QC.” [POL stands for Post Office Ltd. A QC is a senior barrister – a Queen’s Counsel – nowadays known as a KC]. Eleanor has read…
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Redress scheme for families of Post Office victims announced
Read More…: Redress scheme for families of Post Office victims announcedThe government has today announced a new compensation scheme for families of those affected by the Post Office scandal. It looks to have support from at least one victims’ group and the Horizon Compensation Advisory Board, an independent body which has done quite a bit to shape government thinking about this scandal. The scheme is called the Horizon Family Members Redress Scheme, and it is, according to the government “expected to open in summer 2026”. The Business Department says the scheme is “designed to be as accessible and straightforward as possible – minimising bureaucratic barriers so that families receive redress without delay.”…
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Parmod Kalia 1958 – 2026
Read More…: Parmod Kalia 1958 – 2026Parmod Kalia has died. He was 67. His family announced the news on Tuesday, saying “our beloved husband, father, grandfather, brother and uncle has passed away. He was a guiding light in our lives. His love, wisdom and warmth will stay with us always.” Parmod was one of the most decent men I have ever met. We first spoke in 2018 on the first day of Bates v Post Office at the High Court. This is how I described our meeting in my book: “Before the afternoon session started I spotted a small, middle-aged man who had been sitting on…
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Post Office and Fujitsu file their defence against Lee Castleton
Read More…: Post Office and Fujitsu file their defence against Lee CastletonThe Post Office and Fujitsu have finally filed a defence to former Subpostmaster Lee Castleton’s July 2025 claim against them at the High Court. It is a partial defence in the light of a recent judgment which ordered a split trial approach to the litigation (see here and below). Lee seeks the opportunity to pursue a claim against the Post Office for abuse of process over their High Court case against him in 2006/7 (Part B) and he wants the 2007 judgment to that case ruled to be obtained by fraud (Part C). In order to do that, the High…
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The Trials of Lee Castleton
Read More…: The Trials of Lee CastletonArcane legal argument aside it was a fairly straightforward day in court. Lee Castleton and his team wanted a trial of all the issues in his claim against the Post Office. The Post Office (and Fujitsu) argued it would be easier, quicker and cheaper to first see if Lee was still bound by the Bates v Post Office settlement agreement signed on Lee’s behalf by Alan Bates and Kay Linnell back in 2019, which stops him from pursuing any further legal action against the Post Office. This was the “split trial” argument and it won the day. The Post Office successfully persuaded…
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Lee Castleton’s case against the Post Office and Fujitsu
Read More…: Lee Castleton’s case against the Post Office and FujitsuThere are three documents of interest in this blog post. The first is a 41-page Particulars of Claim, filed on 10 July 2025 by former East Bridlington Subpostmaster Lee Castleton against the Post Office and Fujitsu. He is seeking a ruling that the 2007 judgment against him was obtained by fraud and £4m in damages. You can download that here: The next are relevant to the directions hearing about the above claim which took place at the Rolls Building on 21 Jan 2026. The first is the Claimant (Lee Castleton) skeleton argument, which you can download here: And this is…
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No action taken against Post Office barrister who broke the rules
Read More…: No action taken against Post Office barrister who broke the rulesSome of the Subpostmasters who had their convictions quashed at the Court of Appeal in 2021 have been sent a letter notifying them that Nick Vamos, a barrister working for Peters and Peters, the law firm acting on behalf of the Post Office, was “not authorised” to carry out the litigation he conducted. The letter, dated 28 November 2025, is sent by Master Alix Beldam KC, the judiciary’s Criminal Appeals Registrar. Master Beldam tells the recipients: “Your appeal against conviction as a result of a prosecution by the Post Office Limited was dealt with by the Court of Appeal (Criminal…
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