Hi there
We’re heading towards the end of the Inquiry’s two-week half term break, so I thought I’d send you a round-up of the various news lines which have appeared since I wrote to you last week from Dublin.
Compensation pot expands
The government has finally put aside some serious money for victims of the infected blood scandal – £11.8bn in total. During her budget speech on Wednesday, the chancellor, Rachel Reeves said the money would go to “those infected and those affected”. In the same breath, she announced she was “setting aside £1.8bn to compensate victims of the Post Office Horizon scandal” calling it “redress that is long overdue for the pain and injustice that they have suffered.”
Finding out the government compensation pot had topped £1bn in Jan 2022 took some serious sleuthing (well, read the story, and make up your own mind). To have the official sum available increased by £800,000 live on television made a welcome change.
I wonder what influence Darren Jones MP (sitting on the right of Rachel Reeves in the left of the picture above) had on this decision. Jones was a forensic champion of the Subpostmasters whilst chair of the Business Select Committee. Now Chief Secretary to the Treasury, Jones is in the metaphorical room when big budgetary decisions are being made.
Given the whacking great increase in compensation funding available I don’t doubt some lawyers are rubbing their hands with glee, especially Herbert Smith Freehills, who have already made an absolute killing out of this scandal. What all this needs is another inquiry. Hang on, what’s this…?
New Business Committee compensation inquiry
The newly-appointed Business Select Committee has announced yet another inquiry into the Post Office scandal. Once more they are focusing on compensation.
On Tuesday 5 November, whilst the public inquiry is hearing from Sarah Munby (the the civil servant who allegedly told former Post Office chair Henry Staunton to go slow on doling out compensation to Subpostmasters), Sir Alan Bates will be telling the Business Committee about his battle for redress. I’m not yet sure which event I’ll attend, but it will be one of them.
Other witnesses at the select committee include lawyers from Hudgells, Howe and Co and Freeths, who all represent Subpostmasters fighting for compensation. Sadly we won’t hear from any of the people responsible for delaying it.
The one witness who might be able to provide some answers is Sir Gary Hickinbottom, Chair of the Post Office Overturned Convictions Independent Pecuniary Assessment Panel. I suspect he has no idea of the full picture, nor has he had to assess that many cases.
If I were the committee chair I’d have partners from Herbert Smith Freehills and Addleshaw Goddard in front of MPs explaining how this compensation debacle is now stretching into its fifth year.
Maybe that will happen during the select committee inquiry’s second hearing, which is scheduled to take place on 19 November. I might go along to that as it’s the same date as Flora Page’s now sold out Heilbron lecture, so I’ll be in town anyway.
One down two to go
Speaking of legal lectures, after a long day delivering the budget and giving media interviews on Wednesday, the chancellor Rachel Reeves settled down that evening to listen to Professor Richard Moorhead deliver his first Hamlyn lecture*. It is called “Unreliable gods and their fearless logics”, part one of a trilogy entitled “Lawyers Ethics after the Post Office and other cases: What drives ethical failure?” (I think).
You can listen to Richard’s disembodied voice and watch his slides as he delivers his lecture on Youtube here or you can listen to top legal journalist Joshua Rozenberg interview him just before the talk in Exeter here. It’s a perfect scene-setter for the series. Joshua also has some useful front-row photos of the event on his substack.
Richard is off to Leeds next, and then London. He tells me more in-person tickets have been made available for the previously over-subscribed London date if you want to see if they are still available.
* She didn’t really.
Jo’s got a book deal!
I am delighted to tell you that Justice For Subpostmasters Alliance founder Jo Hamilton has been signed by Blink Books to write a book! It’s going to be called Why Are You Here, Mrs Hamilton? The Post Office, Horizon and My Fight for Justice and will feature a foreword from Sir Alan Bates.
Jo told the Bookseller magazine: “This is a chance to tell my own story. One that is full of highs, lows and some truly magical moments. I hope the legacy it leaves is one of hope and it will encourage people to never ever give up.”
Blink’s publishing director Ciara Lloyd said: “When I met Jo, I knew instantly that Bonnier was the right home for her to finally speak her truth and shine a light on the ongoing injustices. Her story of defiance will be told for years to come, and I am incredibly proud to be her publisher.”
The book is coming out in June next year and there will be an audiobook version – I wonder if Monica Dolan will do it, or might it be Jo herself?
Why Are You Here, Mrs Hamilton? (to the best of my knowledge) will be the third book published by a Subpostmaster, after Sami Sabet’s Judge Me If You Can and Noel and Sian Thomas’ Stamp of Innocence (ghostwritten by Aled Gwyn Job and also available in Welsh as Llythyr Noel: Dal Y Post). I wish Jo the best of luck with getting it written and look forward to watching it shoot up the bestseller charts!
Other news
Who is the subject of the Post Office’s Project Tiger investigation? teases Computer Weekly. The answer is Tim McCormack, a former Subpostmaster and campaigner Paula Vennells et al shamefully ignored until it was too late. The Post Office have now apparently set up a project looking into how and why they managed to dismiss the really important information Tim was giving them. Go get ’em, Tiger.
Warning shots fired as former subpostmasters have ‘useful’ meeting with [the new acting] Post Office CEO – another Computer Weekly article writing up Jo Hamilton and Mark Kelly’s meeting with Neil Brocklehurst.
One more big push
Okay, that’s it from me for now. As I mentioned before I’m going to get to as many of the final days of the Inquiry as I can, where I will be tweeting and reporting and newslettering to the best of my ability. It starts on Monday and runs through to Wednesday 13th November.
Then, I think, this newsletter is going to dial down a bit. I’ll obviously be back for the Inquiry closing statements in December and hopefully be all over Sir Wyn Williams’ report when it comes out, which could be any time next year.
Have a great weekend and I’ll be back next week!
Very best
Nick