Archives :
Nick Wallis
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Recusal Top Dog Revealed
One of the most extraordinary episodes in the Bates v Post Office group litigation was the Post Office’s attempt in March 2019, in the middle of the Horizon trial at the High Court, to have the managing judge, Mr Justice Fraser, recuse himself on the grounds his first (Common Issues) trial judgment was somehow biased.…
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A Lot of Criminals in Society
In 2017, the Farncombe Subpostmaster, Chirag Sidhpura, was sacked over a £57,000 discrepancy at his Post Office branch. Chirag’s case was taken up by his MP, Jeremy Hunt, and the campaigner Eleanor Shaikh. In a recent newsletter to constituents, Jeremy Hunt wrote: “In 2017 the tail end of one of the biggest miscarriages in British…
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The Whites of Their Eyes
Howe and Co sit down with BEIS officials to see just how serious the government is about compensation On 19 January 2022 a meeting was held between officials from the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and three lawyers from Howe and Co, who represent 146 Subpostmasters at the Statutory Inquiry into the Post…
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The £1bn Disaster
I recently got a call from a parliamentary friend – not an MP, but someone who works with MPs. He pointed me in the direction of a website I had never come across before. It lists grants made by the government’s Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS – which “owns” the Post Office)…
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Read Admits All 736 Post Office Convictions Are Unsafe
I am not going to attempt to rehash the entire BEIS select committee hearing earlier today as you can still watch it in full here and you can read the transcript here. If you want a blow-by-blow account you can read my live-tweets, carefully collated into a single, readable web-page by the brilliant thread reader…
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Post Office CEO in the Hot Seat
The continued unwillingness of any Post Office executive, past or present, to be interviewed by broadcast journalists on the subject of the Post Office Horizon scandal speaks volumes. We hacks are therefore wholly reliant on MPs to do the job for us. Execs can refuse journalists’ interview requests with impunity. It is rather more difficult…
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Look North 16 Dec 2021
This news report by Mark Ansell features former Postmasters Harjinder Butoy and Alison Hall with a contextual cameo from me at the end.
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“This guy should never be let near a witness-box again”
The above photo is of Dr Robert Worden, who was an expert witness for the Post Office in the Horizon trial, which was part of the Bates v Post Office group litigation. You can read about my experience of watching Dr Worden be cross-examined here, and you can read Mr Justice Fraser’s thoughts on the…
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Compensation, Compensation, Compensation
Tuesday 14 December 2021 was a busy day in Westminster during which three sources of compensation for three distinct groups of Subpostmasters were discussed in various parliamentary corners. At just after 9am yesterday morning the Business (Postal Affairs) Minister Paul Scully (left) published a written statement announcing the government was going to underwrite compensation for…
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More Opposed Cases Fail at Appeal
Two Subpostmasters appealing their convictions at the Court of Appeal have failed to have them quashed. Roger Allen and Alan Robinson, who were prosecuted by the Department for Work and Pensions, were told today by a panel of three judges that Horizon evidence was not essential to their prosecution, and therefore their convictions would stand.…