Rishi Sunak’s Treasury ‘held up correct compensation for Post Office victims’

Rishi Sunak is dealing with tough questions on whether or not the Treasury dragged their toes when he was Chancellor over paying correct compensation to the sub-postmasters who uncovered the scandal.

Alan Bates, who was portrayed within the ITV drama, led a bunch of 555 employees who took the Post Office to courtroom after they have been wrongly blamed for losses brought on by the defective Horizon IT system.

In December 2019, it was agreed that the subpostmasters – lots of whom had had lives wrecked – would obtain £58million in compensation. But round £46million of the cash was creamed off by the claimants’ funders and authorized advisers, leaving them with a mean of simply £21,600 every.

Despite complaints that this was not honest, ministers resisted requires the sub-postmasters to get extra cash as they insisted what that they had acquired was their full and closing compensation. After years of claiming no, it was not till March 2022 that the Government introduced that it will give them honest compensation on the same foundation to sub-postmasters who had not been a part of the group litigation.

Mr Sunak was Chancellor from February 2020 to July 2022.

Tory MP Paul Scully, who was the Post Office Minister throughout this era, blamed the Treasury processes. He advised the BBC’s Politics Live: “It was me who went to him when Rishi was Chancellor to ask him for the money. You had to go through this arcane process when you literally had to do a value for money exercise.

“Crikey… this is people’s lives. There are people who had died, there are people who have committed suicide, there are people who have been chased out of their villages and even left the country as a result of this. Of course it’s value for money, of course we have got to get on and do this.”

Downing Street insisted Mr Sunak was to not blame for the delay in agreeing to provide correct compensation to Mr Bates and the others concerned within the authorized case.

Asked if he was accountable, the Prime Minister’s spokesman stated: “No. During his time as Chancellor, the PM acted to ensure those postmasters who played a crucial role in uncovering the Horizon scandal through the High Court action would receive their fair share of compensation.”