Davey apologises to submasters who had lives ruined in Horizon scandal

Sir Ed Davey has today made a grovelling apology to the subpostmasters and subpostmistresses whose lives were ruined in the Horizon scandal. 

The Liberal Democrat leader admitted he should have seen through the ‘Post Office’s lies’ when he was postal affairs minister between 2010 and 2012. 

He also issued a personal apology to hero Sir Alan Bates for taking five months to meet him, saying it was a ‘poorly misjudged’ decision to decline to see him in May 2010. 

But he went on to say he ‘followed the advice and did not question it’.

Sir Ed made the admission in a witness statement to the Horizon Inquiry as he sat in the witness box today to give evidence.

He said he would have ‘acted differently’ if the Post Office ‘had told the truth’ and said he relied on the advice of his civil servants who weren’t able to ‘dig into the detail of every question’. 

The Horizon scandal is widely considered one of the biggest miscarriages of justice after more than 700 subpostmasters were wrongly convicted when dodgy Fujitsu software showed shortfalls incorrectly reported on their accounts.

In total, 236 postmaster and postmistresses were sent to prison, leading to bankruptcies and at least four suicides.

Sir Ed has been heavily criticised for his role in the scandal while victims accused him of distancing himself from the catastrophe with his daft election campaign antics.

In his 62-page witness statement to the probe, published on Thursday, Sir Ed said he had watched the ITV drama Mr Bates vs The Post Office and was ‘shocked’ by the harm caused to subpostmasters and subpostmistresses. 

‘Since reading about the High Court judgment in Bates & Others v Post Office in December 2019, watching the ITV drama Mr Bates vs The Post Office, listening to the testimonies of so many subpostmasters and hearing the evidence elicited by the inquiry, I have been shocked at the harm done to so many subpostmasters over so many years, and by the scale of the lies told by the Post Office and Fujitsu – to the subpostmasters, to the courts, to ministers of all parties, including myself, to Parliament, to journalists and to the public,’ he said.

‘The Post Office Horizon scandal is the greatest miscarriage of justice of our time, and I am deeply sorry for the individuals and families who have had their lives ruined by it.

‘As one of the ministers over the 20 years of this scandal who had postal affairs as part of my ministerial responsibilities, I am sorry that it took me five months to meet Sir Alan Bates, the man who has done so much to uncover all this, and that I did not see through the Post Office’s lies when I and my officials raised his concerns with them.’

He went on to say he felt he was ‘seriously misled by the Post Office’.

‘I do not know if one or more civil servants misled me during my time as a minister, or if they were themselves misled by the Post Office,’ Sir Ed continued. 

‘I hope the inquiry can shed light on this.

‘However, if I had known then what we all know now – if the Post Office had told the truth – of course I would have acted differently.’

Sir Alan had sent a letter asking to meet the MP for Kingston and Surbiton in which he warned the Post Office was acting as ‘judge, jury and executioner’. 

But in his reply the political leader shrugged him off and said: ‘I do not believe a meeting would serve any useful purpose.’ 

In his apology to Sir Alan today, he said sorry for signing off the response and admitted: ‘I should have accepted Sir Alan’s request for a meeting when he first made it.’ 

He denied that he eventually met Sir Alan in October 2010 due to ‘presentational reasons’ despite a briefing note prepared ahead of the meeting suggesting it was a consideration.

Sir Ed said the note was prepared for him ‘long after’ the meeting had been arranged and said he met with the campaigner because he could ‘see he was cross at my initial response and wanted to hear his concerns directly’.

Sir Ed continued: ‘As far as I can remember, that briefing – long after the meeting had been arranged – was the first time that ‘presentational reasons’ for the meeting were mentioned to me.

‘They were certainly not the reason I decided to meet Sir Alan Bates following his second letter.

‘As set out above, I told officials I wanted to meet him because I could see he was cross at my initial response and wanted to hear his concerns directly.’

There were groans in the public gallery as Sir Ed claimed he did not remember reading Sir Alan’s first letter requesting a meeting.

When asked by council to the inquiry Jason Beer KC if he considered the response ‘terse’, Sir Ed said: ‘Yes it is a terse reply.

‘(But) I do not remember reading his first letter. I remember the second letter … I have apologised and I repeat that apology for not meeting Mr Bates on the basis of his first letter.’

The Post Office pursued the postmasters and postmistresses through private prosecutions, but Sir Ed claimed he did not know that was happening. 

‘If I had known about it I would have been surprised… It seems quite an old fashioned thing to do,’ he told the inquiry. 

‘Now we know that it was wrong and it seems that power should be taken away. I wasn’t aware and it seems odd that they were.’

The Liberal Democrats MP’s evidence came after the Chancellor for the Duchy of Lancaster and former postal affairs minister Pat McFadden said ‘of course I wish I had done more’ to ask the Post Office if the Horizon system was ‘as robust as they suggested’.

The Labour MP for Wolverhampton South East urged the probe not to recommend making ministers ‘shadow chief executives’ to prevent the bosses of state-owned companies going ‘rogue’ following the scandal.

Mr McFadden instead said it was worth considering the implementation of an independent body ‘that can be called in to launch an inquiry or take action when the level of allegations reaches such a point that it looks like that is the right thing to do’.

He said ministers ‘do not intervene in court judgments and cannot overturn court verdicts’ after telling the probe the company’s actions resulted in ‘innocent people being convicted’.

Mr McFadden, who was postal affairs minister between 2007 and 2009, said he does not believe he spoke to then business secretary John Hutton about allegations made by subpostmasters about the integrity of the faulty system.

He told the inquiry that the ‘ultimate responsibility’ for a state-owned company such as the Post Office lies ‘with the Government’, but said he does not recall officials telling him that ‘they thought a miscarriage of justice was under way’.

He said he was first made aware that the Post Office was prosecuting subpostmasters for alleged shortfalls at their branches in February 2009.

Mr McFadden told the probe he believed officials had not told him of a miscarriage of justice because the Post Office’s replies to queries about the system were that it was robust.

He said a handover note given to him when he took on the role of postal affairs minister ‘did not mention anything’ in relation to subpostmasters’ complaints about the system.

Mr McFadden said an email from a Computer Weekly journalist asking for comment on allegations made by subpostmasters was also the first time he was made aware of Post Office prosecutions and of complaints regarding the manner in which the company conducted its investigations.

Hundreds of victims are awaiting compensation despite the previous Government announcing that those who have had convictions quashed are eligible for £600,000 payouts.