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Paula Vennells has said there was no conspiracy “at all” by the Post Office to hide information about the flawed Horizon IT system as she gave a tearful apology to victims of the scandal.
Vennells, chief executive of the state-owned business between 2012 and 2019, told the Post Office Horizon IT inquiry on Wednesday that she had been “too trusting” in her role but “did probe” and “ask questions”.
Asked whether there had been a years-long conspiracy to keep information from her, Vennells said: “I have no sense that there was any conspiracy at all. My deep sorrow in this is that I think that individuals, myself included, made mistakes, didn’t see things, didn’t hear things.
“I have more questions now, but conspiracy feels too far-fetched,” Vennells said, adding that colleagues had sometimes criticised her for being “too curious”.
The comments by Vennells, who led the Post Office as the scale of the problems with its Horizon accounting software became clear, came on her first of three days of evidence to the public inquiry.
More than 900 Post Office branch managers were convicted in cases involving data from flawed accounting software between 1999 and 2015. The cases included more than 700 prosecuted by the Post Office itself.
On Wednesday, Vennells said: “I would just like to say how sorry I am for all the sub-postmasters and their families and others have suffered as a result of all of the matters that the inquiry has been looking into.”
She said she had “listened to all of the human impact statements” and “was very affected by them”.
“I remember listening to one postmaster . . . who said that he would like somebody to go and stand outside his old post office with him so he could tell them exactly what he’d been through. I would do that,” Vennells added.
She wept and reached for a tissue as Jason Beer KC, counsel to the inquiry, listed sub-postmasters who suffered as a result of the scandal. She said she was “incredibly sorry”.
At the start of proceedings, inquiry chair Sir Wyn Williams reminded Vennells she had a right not to answer a question if there was a risk of self-incrimination. In response, Vennells said she intended to answer all the questions put to her.
UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak called the Horizon scandal “one of the greatest miscarriages of justice in our nation’s history” after a television drama in January sparked a public outcry, leading Vennells to hand back her CBE.
The government has since introduced unprecedented legislation to exonerate affected sub-postmasters in England and Wales en masse, bypassing the courts.
In messages from January this year that were seen by the inquiry, Dame Moya Greene, former boss of Royal Mail, which used to own the Post Office, appeared to accuse Vennells of knowing about the problems with Horizon.
Greene, who led Royal Mail between 2010 and 2018, wrote to Vennells: “When it was clear the system was at fault the [Post Office] should have raised a red flag, stopped all proceedings, given people back their money and then tried to compensate them from the ruin this caused in their lives.”
Vennells in response said the process was “taking too long” and that “the toll on everyone affected is dreadful”.
“I don’t know what to say. I think you knew,” Greene said. In response, Vennells wrote this was “not the case”.
“I want to believe you,” Greene said, adding that when they worked together she had been afraid Vennells was being lied to and urged her to begin an independent review of Horizon, only for Vennells to say the system had already been reviewed multiple times.
“How could you not have known?” Greene asked, adding that the Post Office had “dragged their heels, they did not deliver docs [documents], they did not compensate people”.
“I’m sorry, I can’t now support you. I’ve supported you all these years to my own detriment. I can’t support you now after what I have learned,” Greene wrote.
