Investigating the Post Office Scandal

A wide-ranging interview with Mark Baker, a long-serving Postmaster and CWU union rep, who has just announced his retirement. Mark posted a note on the CWU Postmasters facebook page stating that the Post Office has rendered the Post Office counter side of his retail business "totally unviable" due to what he calls "their scandalous remuneration system". He goes on to say "we will not allow our retail business to be damaged by the Post Office leeching off the income we derive from our retail side. Neither of us enjoy working in the Post Office anymore and we both have held a mantra throughout our working lives that we will not work in a job we no longer enjoy. We do not see a future for the Network. The Post Office are not prepared to change their ways and the Government has no plan for the Network it owns, except a managed - or mis-managed - decline."

In this interview Mark explains why he thinks this is the case and opens up about his NFSP past during the Post Office's prosecution spree. He also explains how he came to understand Horizon was not a reliable system, his departure from the NFSP and his work for the CWU helping Subpostmasters under the Post Office cosh.

Journalists Rebecca Thomson and Nick Wallis attend the Post Office Horizon Inquiry's second compensation hearing in Central London. Interviews with Flora Page, Seema Misra, Janet Skinner, Tracy Felstead and Parmod Kalia

On 6 July 2022, the statutory inquiry into the Post Office Horizon scandal held the first (see the video here) of two hearings into the issue of proper compensation for Subpostmasters at The Oval cricket ground. Rebecca and Nick went along and ended up interviewing David Enright from Howe and Co (a legal firm representing more than a hundred Subpostmasters at this inquiry) and Kevin Brown, whose wife Sharon is a member of the 555 High Court claimants who blew the scandal open in 2019.

On 9 June 2022, Gillian Harrison and Richard Ormerod won their appeals against their convictions at Southwark Crown Court. They became the 74th and 75th Subpostmasters to have their convictions quashed. Rebecca and Nick went along to watch it happen and speak to Gillian, Richard and representatives from their legal firm, Hudgells. Rebecca and Nick start by discussing the awkwardness of being a journalist at a court case, then we hear about Gillian and Richard's criminal convictions and why the Post Office did not oppose their appeal. Then, an interview with Gillian and a second interview with Neil Hudgell, Executive Chairman of Hudgell solicitors. Neil talks about the wider issue of compensation and the apparent impasse between the Post Office and the Postmasters' legal representatives over how that compensation should be finalised. This interview was recorded before the Post Office and and Hudgells agreed to appoint a retired judge (Lord Dyson) to conduct an "early neutral evaluation" to decide on the issue of "non-pecuniary damages" (ie to reputation, health etc). 

In which Rebecca, Nick and Silent Simon the Producer try to decide what the podcast should be called. And then they decide. And then Nick tries to explain the Post Office Horizon Scandal for people who may not be aware of it, and Rebecca talks about breaking the story back in 2009.