Paula Vennels being questioned at the Post Office Inquiry, followed by others - thread 2

I think it was because he hadn't followed the security measures exactly to the letter.

They could then say he was at fault

A bit of aside that just popped into my head…. going back to the subpostmaster, Martin Griffiths, who committed suicide. As well as spurious horizon-related money, he was also held accountable for the money that was stolen in an armed raid on his post office? How can this be possible legally? How could the post office hold him liable for that?

She's making a lot of use of the same strategy we saw spelt out in a briefing for a meeting with, IIRC, James Arbuthnot about Second Sight preliminary report:

a) say we're pleased with how good the report says we are in any positive or neutral findings;
b) talk about thousands of happy SPMs who have no problems;
c) describe findings of gross and critical failures which had destroyed individuals' lives as "identified some areas where we can make further improvements, which we look forward to doing".

She trotted the same out today, I think in response to Mr Henry saying something like, "Here's some cast-iron evidence of you being told of life-destroying error by POL, which you claim came as news to you; how did you react?"

On Radio 2, Jeremy Vine as I type

I'm looking forward to watching all the coverage 🤠

I cannot bear the way that she presents herself as hard working and caring as a CEO but allowed the sub post masters and mistresses to be treated so harshly. The point where the new contract made it clear that any shortfall had to be covered by the SPM/M. Surely she could have challenged the wording?
I will never forgive her for failing to show any interest/respond to Tim McCormack's email about Seema Misra (pregnant post mistress sent to prison). She knew about her but failed to act.

All of her crying (even the fake crocodile tears) are setting the women's movement and women trying to break the glass ceiling back so many decades! I mean if it was a bloke in that seat giving evidence at the enquiry, he simply wouldn't be given the opportunity to cry so often and to gather themselves before questioning took up again.

She is such a disappointment to women, to executives, to the Church of England and to so so so many people affected by her conduct then and now. I'd be so embarrassed if I was related to her in any way.

Shame on her.

Quite so. My pals on the front desk and on the cleaning teams were useful founts of information. My HoD was genuinely surprised how much I could glean from them, the great big snob, not that I named sources specifically.....

Oh suddenly she knows a lot about Scotland

She don’t know anything

If only. Back in my very first job our tea lady knew absolutely everything that was going on in every department. We used to call her the Oracle.

Unlike Paula who clearly knows absolutely fuck all about anything, ever.

How did she not know about Scotland

I had to go out so I’m catching up and way behind all of you, but I’ve just got to the point where PV says all she’s worked on for the last few years is the enquiry and that’s been her ENTIRE focus.

IIRC didn’t Mr Beer say either yesterday or on Wednesday that she’d been invited to contribute her thoughts in advance but she declined to do so on the grounds that there was no need, the enquiry would be establishing the facts? So WTF was she actually doing while ‘working’ on the enquiry for all this time?

[I just checked and it’s on Nick Wallis’s blog, he puts it much better:

Jason Beer KC (who asked questions on behalf of the Inquiry) reminded Vennells that in August 2023 the Inquiry wrote to her telling her that in her witness statement they would like her to: “reflect on your time at the Post Office and set out whether there was anything you would have handled differently”.
Beer took Vennells to paragraph 1801 of her witness statement, which states: “With the benefit of hindsight, there are many things I and the Post Office should have done differently. I am now reflecting with care on these matters and I will expand upon them and answer them as fully as possible when I give my evidence to the Inquiry.”
Beer was curious. “given you provided a 775-page witness statement that took seven months to write, could you not have reflected on what you could and should have done fully and differently within the witness statement?”]

She might not be that cunning if she ends up facing POCA consequences and the way things are going, she might.

I hate the cold, calculated moral rot like her, she deserves every bit coming her way.

I honestly feel for these people. Like there's just some things in life you can't quite move on from.

This is absolutely appalling

Oh dear, the sentence is too long, I can't understand.

She is outrageous.

Playing damsel in distress

The only good thing is she does have quite an invidious choice, to appear cruel and heartless or thick and lazy. I guess thick and lazy is better than slopping out on a daily basis but, to someone who is used to being deferred to and calling the shots, it must be quite upsetting.