To clarify - much of the evidence of POL witnesses is awful and shows varying levels of incompetence, concealment and/or arrogance. However, there are some aspects of evidence given that others are heavily critical of, but which I don't necessarily see in quite the same way.
An example would be around the incredulity towards the idea that people within POL didn't understand the fact that we brought about our own prosecutions. In the 1990s I was well aware that the investigators had a reputation that preceded them. My husband worked in branches during this period and tells of his own experience when a shortfall arose in his till. However, I was not aware that the powers of Post Office were unusual in carrying out its own prosecutions. I think Paula referred to the fact that this ongoing investigative role was so well established that it didn't register with her that POL was doing anything more than another organisation that dealt with large sums of money. I appreciate that as CEO there was more obligation on Paula to understand the scope of what POL did, but I was nodding along as she kept saying that this was not something of which she was made aware.
Not Paula but earlier witnesses were repeatedly pushed on where the idea came from that 'Horizon was robust'. Witness after witness referred to this as a widely understood message and it was certainly a message that I also recognised as one which was shared across the business.
In respect of Paula and her email re 'I need to be able to say that remote access is not possible' (I paraphrase). This is one where I have to question my own bias. It is exactly the sort of thing I would say - not to direct the answer but rather to be clear that the answer needs to be that specific and a more general or waffly response would not suffice. However, I acknowledge that the wording coming from a CEO will carry more weight and could have been perceived as a direction rather than anything else.
On the whole, my experience of POL was that there was a tendency to point fingers and seek out someone to blame when something went wrong. I don't have much experience outside of POL to know how typical this is, but within POL I think that mindset led to a reluctance throughout the organisation to own up to issues, and instead to sweep issues under the carpet and trust that they wouldn't emerge unless a wise person looked in the right place. POL teams also had a tendency to operate within silos and so there was not the widespread practice of working across teams which might have created more challenge to team-level 'group think'. And that idea of 'group think' is one that I think played a significant part in this scandal, such as in the communications messages around Horizon's robustness. I would also say that there was a quite 'insular' feel to the organisation - us against the rest of the world. That view is hard to demonstrate (and wouldn't stand up to any of Mr Beer's analysis) but is my own perception. The notion of us as protectors of tax payers' money is perhaps symptomatic of this.
I don't believe that POL did no wrong as you put it. Things went badly wrong and I will continue to follow the inquiry and conversations here (and elsewhere) even when I find that difficult and uncomfortable.