to enjoy hearing Paula Vennels being taken apart?

[Sausagenbacon]

Is anyone else listening - radio 5 at the moment. Paula Vennels being slowly picked apart by an expert?

Paula Vennells was the Chief Executive of Post Office Limited from 2012 to 2019. She was.............. a member of the government’s Financial Inclusion Policy Forum................. . She served as a Non-Executive Board Member at the Cabinet Office between February 2019 and March 2020.
https://www.gov.uk/government/people/paula-vennells

Not really shocked to read the above, but if it has been mentioned before I've missed it. How did she go from leaving a mess at the PO to being a non-exec board member at Cabinet Office and taking a role as chair of Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust???

@ALovelyCupOfNameChange you forget you have to be clinically incompetent and a sociopath. Do you tick those boxes to apply for the top job?

I think a lot of it is going for the jobs that you're entirely unqualified for, but styling it out.

Someone better read can probably find more succinct language,

There's a whole class of people who basically move between boards with very little talent, ability or actual experience in the industry.

NHS, media, universities, politics, people like Rishi Sunak or Ruth Hunt. When Sunak goes there'll be a nice vanity role for him somewhere.

Once they're in, all the contracts for "funds" paid for by the taxpayer start going to them and their partners and families, and even if they completely lack business acumen or the business shouldn't be expanding, they try to squeeze free labour and money out of the people at the bottom to make up for it.

Smoke and mirrors and giving each other bonuses, until its time to go to another board.

(See the financial mismanagement situation with universities).

A hardworking and sincere surgeon or academic would never get to a board if their face didn't fit.

Private Eye is good for this kind of thing, thinking of getting in a subscription.

I imagine it's always gone on -human nature is human nature - but the scale over the last few years has been extreme.

Have you seen that it just happened as well to the Russell Group Universities organisation - so common among the well-educated elite these days apparently.

I just don't believe this. Even my totally technophobe DH can print a document. I find it VERY difficult to believe that Singh didn't need to print things regularly. Even when you have clerical staff to type and print out stuff you dictate, there will regularly be times when someone emails you an important document (like, um, a barrister's opinion) that you want to read there and then, not when some clerk gets around to printing it out for you.

My 77 year old dad can work a printer, there's no way this person can't print.

Of course nobody believes his utterly pathetic excuses. But it appears there are many witnesses who are prepared to portray themselves as extremely dense and incompetent, rather than tell the truth and thus incriminate themselves.

It’s preferable to look utterly ridiculous and incompetent, rather than being aware of the situation and looking to minimise their part in the cover up at various stages.

Non-exec director roles are money for old rope. Few days work a year for a good salary where they bring their “expertise”. The roles are intended to show an organisation is outward looking rather than insular, as they provide challenges to the way we have always done things.

WRT prosecutions. I think the timeline is complete the inquiry where witnesses are not required to incriminate themselves. The panel prepare a report which is published in due course. I think witnesses and other interested parties get an advance copy.

Then the CPS (I think) will decide if there is sufficient information to launch an investigation and gather evidence e.g. interviews under caution, which they then use to decide whether or not to prosecute.

The difficulty for prosecutors will be how much they can directly link unlawful action to an individual. Much easier to do for those lower down the chain than proving a controlling hand at senior level.

What will be interesting is PV appears to have misled the parliamentary committee and what action they take.

It's best to put Jarnail Singh's evidence into context. In total he's given 3 days of evidence to the Inquiry and when he does he just says random stuff in the desperate hope of moving on to the next, usually painful, question:

@Galdos Galdos · Today 17:46

Not read/listened to everything she said, but from what I have seen/heard she seems to have had no idea what the PO was up to, never really enquired, didn't understand the PO organisational structure, didn't ask questions ... and was being paid very handsomely for very very little. It is beyond belief (from her own account) that she was hired, by the PO or for any of her previous positions. The disclosed communications show a complete lack of grip on her part, and very little understanding.

She's been coached by top lawyers at Mishcon de Reya. They have helped her to prepare for this.

The tactics are -

1 Play dumb and stupid (which is not illegal)

or

2 Admit you did know everything and ignored it to save your own skin as CEO which will show criminality.

She's choosing 1. on advice of her legal team (IMO.)

When a file is saved to temporary internet files, that means it has been opened and read.

He may not have saved it permanently to a drive, but he definitely opened it, read it and more specifically, he printed it out directly after opening it from his email, as the temporary internet file is used for printing. It doesn't happen by magic, he has to have done one of the following;

File-Print-OK
Click on the printer icon-OK
Ctrl-P-OK

Pretending to be incapable around computers seems to be a bit of a theme here. As though they're trying to imply that they couldn't possibly have understood because it's all scary, scary techie stuff that people of such import could never have been capable of comprehending (and therefore shifting all of the blame onto the evil IT bods).

Has anyone else noticed how many of the e mails say ‘call to discuss’ or ‘I am in regular contact with …’?

it seems clear to me that even in the 2011-2014 period they were already aware of how bad it was and were very careful not to leave an email trail. So what we are seeing is the tip of the iceberg. I am guessing all the changes in mandates etc took place telephonically, with the minimum possible committed to record.

Oh yeah.
but I would call it Boris defence.
sadly it works

I'm so pleased to hear that. Send him my love x

Do you think they ever have imposter syndrome or do they think they are qualified and deserve it?!

so essentially I need to strut in with the confidence to own the place, talk like I’ve already got the job and I stand a good chance? Then once I’m in, schmooze everyone to get my next big role for when I’ve fucked this one up

Pretending to be incapable around computers seems to be a bit of a theme here.

apart from being certain there’s no bugs in horizon

Others have used it, but I think she was the first, or at least I remember her being the first, to decide that being considered monumentally stupid in the eyes of the public in the modern media era was better than being charged with criminal offences.

My 90 year old DF can print a doc

That's good going, so no excuse for this fool.

PV and parlimentary committee .... Vennels has claimed some version of parlimentary privilege. Jason Beer mentioned it yesterday.

I think this is why JB chose Lord Arbuthnot as a very early witness (no. 2 after Alan Bates I think). Arbuthnot and Beer went through a ridiculously formal process during which Arbuthnot openly, explicitly and very specifically accused Vennels of telling 16 lies of omission to the 2015 parlimentary committee.

If Vennels wants to hide behind some bizarre parlimentary privilege then fine, she can do. Arbuthnot still openly and directly accused her of lying.

This was about 3 months ago. Jason Beer has played an incredibly long game with her. I think this will reach a climax tomorrow.

@Sceptic1234 thank you for that. I haven’t watched all of the hearing so missed elements like this.

Jason Beer, and I assume his team, have been so thorough in their preparation and taking witnesses through the evidence. I am hugely impressed by his abilities.

Is anyone else starting to think she will get away with this? She is making such a farce of the enquiry with her performance, makes me wonder if she knows she is untouchable. Will it go to a criminal court? I don’t have much faith, these enquiries seem to go over the facts but nothing happens, like hillsborough and green fall. Sad country we live in.

She'll not be charged, but she must know she's chosen to make herself look stupid, venal, malicious, and fundamentally non Christian.

It's the second item trending on iplayer when I go there to watch, so lots of people have seen this.

I'd be emigrating if I were her. If anywhere would have her.

It certainly wouldn't surprise me at all. Sometimes I think the public humiliation of the inquiry is seen as 'enough'. Something has been seen to have been done and they can all slink away into the ether. Maybe when the victims families testify people will get a bit more riled up. So far, they have been forgotten in the whole thing.