Paula Vennells was back in Phase 5/6 of the Post Office Inquiry and now we're at Phase 7 - thread 5

[nauticant]

A continuation of this thread about the Post Office Inquiry:

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5105378-paula-vennells-is-history-but-now-at-the-post-office-inquiry-is-fujitsu-distinguished-engineer-gareth-jenkins-thread-4

The Inquiry is at Phase 7 which is about how things stand now and looking to the future. Here's the timetable:

https://www.postofficehorizoninquiry.org.uk/phase-7-timetable

When the hearings are going on, live-streaming can be found here:

https://www.youtube.com/@postofficehorizonitinquiry947/featured

All of the previous hearings can be found here:

https://www.youtube.com/@postofficehorizonitinquiry947/videos

Yes. Yes he has.

I wonder how he spent his leave his absence. It certainly wasn't preparing for this inquiry

I've been in meetings all afternoon, so I'm 1hr 30 mins behind, clearly I'm about to see something astonishing!

I'm.just starting to watch Mr Henry now.

Mr Hebry sounds really broken, like he is trying to hold back tears.
He doesn't normally sound like this.

Yes I noticed that - he really struggled for the first few questions that related to that case

To me it looks like Post Office is responsible for running the schemes, ostensibly has control of the money, but they know that the Treasury have an expectation that claims will be settled on the cheap, and to meet this (and they better had because it'll cost them in various ways if they don't) they run the schemes in an obstructive manner, being mean in the settlements.

Post Office largely created this mess, but they're being hung out to dry when the government should be helping rather than hiding behind Post Office, using them as a puppet when it suits.

I am going to disagree with you slightly @nauticant .

The Treasury have allocated £1.2 billion for all the different redress schemes.
Only a small % has been paid out by POL.

Out of this £1.2 billion includes the fees for the POL Lawyers.

My view is POL and its lawyers are dragging this out, so that the lawyers can increase thier fees.
If they had service level agreement for say, 1 year in which to pay out all the redress, then the lawyers only get 1 years of fees.
But, if they can drag this out for years and years, the lawyers will score quite handsomely from public money.

I may be wrong, but I watched the Select Committee with the POL lawyers dealing with the redress scheme, and they seemed shifty to me.

I think its a bit of both, Government would definitely rather POL carry the can... but POL definitely have seen the benefits in dragging it out and making it really fucking difficult for claimants to actually claim.

As for 'POL shouldn't have been the ones to run the compensation and redress scheme and we should have said so'...

No shit sherlock, but you didn't want to say that, because by running it you could continue blaming SPMR and screwing them over to your hearts content.

I actually don't think £1.2B is enough to give a fair settlement to all claimants and to pay all the admin and related fees. I think Post Office and the Treasury will have a similar view.

What do you think would happen if several thousand subpostmasters clubbed together in another class action lawsuit?

No, it's not enough. I'm sure they said in the Select Committee that they will be approaching the Treasury for more money.

Well, group action (UK) rather than class action (US).

Something else I remember from the Select Committee.
The POL lawyers were questioned why it is taking so long to pay out the redress.

POL lawyers said its very complicated. The example they gave was calculating the amount of redress for the mental and emotional harm. The calculations to determine how much for this is complex and difficult. Which I can kind of see.
How do you come up with an amount for causing someone to have depression?

But, the POL lawyers explained they use case law and calculations methods based on botched plastic surgery cases!
They have case law in which people who suffered emotional/mental distress from botched plastic surgery were paid damages, and this is what they use.

The MPs were not impressed.

I still think that one of the high profile subpostmasters, who has really suffered, should go it alone with an precedent setting High Court action. That settling at more than £5M would be a real game-changer.

However, that would be years more of risky litigation Hell and I can see why no one would want to go through this.

I agree with that.

Perhaps there is conversations happening to do this.

INAL, but could a judge in a civil proceedings case potentially reject hearing a Case like that, seeing as there are Conpensation/Redress schemes already in place.
I.e. could the Judge say, "You have to go through the Scheme first, before lodging a High Court case"?

Possibly but this is also in the political realm and I think any judge would be wise to find a way through. That is, we're well past the point of it being acceptable to use technicalities to thwart justice for such a horribly wronged individual. (But the judge would know that this might have an adverse impact on his/her future career advancement.)

All in all, my summary of the last 2 days and Nick Read is: I'm not impressed.

If the government want my opinion, he really wasn't worth the £430,000 salary + £415,000 yearly bonus

It's his waffling that aggrevates me the most. He can't give a straight forward answer.
It's like he thinks we will all get bored listening to him and go away.

Tomorrow should be interesting when the core participants Mr Maloney and Mr Stein asks thier questions.

Mr Stein is not known for accepting billy bullshit answes 😂

Beer is kicking off today, going back over Read's assertion that POL shouldn't not be in charge of the redress Schemes.

A witness statement from Tom Cooper stares that the Government put forward a paper stating that POL should not administer the redress schemes in 2020.
The POL Board disagreed and set up the Remediation Unit.

Read disagrees, and continues to assert that he thought it was a bad idea for POL to be in charge of the redress schemes.

But that doesn't make any sense.
Here was a perfect opportunity for Read, as the CEO, to say to the Board "Right guys, we are going to follow Government advice and not be incharge of the redress scheme". But he doesn't.

Beer asked him why he didn't do that and Read says "good question" and then doesn't answer it.

Unbelievable.

Beer is going over Read's letter to the Lord Chancellor, saying POL don't think it's wise to introduce legislation to overturn all the convictions.

Reads answer: waffle, waffle, waffle, that's not what I meant, even though that's what I wrote.

They are now looking a letter from one of POL criminal lawyers dated May 2024.
This letter was posted on POL website.

The letter says that SPMRs who haven't yet appealed are most likely guilty.

Read doesn't know:
..why this crim8nal lawyer wrote thus letter
...why it was posted to POL website.

Read knows nothing

Nick Read is ....

I am trying to follow but busy working at the same time so may have missed salient points but hasn’t Read spent today contradicting himself?
I’m left wondering if his ‘career trajectory’ was simply moving every time his poor performance became a liability- Peter Principle ? Given a fabulous reference and moved on …… and he believes he’s done a great job and is worth so much more?
Christ on a bike !!

Oooo - Nick is getting snappy now

I agree @dewfirst

He is continually contradicting himself.
He gives an answer, an hour later its pointed out that he has contradicted himself, but then he changes his answer again.

In case anyone is interested, there are now 8 Redress Schemes.
6 of which POL administer!

Mr Stein was excellent..
He brought up the point that POL lawyers have been told to give SPMR the benefit of the doubt, if they lack document evidence to support thier redress claims.

Mr Stein explained a SPMR has just got his offer last week, through the GLO Scheme, and was only offered 70% of his claim due to "lack of supporting documentary evidence".

Of course, Read doesn't know about this specific case, but asserts it shouldn't be happening.
Well Nick, it is happening.

I'm coming round to @nauticant view for a SPMR to take thier case to High Court and ask a judge to determine the amount of redress.

Well, I remain with my opinion that Nick Read is/was not worth the salary and bonus he was paid.

Every question the Core Participants ask he either:
.. Doesn't know
.. Sorry its taking to long
.. sorry they have made mistakes ( and continue to make the mistakes)