A victim of the Post Office Horizon scandal has told Sky News that ex-boss Paula Vennells must “come clean” in her evidence to the statutory inquiry.

Chirag Sidhpura, a former sub-postmaster who became one of the public champions for justice based on his own treatment at the hands of the Post Office, said he was expecting a “culture of denial” and “lies” over Ms Vennells’ three days of scheduled evidence.

She is due before the inquiry later this morning.

The 65-year-old, who was Post Office chief executive from 2012 to 2019, will be speaking publicly about what happened for the first time in almost a decade.

While she has since acknowledged that sub-postmasters were wrongly accused and prosecuted over faults in the Horizon accounting system under her watch, the inquiry will seek to uncover what she knew and when.

She told a committee of MPs in 2015: “We are a business that genuinely cares about the people who work for us. If there had been any miscarriages of justice, it would have been really important to me and the Post Office that we surfaced those. As the investigations have gone through, so far we have no evidence of that.”

Victims at the heart of this scandal beg to differ.

Post Office prosecutors were alerted to bugs with Horizon days before the trial and eventual conviction of sub-postmaster Seema Misra in 2010 – before Ms Vennells had taken over.

There is further evidence – in the form of recordings leaked to Sky News – to suggest Ms Vennells had been told by May 2013 that Horizon operator Fujitsu had remote access to the system.

On Tuesday, ITV News reported that she described potential wrongful convictions of sub-postmasters in an October 2013 email as “very disturbing”.

That was written more than a year before the company halted prosecutions.

Chirag Sidhpura’s experience

Chirag had written to Ms Vennells personally about his own case in 2017. A week later, his contract was terminated.

He chose to hand over more than £57,000 to avoid prosecution. He lost not only his business but also his house and mental health.

Chirag said of Ms Vennells’ evidence: “I think there is still going to be a culture of denial, lies, ‘I don’t remember, I don’t recall’.

“It is put to you in black and white you have done this, you made these decisions. Just come clean.”

ITV drama Mr Bates vs The Post Office ensured a spotlight was firmly placed on Ms Vennells, whose career has included stints at companies including L’Oreal and in the NHS.

She is also an Anglican priest.

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Read more:
Who is Paula Vennells?
The major questions for key Post Office boss to answer – and why her replies matter
The Post Office Horizon scandal explained

A lawyer’s view

Paul Marshall, a lawyer for victims, told Sky News that the evidence from Ms Vennells was an opportunity to “make confession”, claiming she presided over a Post Office “cult” which had a corporate inability to accept flaws.

“In one sense, she was or became the leader of what was indistinguishable from a cult.

“It had a belief system in which everything that didn’t coincide with that cult and its set of beliefs had to be either destroyed or excluded and removed.”

Ms Vennells has pledged to co-operate fully with the inquiry and, like all witnesses, must give an oath to tell the truth ahead of her evidence.

A statement released by her earlier this year stated: “I continue to support and focus on co-operating with the inquiry and expect to be giving evidence in the coming months.

“I am truly sorry for the devastation caused to the sub-postmasters and their families, whose lives were torn apart by being wrongly accused and wrongly prosecuted as a result of the Horizon system.

“I now intend to continue to focus on assisting the Inquiry and will not make any further public comment until it has concluded.”

Follow the questioning of Paula Vennells at the inquiry live on Sky News on Wednesday. Watch Sky News live here, and on YouTube, or on TV on Freeview 233, Sky 501, Virgin 603, and BT 313. You can also follow the latest on the Sky News website and app.

People infected with deadly viruses due to the tainted blood scandal could receive more than £2m in compensation, according to government documents.

“Illustrative figures” have been published on the Infected Blood Compensation Authority section of the government website, which show “the compensation award that an infected person living with a single infection or co-infection may expect to receive”.

The documents say that people living with HIV as a result of the scandal could receive between £2.2m and £2.6m.

Payments for those with hepatitis vary from £35,500 for an “acute” infection up to £1,557,000 for the most severe illnesses caused by the virus, according to the figures.

People with both viruses could be paid up to £2.7m, according to the tables.

More than 30,000 people were infected with deadly viruses between the 1970s and early 1990s through blood transfusions or blood products while receiving NHS care.

The report from the Infected Blood Inquiry, published on Monday, found the scandal, which has so far claimed the lives of around 3,000 people, “could largely have been avoided” and there was a “pervasive” cover-up to hide the truth.

The illustrative figures were published as the government set out more details of the compensation scheme, although they are not the final numbers.

Cabinet Office minister John Glen said he recognised that “time is of the essence” as he confirmed that the first full compensation payments to victims will be made before the end of the year.

In the meantime, some victims will receive a £210,000 interim payment before the end of the summer, he said.

Mr Glen also announced that family members of those infected would also be eligible for compensation.

The illustrative figures also show how much family members may expect to receive.

They suggest the partner of someone infected with HIV who is still alive today could receive around £110,000, while a child could get £55,000, and siblings could receive £30,000.

He told MPs: “Those who have been infected or affected as a result of this scandal will receive compensation.

“When a person with an eligible infection has been accepted on to the scheme, their affected loved ones will be able to apply for compensation in their own right.

“That means partners, parents, siblings, children, friends and family who have acted as carers of those who are infected are all eligible to claim.

“Our expectation is that final payments will start before the end of the year.”

Read more:
The stories behind 100 victims
‘I gave my young son to his killers’
Analysis – Prosecutions must wait despite so many facing criticism

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He confirmed that anyone already registered with one of the existing support schemes will automatically be considered eligible for compensation.

Mr Glen said there will be five categories under which compensation will be awarded – injury, social impact, autonomy, care and financial loss – and multiple awards will be provided where applicable.

The illustrative tables calculate the possible payouts based “across all categories of award”.

Jason Evans, director of the Factor 8 campaign group, called for more clarity on the scheme, adding: “Taken together, the government’s announcement today creates fresh disparity. Some estates may have received £310,000 in total interim payments by the summer, while most may have received nothing.”

Richard Angell, chief executive at the Terrence Higgins Trust, said: “The priority now must be ensuring that everyone who is entitled to compensation gets it and gets it quick.”

Severe turbulence struck a Singapore Airlines flight from London Heathrow earlier today, with one man killed and many others “launched into the ceiling”.

Authorities believe a 73-year-old British man, who had a heart condition, likely died from cardiac arrest, with at least 30 others injured as a result of the turbulence.

Deaths from turbulence are extremely rare, and the US’ Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said 146 passengers and crew have been seriously injured by turbulence between 2009 and 2021.

Read more:
Images show damage in plane after one killed in turbulence

But what could have caused the incident, what types of turbulence exist, and are the events getting worse? Here’s what experts have said so far:

What does the flight data show?

Flight data shows a spike in altitude of around 275ft (84m) at 2.49pm local time. Shortly after, the plane returned to a cruising altitude of around 37,000ft (11,277m).

According to Flightradar24, “the flight encountered a rapid change in vertical rate, consistent with a sudden turbulence event”.

At 3.03pm local time, the flight changed course and began its diversion to Bangkok.

Around 20 minutes later, at about 3.25pm, the flight declared an emergency – a Squawk 7700 – before landing in Bangkok at 3.45pm.

What could have caused the turbulence?

Tim Atkinson, an aviation consultant and pilot, told the Sky News Daily podcast he believes “it’s fairly clear” the Singapore Airlines flight “encountered atmospheric turbulence”.

He noted that the area – called the Intertropical Convergence Zone – where the Boeing 777 plunged 6,000 feet is “renowned among pilots, and I dare say passengers, for turbulence”.

“Despite abundant caution occasionally, there’s turbulence ahead which can’t be identified, and the unfortunate result of an encounter is injury and, very rarely, fatality,” he said.

Mr Atkinson also noted that the larger the aircraft, “the worse the atmospheric perturbation, the disruption in the smoothness of the atmosphere, needs to be to cause major problems”.

He then said the 777 is “one of the largest and, I daresay, most solid airframes widely flying around the world”.

What types of turbulence are there?

Sky News’ weather producer Jo Robinson notes there are a few forms of turbulence – where there’s a sudden change in airflow and wind speed.

Turbulence can often be associated with storm clouds, which are usually well forecast and monitored, allowing planes to fly around them.

Clear-air turbulence (CAT) is much more dangerous as there are no visual signs, such as clouds.

This invisible vertical air movement usually occurs at and above 15,000ft and is mostly linked to the jet stream.

There are clues on where CAT may occur, but generally it can’t be detected ahead of time, which means flight crews can be caught unaware with no time to warn passengers and put seat belt signs on.

It is unclear what type of turbulence the Singapore Airlines flight went through.

How common is an incident like this?

Chris McGee, a commercial pilot for more than 20 years, said in her experience the plane did encounter CAT which is “almost impossible to predict” and comes “out of the blue”.

Ms McGee said turbulence is not in fact that rare, but to experience it to this degree is “phenomenally rare”.

“In my career I’ve experienced one incident of severe turbulence,” she said, adding that she has heard of maybe “two, possibly three incidents of something that extreme” from fellow pilots.

The reported 6,000-ft drop in under five minutes is quite normal in a controlled descent instigated by the pilot, she said.

However, what they experienced was not a nice smooth, controlled descent, but an “absolute maelstrom of the aeroplane flinging itself around all over the sky”.

“It’s awful what happened to those on board, one death is tragic, other people were injured, but something like that is incredibly rare,” she said.

“We do train in the simulator every six months at least where we practicse things we can’t practise in the real aeroplane. Things like emergency procedures, abnormalities and unusual weather conditions like this, for example.

“We are taught how to fly the aeroplane through these extreme events and how to recover them should the plane depart from its normal flight mode.”

Her best advice for any passengers concerned about their safety on the flight is to follow what the cabin crew “strongly suggest and keep their seatbelts loosely tied at all times. On the flight deck that’s what we do. It will protect you”.

Is turbulence getting worse?

It’s been understood for some time that climate change is increasing turbulence during flights, and the trend is set to worsen according to reports.

In June last year, a study from Reading University found that in a typical spot in the North Atlantic – one of the world’s busiest routes – the total annual duration of severe turbulence increased by 55% from 17.7 hours in 1979 to 27.4 hours in 2020.

Moderate turbulence was also found to have increased by 37% from 70.0 to 96.1 hours, and light turbulence increased by 17% from 466.5 to 546.8 hours.

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Professor Paul Williams, an atmospheric scientist who co-authored the study, said at the time: “My message from this is we need to do something otherwise flights will become more turbulent in future [as global heating increases further].”

Professor Paul Roundy, from the University of Albany, said on X on Tuesday that the 55% increase in “a very infrequent signal gives a real, but small, change in absolute risk”.

He noted that “it’s not something a randomly selected passenger should worry about,” before adding: “Airline travel of the future won’t be fraught with wings ripped off planes, or have thousands of dead or injured passengers.

“It will mostly look like it does today.”