Sub-postmaster victims and Royal Mail’s Dame Moya Greene alike don’t believe Paula Vennell’s account
The account of the Post Office’s former chief executive about what she knew during key years of the firm’s scandal is not believed by the former CEO of Royal Mail, the inquiry into the injustice has heard.
Paula Vennells has been giving evidence as part of a three-day appearance at the inquiry into the impact of faulty Horizon accounting software, which led to the prosecution of more than 700 sub-postmasters.
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Paula Vennells breaks down in tears during questioning
In addition to the wrongful convictions for theft and false accounting, many more sub-postmaster victims generated large debts, lost homes, livelihoods and reputations and suffered ill health. Some died by suicide.
Widely not believed
The inquiry heard that Dame Moya Greene, the former Royal Mail CEO whom Ms Vennells worked alongside for many years, texted Ms Vennells in January of this year to express her disbelief at the wrongdoing denials.
Ms Vennells has long maintained – and reiterated on Wednesday – that she was unaware of the extent of flaws with Fujitsu’s Horizon software.
Sub-postmasters listening to the inquiry in the Fenny Compton village hall in Warwickshire, where dozens of sub-postmasters met for the first time in 2009 as they began their fight for justice, also said they did not believe Ms Vennells.
“She is blatantly, utterly lying, and it’s got to stop,” former sub-postmaster Sally Stringer told Sky News.
Dame Moya texted Ms Vennells after the airing of the ITV drama Mr Bates Vs The Post Office, which reinvigorated interest in the scandal, saying: “When it was clear the system was at fault, the Post Office should have raised a red flag. Stopped all proceedings. Given people back their money, and then tried to compensate them from the ruin this caused in their lives.”
When Ms Vennells replied that she agreed, Ms Greene said: “I don’t know what to say. I think you knew”.
“I want to believe you. I asked you twice. I suggested you get an independent review reporting to you. I was afraid you were being lied to. You said the system had already been reviewed multiple times. How could you not have known?” her text said.
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Why she says she didn’t know
The question of how it was that she couldn’t have known was taken up the the inquiry’s lead barrister Jason Beer KC.
Ms Vennells core argument emerged early in questioning: she said she wasn’t informed of bugs because of the way information flowed within the organisation. She accepted that as CEO she was in charge of how information was communicated.
“I was too trusting,” she said.
Emotional testimony
Ms Vennells broke down in tears numerous times during her evidence, the first of which was when Mr Beer read out details of sub-postmasters who were not convicted, as juries accepted there were flaws with Horizon.
The inquiry had just been presented with evidence of Ms Vennells telling MPs in 2012, “Every case taken to prosecution has found in favour of the post office. There hasn’t been a case investigated where the horizon system has been found to be at fault”.
This belief, Ms Vennells said, was “a representation of the information that I was given” rather than proof of an unwavering belief that nothing had gone wrong.
‘Wait and see’ accusation
Criticism came from Mr Beer over the fulsomemess of Ms Vennells cumulative 798-page witness statement.
He asked if she was adopting a “wait and see” approach: “Let’s see what comes out in evidence. See what I’ve got to admit and then I’ll admit that?”
“Given you provided a 775-page witness statement that took seven months to write, could you not have reflected on what you should have done fully and differently within the witness statement?” he added.
Post Office Horizon IT scandal inquiry lead counsel Jason Beer KC.
Ms Vennells’ statement said that with the benefit of hindsight, there were “many things” she should have “done differently”, but she would wait for the inquiry to conclude to expand on that detail.
But she denied adopting a “wait and see” approach.
Rather, “It was simply a matter of time,” she said. “The inquiry asked me, I think, over 600 questions to 200 or 300 with subquestions in each. I went through probably hundreds of thousands of documents.”
Evidence to Parliament in 2015
A major question going into the inquiry was how Ms Vennells was able to tell Parliament in 2015 there was “no evidence” of “miscarriages of justice”.
On Wednesday morning, Ms Vennells said that was what she had been told “multiple times” by Fujitsu – that nothing had been found in Horizon.
Comic relief
Back in the village hall in Fenny Compton there were moments of laughter when Mr Beer asked Ms Vennells if she was “the unluckiest CEO in the United Kingdom?”
His question was asked “In the light of the information that you tell us in your witness statement you weren’t given… the documents that you tell us in your witness statement that you didn’t see. And in the light of the assurances that you tell us about in your witness statement that you were given by Post Office staff”.
‘Exculpatory’ remembering
Another line of questioning from Mr Beer was that Ms Vennells had a better memory of events and records that made her and the Post Office look good and a worse recollection of things that made her and her organisation look bad.
“Why is it that in your witness statement, when you refer to a recollection of a conversation that’s unminuted, undocumented, not referred to in any email there are always things that exculpate you that reduce your blameworthiness?” he asked.
That wasn’t her approach, Ms Vennells said.
Signing off a £300,000 legal bill to go after a £25,000 loss?
Sub-postmasters and those following the scandal likely will be listening out to see if Ms Vennells approved the legal bill to prosecute Lee Castleton, who was featured as a victim in the ITV drama.
Earlier this month former managing director Alan Cook told the inquiry Ms Vennells approved legal costs of £300,000 to prosecute Mr Castleton for a supposed £25,000 shortfall when she was a network director at the Post Office.
The UK’s power grid operator has issued a call for electricity providers to bolster output this evening to avert the risk of blackouts.
The National Energy System Operator (NESO) issued an alert “to encourage market actions to increase system margins”.
It was the first such precautionary measure of the winter to date and issued at a time when much of the UK is shivering under sub-zero temperatures.
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The NESO is worried about a lack of spare capacity in the grid from 4pm until 7pm due to “system constraints”.
The body, which is in public control having been part of National Grid until last autumn, said in an update that it was seeking 1,200 megawatts (MW) of power as part of the so-called system margin notice.
Such notices are a call for a greater safety cushion between power demand and available supply.
The NESO was at pains to point out that it does not signal that blackouts are imminent or that there is not enough generation to meet current demand.
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Sky’s Ed Conway explains why your energy bills look set to rise this winter.
There is strain on the system due to a lack of wind and bitterly cold temperatures, which stoke stronger demand for electricity and gas.
Lows of minus 16C, the coldest of the winter so far, are forecast for parts of the UK on Thursday.
A yellow warning for snow and ice has been issued for northern Scotland and Northern Ireland from noon on Wednesday until midnight on Thursday.
Sub-zero temperatures are expected across the country for the foreseeable future.
It is the first winter the UK has seen in living memory without coal power forming part of the domestic electricity generation mix.
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The number of such power stations held in reserve was gradually drawn down under efforts to reduce the country’s carbon footprint.
Ratcliffe-on-Soar power station shut down in September.
The UK has reciprocal arrangements with neighbouring countries to draw power via so-called interconnectors if and when required to help keep the lights on.
National Grid data showed that more than 50% of the UK’s power was being generated through natural gas.
Renewables accounted for just 16% while France and Norway were helping provide 10% of output, with nuclear and Biomass accounting for the bulk of the balance.
Piers Morgan, the broadcaster and journalist, is leaving Rupert Murdoch’s British empire to focus on expanding his Uncensored YouTube channel in the US and other international markets, underlining prominent media figures’ accelerating shift away from traditional outlets.
Sky News can exclusively reveal that Mr Morgan and News UK – publisher of The Sun and The Times and owner of Times radio – have agreed a deal that will see him taking ownership of the Uncensored media brand and its existing 3.6 million-strong YouTube subscriber base through his production company, Wake Up Productions.
He is understood to have struck a four-year revenue-sharing deal with News UK that will see the Murdoch-owned company receiving a slice of the advertising revenue generated by Piers Morgan Uncensored until 2029.
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Mr Morgan returned to News UK in January 2022 with a three-year deal that included writing regular columns for The Sun and New York Post, as well as presenting shows on the company’s now-folded television channel, Talk TV.
People close to the situation said a book deal with the Murdoch-owned publisher Harper Collins would still go ahead, with Mr Morgan expected to complete that project later this year.
He will also continue to write occasionally for News Corporation’s newspapers, according to one insider.
Mr Morgan’s future had been the subject of growing speculation following the expiry of his three-year contract with News UK at the end of 2024.
As part of his new arrangements, Mr Morgan has also signed a deal with Red Seat Ventures, a US-based agency which partners with prominent media figures and influencers to help them exploit commercial opportunities through sponsorship and other revenue streams.
Piers Morgan on TalkTV. Pic: PA
Among those Red Seat has worked with are Megyn Kelly, the American commentator, and Tucker Carlson, the former Fox News presenter.
Mr Morgan is also understood to have received expressions of interest in other commercial and broadcasting deals from American media groups, having been one of few Brits to present his own TV chatshow on a mainstream US network.
Fond of the phrase “One day you’re the cock of the walk, the next you’re the feather duster,” during various phases of his career, his latest deal reflects the shifting dynamics in media consumption.
Responding to an enquiry from Sky News on Wednesday morning, Mr Morgan said in a statement: “I have had a great time working back at News and am delighted that we will continue to be partners.
“Owning the brand allows my team and I the freedom to focus exclusively on building Uncensored into a standalone business, editorially and commercially, and in time, widening it from just me and my content.
“It’s clear from the recent US election that YouTube is an increasingly powerful and influential media platform, and Uncensored is one of the fastest-growing shows on it in the world.
“I’m very excited about the potential for Uncensored.”
Mr Morgan declined to comment on any other aspect of his new arrangement with News UK or his expansion plans ahead of an official announcement, which is understood to be scheduled for later on Wednesday.
His decision to strike out on his own – albeit with a continued relationship with News UK – is said to reflect his belief that broadcast audiences will increasingly shift away from mainstream channels to platforms such as YouTube.
“He thinks YouTube will be a dominant broadcasting platform in terms of audience share within a couple of years,” said one.
It was unclear what the precise revenue split would be between Wake Up Productions and News UK during their four-year partnership.
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He is expected to focus his efforts to expand Uncensored on US audiences initially, with a wider international plan to follow that.
On Tuesday, Mr Morgan posted on X that he believed an interview with Elon Musk, the Tesla founder who has sparked a firestorm in British politics in recent weeks, was “getting closer”.
Among the other interviewees on his YouTube show have been Donald Trump during his first presidency, the Ukrainian president Volodomyr Zelensky and Cristiano Ronaldo, the footballer.
Rolls-Royce Motor Cars says a record £300m investment at its West Sussex factory base will help expand production of bespoke and electric models.
The BMW-owned firm, like rivals in the luxury sphere, has enjoyed rising demand for personalised vehicles among its wealthy customer base.
The carmaker said recent orders to complement its base models included 18-carat gold sculptures, embroideries consisting of more than 869,500 stitches, wood veneers including 500 individually-shaped pieces and holographic paint finishes.
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The investment, Rolls-Royce said, would bolster facilities at Goodwood to cover such requests and also its Coachbuild programme – an invitation-only service where clients get to “craft an entirely original motor car.”
The company added that additional space would also be created to prepare Rolls-Royce for an all-battery electric future, with a new fully electric model due to be unveiled later this year.
Bespoke commissions for 2024 included ‘year of the dragon’ embroidery for one customer. Pic: R-R/Ciaran McCrickard/Mindworks
The £300m investment marked the largest cash injection in the company’s operations since the plant opened in 2003, Rolls said.
It made the announcement while revealing a fall in sales during 2024.
The company sold 5,712 cars in 2024, a drop of more than 5% versus the 6,032 vehicles sold over the previous 12 months.
It said the decline was in line with expectations as it switches over to new models. Four were introduced during 2024 including the Cullinan Series 2 and Ghost Series 2.
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North America was its largest market in 2024. The most popular model, it said, was the all-electric Spectre.
Goodwood employs 2,500 people and produces 28 cars daily, it added.
Recent workforce expansion has been a result of its high margin Bespoke and Coachbuild programmes but also the transition to electric technology.
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