Paula Vennells Post Office inquiry live: Ex-chief executive blasted for calling postmasters ‘inadequate’ in bombshell email

Former sub-postmaster Keith Bell – who was wrongly convicted of false accounting over a £3,000 shortfall – said he was “disappointed” by Paula Vennells’ answers to the inquiry.

“She had the opportunity to answer the questions truthfully. The facts were there, she can’t deny them,” he told Sky News.

“Her job was to understand the facts and act on them and not go the way she decided to go.”

Here are some other reactions to Paula Vennells’ email from 2014, which prompted boos from the gallery when viewed.

Journal of the Law Society Deputy news editor John Hyde suggests there is “no going back”.

Channel 4’s Jamie Robertson commented that it was a “very bad moment” for the former chief executive.

And Tom Hamilton of Times he pointed out that Sub-Post Jo Hamilton watched barrister Tim Moloney question Ms Vennells about the email claims about her.

Former subpost Jo Hamilton said she doubted the sincerity of Paula Vennells’ apology.

Ms Vennells apologized to Ms Hamilton directly after an email written by the former postmaster was read out at the Horizon investigation in which she said the postmistress “lacked passion and admitted to false accounting on TV” – prompting boos from the gallery when was screened. .

Speaking after the hearing, Ms Hamilton said: “I accept anybody’s apology but whether they mean it or not is another matter. I’m not sure.”

Asked if it meant anything to hear Ms Vennells’ apology, she said: “Not really, no. I think people just say sorry, but some people say sorry and mean it, but I don’t know if it was meant to be or not. I’m in two minds about whether it was real or whether she was so publicly embarrassed.’

The drive is now closed.

Inquiry chairman Sir Wyn Williams concluded that he was grateful to Paula Vennells for her very lengthy witness statement and for giving evidence this week.

Paula Vennells was booed by some in the gallery when an email was shown in which she said postmen appeared “inadequate” and “boring” during a 2014 TV appearance.

Pressed by Tim Moloney KC about her “triumphalist” email (see post below for details), Ms Vennells said there was “simply no excuse” for what she wrote and that she had apologized to Sub-Postmaster Jo Hamilton.

“Is it really that those were triumphalist remarks and now you regret them because you’re here?” pressed.

She said: “I absolutely agree that the pressure we were under at the time to try to manage what we really felt was an imbalance in the media coverage and representation of what was happening at the Post Office and I think the pressure … I have no apology for what I wrote.

“Other than that, as I say, I was under pressure and I think I was relieved that maybe the program wasn’t as bad or as hard as I expected. And I’m so sorry – it was terrible to write.

She added: “Maybe I’m very relieved… There’s just no excuse because it wouldn’t matter how bad it was – because we were wrong.”

Ms Vennells denied that this really reflected the behind-closed-doors attitude towards postmasters.

After rejecting postmaster general Mark Davies’ claim in 2014 that subpostmasters “faced lifestyle issues”, Paula Vennells received an email she sent him eight days later congratulating him on “achieving balance in reporting above all else, what could i hope for “.

Email sent by Ms. Vennells and others One show broadcast said: “They highlighted everything we did and it felt like… fact! Very good.”

She claimed the rest of the show was “hype and human interest” and said she was “more bored than outraged” while watching it. She added that now-exonerated sub-postmaster Jo Hamilton “lacked passion and admitted false accounting on TV” and claimed the segment made postmasters look “inadequate”.

Pauly Vennells questions the Post Office’s director of communications, who suggested on BBC Radio 4 in 2014 that subpostmasters “faced lifestyle issues”.

Asked what she thought of the remarks, Ms Vennells said: “I remember listening to it and thinking ‘oh Mark’. As he said here, I don’t think he ever intended for the word to get out.’

He admits it was extremely insensitive. At the time, a sub-postmaster was serving an 18-month prison sentence as the mother of the minors. Subsequently, her convictions were overturned. Another long-time local councilor spent his 60th birthday behind bars.

Tim Moloney KC said: “They have all been subjected to public censure and humiliation and you, Ms Vennells, have recently had a taste of that. And that’s not very nice, is it? And if someone were to say to you, Paulo, you seem to be having a bit of a problem with life at the moment, you might think that could be taken as slightly ironic or sarcastic.

Mrs Vennells said: “It was the wrong word altogether.”

When asked to explain why she would never say that herself, Ms Vennells replied: “The reason I’m here today. Because people’s lives were completely devastated.”

Ms Vennells countered that it “doesn’t just reflect the dismissive attitude that the Post Office had” towards subpostmasters, saying: “I don’t believe that. I understand why people think that, and I deeply regret that we are where we are today.”

She denied supporting this dismissive attitude.

Solicitor Tim Moloney KC now questions Paula Vennells about media coverage in 2014.

She explains that she can’t remember if some degree of damaging revelations about Horizon began to emerge, saying, “I’ll take your word for it, I’m sorry, I can’t remember the details now.”

Mr Moloney states that “campaigning postmasters appeared on radio and television to describe their experiences at the hands of the post office and how their lives had been ruined and Horizon was at the root of their problems”.

Ms Vennells then admits she told the inquest this week she worked closely with Post Office communications director Mark Davies and kept a close eye on how the Post was portrayed on TV and radio.

Paula Vennells was shown a documentary summarizing her key achievements over the past 12 months in her role.

One point made in the document was that Ms Vennells had “personally intervened” to change wording in the Royal Mail prospectus in relation to the Horizon investigation.

Ms Vennells said it was “one of the bucket list areas I’ve been working on”.

Hitting her that she “remembers it well enough to list it as a key achievement in your assessment of your 2013/14 year”, she said: “That was at the time. I didn’t remember it now.”

She said she imagined the reason she made this known in her report to the Postmaster General was because it was considered inappropriate for this statement about the Post Office’s information system to appear in a section of the Royal Mail prospectus when at that stage “we believed there were no problems and “wasn’t seen as something useful because it could be intercepted and misinterpreted”.