Ex-Post Office chairman hits back at Badenoch in Horizon scandal row

The former Post Office chairman has hit back at Kemi Badenoch in the row over the handling of the Horizon scandal.

Henry Staunton has accused ministers of failing to take action to deliver justice for postmasters until after a TV drama on the scandal was aired.

In a statement to Sky News, Mr Staunton said it was “pretty obvious what was really going on” after Kemi Badenoch sparked a major row with him over the Horizon IT scandal.

He insisted there had been “no real movement” on the payouts until after the airing of ITV drama Mr Bates vs The Post Office last month.

“It was in the interests of the business as well as being fair for the postmasters that there was faster progress on exoneration and that compensation was more generous, but we didn’t see any real movement until after the Mr Bates programme,” he said.

“I think it is pretty obvious to everyone what was really going on.”

At the weekend, Mr Staunton told The Sunday Times he had been told by a senior civil servant to delay payouts to sub-postmasters ahead of the next general election because of concerns about costs.

He also claimed that, when he was sacked last month, Ms Badenoch told him that “someone’s got to take the rap” for the scandal.

On Monday, the Business Secretary hit back, claiming Mr Staunton’s comments were “full of lies”. She said he had been removed after whistleblowers raised concerns that he was not doing enough to ensure people received their compensation quickly enough.

Ms Badenoch made a Commons statement on the affair on Monday afternoon.

More than 4,000 people have been told they will be eligible for compensation as a result of the Horizon scandal.

Errors in the Horizon software, made by Fujitsu, the Japanese technology company, caused shortfalls to be recorded that did not exist.

Overall, more than 900 sub-postmasters were prosecuted after they were blamed for the shortfalls. Some served time in prison as a result.

The Government has been repeatedly criticised for its treatment of sub-postmasters – some of whom have never received any compensation from three government schemes, despite their lives having been ruined.

After the ITV drama aired earlier this year, the Government announced  legislation that would swiftly exonerate all sub-postmasters who were wrongly convicted.

In a letter to Mrs Badenoch on Monday, Jonathan Reynolds, the shadow business secretary, said that to “truly ascertain the veracity” of Mr Staunton’s allegations, she should publish all correspondence and minutes of meetings between her department and the Post Office since the 2019 High Court ruling that there had been bugs and errors in the IT system.

He also asked her to explicitly confirm whether any civil servant had told Mr Staunton to stall on compensation payments so the Government could “limp into the election” with the lowest possible financial liability.

Kevin Hollinrake, the Post Office minister, told Sky News he “does not recognise” claims of trying to slow down compensation.

He said: “We’ve been very focused on getting that compensation out the door as quickly as possible. We’ve done much to try and accelerate those payments over the time Henry Staunton was in office, so I don’t recognise what he’s saying and I’m a bit confused why he’s saying it.”

He added that he was not on the call when Mr Staunton was sacked, but Mrs Badenoch has been “very clear that the version of events that she read in the paper was nothing like the version that she had from the notes that were taken on that call”.

“Clearly, Henry Staunton sees it differently. You’d have to ask him why he’s saying those things,” he said. “It doesn’t accord with the situation as I see it.”