Diary of a Shopkeeper, 7th January 2024

In the doldrum days of early January, it’s good to get recommendations for distraction and entertainment. So when a customer praised a new ITV series, I was happy to give it a go. It turns out that half the country was doing the same. Like everyone else, I found Mr Bates v The Post Office riveting drama: gripping, heartbreaking, inspiring.

The four-part series tells the true story of the prosecution of hundreds of sub-postmasters for allegedly defrauding their employer, the Post Office. The truth was that the postmasters were innocent, and it was the Post Office’s computer system that was faulty, its senior staff who were dishonest. The initial prosecutions were followed by something even worse: the persecution of any postmaster who tried to argue their innocence, or ask for help with a problem that was none of their making.

With levels of cruelty and vindictiveness reminiscent of East Germany’s Stasi, the Post Office didn’t just accidentally ruin lives, but deliberately set out to do so. Why? To protect itself and its profits, no matter the human cost – and no matter the truth.

So far it’s taken Alan Bates and hundreds of fellow campaigners 20 years to get some justice and compensation for what they suffered. The Post Office obfuscated and delayed every step of the way. Not much wonder the case has been described as the biggest miscarriage of justice in British legal history.      Their battle is not over, but the power of Gwyneth Hughes’ drama has brought it to the fore more than any dry newspaper report. I, like many others I’m sure, was only vaguely aware of the scandal, and have belatedly been prompted to learn and think about it.

One small thing I noticed in the series was the number of cups of tea proffered and accepted, and the number of biscuits handed round. Sometimes the tea was offered as a comfort in the face of tragedy, when any words would have been inadequate. Other times it was the fuel for a campaign meeting or a mammoth email-writing session. Tea and biscuits in modest living rooms and kitchens were the sustenance and symbol of the little people, the normal people, the honest people. By contrast, the sleek senior executives of the Post Office sat around gleaming boardroom tables in vast steel and glass offices. Not a cuppa in sight: only a thirst for revenge and self-exculpation.

Tea and biscuits might be a very British tradition, but so, sadly, is corporate corruption. And so is the way that government, legal and even church establishments can combine to make it almost impossible for the little people to get justice. Despite the moments of triumph that Mr Bates v The Post Office allows itself, the enormous, life-dominating struggles of the real people in its story are continuing. And they are the lucky ones: dozens of the Post Office’s victims died before they could see justice.

Successive governments failed to act to address the corruption. The court system moved so slowly and expensively that the suffering of the victims was redoubled and dragged out excruciatingly. One of the most shocking moments of the drama showed Paula Vennells, CEO of the Post Office, use her position as a part-time Anglican priest to avoid answering journalists’ questions about the scandal. In the 2019 New Year’s Honours List Vennells was awarded a CBE ‘for services to the Post Office and to charity.’ A petition to remove that honour is approaching one million signatures as I write.

As well as the campaigners themselves, certain individuals do come out of the saga well. Some idealistic lawyers and investigators. A journalist or two. Even some politicians. James Arbuthnot was the local MP for one of the postmasters in Hampshire. He gave resolute support for years, and helped get the campaigners’ plight aired at Westminster. Funnily enough, at the same time he was himself mired in the MPs’ expenses scandal, having claimed thousands of pounds of public money for cleaning his family swimming pool. Thousands more had to be repaid after he received expenses payments for painting a summer house and for tree surgery at his £2m home.

Corruption comes in many guises – but very rarely from postmasters and other small business owners.

This diary appeared in The Orcadian on 10th January 2024, the same day that Paula Vennels announced she would be handing back her CBE. Quite right too.

So much has now been written and said about this shameful episode in our country’s history that it would be pointless to comment further here. Except…always looking for a wine connection, I noticed that James Arbuthnot is married to Emma Broadbent, daughter of an eminent wine critic, writer and auctioneer, the late Michael Broadbent.

A new diary appears weekly. I post them in this blog a few days after each newspaper appearance, with added illustrations., and occasional small corrections or additions.