All language subtitles for Mr.Bates.Vs.The.Post.Office.2024.S01e00.The.Real.Story.Web-Dl.X264.Sdh

The village shop and post
office had come up for sale.

Someone suggested that I would be
the perfect person to take it over.

I started my first job as
a postman back in 1965.

And in 1994, I took
over the post office.

I passed my interview, so,
yeah, I was given the position.

And everything was perfect.

We had a group of
pensioners who would come in

to get their pension every week.

Very much part of a community.

28p, please, love. How much?

You do get to know your locals.

We'd have a good banter, a good
laugh with all the customers.

It was really good.

You're not only
their postmaster.

You were also an
adviser to people.

It was lovely.

You felt like you were actually
the heart of the village.

Morning. With you in
a minute. No rush.

'It was idyllic.'

I felt that I'd managed to
get myself a good position.

As a postmistress,
it's not easy.

'The idea was it would be
my retirement business.'

'I thought I was gonna spend
the rest of my life there.'

But I didn't know
what was ahead of me.

I went through hell.

'It was diabolical.'

Something had to
be done about it.

'Look, Alan!' CHEERING

'Look what we did,
look what you did!'

'Should the Post Office
bosses go to prison, too?'

'No. No, no.

'Hit them in their pockets.'

Hit them in their pockets.

That's what you want to do.

That's... That's
what's gonna hurt them.

TOBY JONES: This is the
story of a saga that began

nearly 25 years ago.

We were not mad, were we?

Dealing with Post
Office has been harder

than dealing with the mafia.

It's like fighting
a steam roller.

A group of subpostmasters
from all over the UK

fought to expose one of the
widest miscarriages of justice

in British legal history.

We want answers now to know
who's actually done this

to so many people, and why.

NEWSREEL: 'There begins the
long chain of accounting,

'and every ha'penny of every
transaction accounted for.'

The Post Office was
established in 1660,

and had always used paper
and pen to balance the books.

But in 1999, management introduced
something completely new...

a computer system
called Horizon.

It was the biggest IT
roll-out in Europe.

The Post Office connected 40,000
terminals across the country

to one central hub.

'An engineer arrived.'

He screwed it on the desk,
and I asked him what it was,

and he goes, "That's Horizon.

"It's going live shortly,
you'll hear all about it."

It was great, I was
really enthusiastic.

I'd been involved with developing
bespoke software packages

where I'd worked before,
and I was all for it.

Basically, I never had a problem
balancing until that was installed,

and then a couple of
months after that,

I had a very big shortfall
at the end of the week.

It said I was minus £2,000.

Just overnight, £11,000 of
stamps had gone missing.

I suddenly found I
had £6,000 shortfall,

and I couldn't understand
where that had gone.

That was a ridiculous amount.

There was no way of going
back and checking stuff

like you did with the paper,

cos once you pressed
that button, it had gone.

I rang the help desk,

and they told me to
do various things,

which doubled the
shortfall to minus £4,000.

When I rang the helpline,

I was told that there was nobody
else having these problems.

Oh, yes, the helpline
was telling you,

"Nobody else has got a problem.

"You're the only one."

"You're the only one
this is happening to."

"You're the only one."
That's what they kept saying.

Then I started feeling
like I was going mad.

I knew I wasn't computer-literate,
but I wasn't stupid either.

In the end, you were
totally confused,

and nothing was done.

Under the terms of
their contracts,

the 20,000 subpostmasters
were liable for any shortfall,

whatever the cause.

When it got to
about £9,000 short,

I told my parents and
my husband, and I said,

"Can we re-mortgage
and put the money in?

"Cos I've got no idea
what's happening,

"but I've got to make it good."

My mum went down to
the building society

and drew it out,

and we put it into -
the money into the safe.

Every week, I was
putting money in myself.

So, we basically went through
the cash until it all ran out

to try and make up
the balance every day.

It was just up and
down, up and down.

It was never, ever right.

And on the end of the month when
we had to do the main balance...

that's when it all used
to come out, like...

Where's this money gone?

And the amount kept growing,

so I then didn't say anything.

I kept quiet and let
it grow to £36,000.

Terrified of what
was gonna happen.

In North Wales,

one subpostmaster took
a different approach.

I had £1,000 of shortfall,

and I've never been
accepting the figure

that Horizon had
thrown up each week.

Because I always felt
that if I cleared it,

I was accepting the
Horizon system's figures.

And I wasn't
prepared to do that.

Eventually, they got
round to telling me

I had to do it or else.

And I said, "I won't do it, not
until I have access to the system."

And eventually, they decided
just to terminate my contract

without giving me any
reason, and that was it.

So, they walked off
with my life savings

and they decided to give my
post office to somebody else.

Horizon just created a
whole batch of worry,

not just for me,

but for subpostmasters
all over the country.

I shall probably clean
at least till I'm 70-ish.

I'm resigned to the fact that
I only have the state pension,

and unless I sell my house,
I need to keep working.

The Post Office used
their sweeping powers

to bring private prosecutions
against their own employees.

In 2003,

they went after Jo for the
money they said she'd stolen.

I was originally
charged with theft,

and I pleaded not guilty.

And we almost got to trial,

and they offered up a plea
bargain at the 11th hour,

And said, "Well, if you plead
guilty to false accounting,

"we'll drop the theft charge,
provided you repay the money."

That meant Jo was
forced to borrow

in order to pay back the £36,000
the computer said was missing.

I could only raise
£30,000 on the house,

so we had a village meeting.

And I had to
explain to everybody

that I was in trouble
in the Post Office.

And someone put up their
hand and they said,

cos it was November, they said,

"Well, couldn't Jo have an
early Christmas present?"

And from the moment I told them,

I thought they were all gonna think
I'd stolen money, and they didn't,

it was quite the opposite,
and, erm... yeah.

It was very humbling.

Literally thousands of pounds
went through the letterbox.

I think we'd reached it in
about two weeks, and... Yeah.

INTERVIEWER: Wow. My village.

When she went to court, the
village showed up again.

I just looked at the judge,

and he goes, "Well I'm not
considering a custodial sentence."

Well, I was literally...

Just the tears were
streaming down my face.

Jo was sentenced to a
12-month supervision order.

But there were other people whose
ordeals left an even greater mark.

'We had a lot of
happy memories here.'

Especially when the children
used to come off the bus.

We used to look forward to
seeing them after school.

They used to come
running across this road.

Yeah.

'They enjoyed
being here as well.

'Would've handed
it over to them.

'A lot of happy memories.'

But they all got broken.

In 2009, the Post Office charged
Jess with the theft of £5,000.

And her face was splashed
across the local papers.

Family members actually went
round to the shops, local shops,

and gathered as many
papers as they could.

It was also in one of the
Punjabi papers as well.

So, basically, everybody read
that story and pointed fingers.

We had somebody come in and
spit on the floor as well.

We had car windows broken.

You know, they did try and,
like, traumatise us, really.

I got this feeling that
everybody else is thinking

that "she's a thief".

And thinking about it day
and night, day and night.

I just wanted to end my life.

I'm showing you the box.

We can cross quickly.

And this is where
the Post Office was.

Noel Thomas became a
postman at the age of 17.

In 2005, when his
nightmare began,

he had only ever worked
for the Post Office.

There we are.

We're by the box which
was the Post Office

that my wife and I ran
for, erm, 36 years.

You know, it was a betrayal,
wasn't it, when we lost this?

At half past seven, there
was a knock on the door,

and, er, there was a lady
and a gentleman in the door,

and said they were Post Office
auditors, and so I let them in,

made them a cup of tea, and I
told them straightaway that I was,

erm, about £52,000 down,
so all hell let loose.

Noel was arrested and
questioned at a police station.

She was just, "Where was the
money? Where was the money?

"And what did you do with it?"

You know, it was
really aggressive.

Then the Post Office did to Noel

what they did to many
other subpostmasters.

They offered to drop
the theft charge

if he agreed to plead
guilty to false accounting.

I remember me telling him,
"Will it keep me out of jail?"

And he said, "Yes."

But unfortunately,
when I went into court,

er, the judge, erm, came
to his sentencing words,

and he said, erm, "Nine
months," and he sort of paused.

And I waited for a
suspended sentence.

But he said, erm,
"Take him down."

'I'd been a councillor,
I'd been a postmaster,

'I'd been a postman and,
er, highly thought of.'

All of a sudden, er, it
was all taken away from me,

like taking a mat from under
your feet, if you like.

It was bloody horrible.

'My journalistic life has
been dominated by this.'

I mean, it's the biggest
story I've worked on.

It's probably the biggest
story I'll ever work on.

In 2009, the story
hadn't hit the press yet.

Social media was in its infancy.

Even though many subpostmasters
were being prosecuted,

each one of them thought
they were the only one.

But that was about to change.

This particular article began

because we were contacted by a
subpostmaster about his problems.

Often when you get contacted
by a single person,

it's very hard to
stand up a story.

But one of my former colleagues,
an alarm bell rang in his head,

and he thought, "I've
heard this before."

And I think it was
four years earlier,

he'd been contacted by Alan Bates,
who'd had the same problems.

Then they started to
build up a picture.

People having the same problems,

people being told the same
thing from the Post Office,

which eventually led to
them gathering information

about four other subpostmasters
and doing this first story.

But we were so worried
about legal action.

We didn't publish it for a year.

This was the response
from the Post Office.

That was an outright lie.

We knew of seven postmasters
who had complained,

and also, we know that
computers have problems,

especially complex systems.

Suddenly, subpostmasters
who had problems

were seeing the story,
contacting each other,

which then started the campaign.

That's the seven
from Computer Weekly,

then there's, er, two
that came via our website.

But where are all the others?

So we thought, "Let's see if
we can get people together,

"and let's see how big
the problem actually is."

Somewhere central.

Fenny... Compton.

We didn't know if anyone
was gonna turn up, but, er,

slowly but surely,
people turned up.

We all sat round in a
circle telling our stories,

and you almost felt embarrassed
about having to say,

"Oh, I'm Jo, and I've
been done for £36,000."

But I realised, "Oh, my God,
we're all exactly the same."

That's when the stories...

A jigsaw started coming together,
if you know what I mean.

And we'd all had our lives
completely tipped upside down.

People had been losing houses,
cashing in their pensions,

they'd been borrowing
money off relatives,

marriages were splitting up.

We all looked like
we'd been in a war

and just weary with the stress
that we'd been put through,

and the shame of it.

It was diabolical.

But that's when we knew something
had to be done about it.

And that's when we picked
Alan Bates as chairman.

That was really the
start of everything,

and that's where the JFSA,

Justice For Subpostmasters
Alliance, was born.

It was like a switch got turned,
and the Post Office was the enemy.

They'd gone from this
trusted brand to a monster.

And it was like, "We
are gonna get them."

This is the view I have
of him most of the time.

I mean, most mornings,
this is what he's doing,

and as you can see, he's
still in his dressing gown.

TOBY JONES: For the past 20 years,
Alan and his partner, Suzanne,

have had their lives
dominated by one thing.

The whole of this Post Office
issue has, er, turned into probably

the worst unpaid full-time
job you can imagine.

I'm gonna do the cat,

and I'll have her sitting
down on the carpet here,

looking up at him as if to say,

"Well, when are you
gonna finish, you know?

"When are you gonna
take a break?"

Because you are hearing stories
of such distress and family ruin.

So you couldn't give up
working on something like this

because it developed
a life of its own.

And it wasn't just me.

Other people were
chasing their own MPs.

The good thing about
being an MP is,

if you contact someone like
the Chairman of the Post Office

and say, "I'd like to meet
you to talk this through,"

they tend to respond.

Erm, Mrs Hamilton? That's me.

James Arbuthnot.
Thank you for coming.

'He came out to the shop
and met my parents.'

And he was just a
thoroughly decent guy.

There are two other cases
in my constituency alone.

Wow, really? It's
very odd, isn't it?

I thought, "There's something
obviously not right."

'And so I went to see

'the then Chief Executive of the
Post Office, Paula Vennells.'

We're the ones who are going
to keep the Post Office

as relevant and as loved and
as trusted in the communities

that it is today.

Paula Vennells was hired
by the Post Office in 2007.

By 2012, she'd worked her
way up to the top job,

and used her in-house PR

to highlight her commitment
to subpostmasters.

I say this very
specifically, actually,

putting our subpostmasters

and the colleagues who
work in our agency branches

right at the forefront of
everything we think about.

It was Paula Vennells who
suggested that what we needed

was forensic accountants
to go into the allegations,

and we said, "That's
exactly what we need.

"Who would you recommend?"

Ron Warmington
runs Second Sight.

I was Head of Investigations

for one of the world's
biggest banks for many years.

And now I'm meant to be retired.

The only reason I'm not retired
is because of this case.

Ron's investigation was paid
for by the Post Office itself.

But, obviously, we had
very serious concerns that

it's gonna be a
bit of a whitewash.

So Alan and the MPs brought in
their own top forensic accountant.

RON: Kay Linnell flew
at me like a tigress.

I don't doubt your
paper qualifications,

I have them here in front of me,
but I see nothing to persuade me

that Second Sight
is remotely capable

of producing a truly
independent report.

Clearly suspecting that either
we were hired to do a whitewash

or that we'd be
hopelessly incompetent -

probably, she thought both.

The involvement
with the Post Office

started with Jo Hamilton,
my local subpostmistress.

Kay volunteered to help
the subpostmasters.

I had no idea how
long it would take,

but I knew we had a room of
people who had lost everything

or were losing everything,

and people were still being
prosecuted almost on a daily basis.

And I knew we had
to do something

to try and stop the tide
or raise the profile.

She clearly was exactly
the person we needed.

Having had that meeting
with Ron and Ian,

which I suspect
they will remember,

I was satisfied they would
do an independent job.

Ron's team began their
investigation in 2012.

At that time, the
Post Office continued

to prosecute subpostmasters.

Basically, I was told I was
going to get two years in prison.

In the West Midlands,

Jess was convinced a faulty
PIN pad on her Horizon terminal

had caused the shortfall.

And she pleaded not
guilty to theft.

But the case dragged
on for three years.

Went to numerous courts
up and down the country.

In Wolverhampton Crown Court,

the judge said,
"Where's the PIN pad?"

And the Post Office said,

"The PIN pad's been
taken away for repair."

And so the judge said, "Well...

"If it's gone for
repair, it was faulty."

That's when it all got
thrown out, basically.

By then, the damage
had been done.

The stress that
we'd been through,

the trauma that we'd been
through, lied to, bullied,

it all mounted up, and
I ended up in hospital.

And I-I went to commit suicide.

I even tried to commit
suicide in hospital.

Jess was so ill,

the doctors decided to treat her
with electroconvulsive therapy.

All I remember is they
used to put this...

Like a helmet type
thing on my head.

And the shockwaves were
going through my brain.

So I had... I think I had
14 treatments like that.

After that, I lost
all my memory.

I don't remember anything
from my childhood.

I couldn't sleep unless
I had sleeping tablets.

Put me on numerous medication...

which I'm still on today.

And it's all down
to the Post Office.

During Ron's investigation,
it became clear

the Post Office had some
serious questions to answer.

There were documents which
looked extremely suspicious,

very poor investigative
processes that were directed

blatantly at simply
recovering assets

by trying to get the
easiest conviction possible,

which generally was
false accounting,

using as a cudgel, bluffing
that they had a theft case.

I'm pretty used to being
able to detect crooks.

But when I really dug deeper,

I didn't find any
evidence of theft at all.

We didn't know whether the
investigation would work,

but the very fact that they had
access to Post Office's data,

erm, seemed quite promising.

And at that time,
we did understand

that Post Office... did actually
want to get to the truth.

I felt we were
getting somewhere.

Ha, little did I know how
long the journey was gonna be.

Remote access to the system
was always a huge concern.

And the reason why

was it meant that someone else
could be accessing your accounts

on your counter in your Post Office,
and you did not know about it.

When the Post Office rolled
out their new computer system,

every subpostmaster's computer
was hard-wired to a central hub.

This was located at the
headquarters of the company

who designed and managed
Horizon, Fujitsu.

Post Office were quite
adamant that no-one else

could ever access the systems
or do anything like this at all.

And that was something

that we wanted Second Sight
to prove had occurred,

or how it had occurred.

I went to Fujitsu headquarters
with the intention of helping

and looking at the system,

and how we accounted for bureau
de change within branches.

Er, Michael Rudkin
to see George Delph.

That was the
purpose of my visit.

'I arrived, as scheduled, about
ten o'clock in the morning.'

Cheers. 'Went into reception.'

Mr Rudkin, George Delph, hi.

'Within a few minutes,
my chaperone arrived.'

I was really taken aback by
the number of security doors

that we had to pass through.

I was encouraged to enter into
the boiler room by my chaperone.

And in doing so, I then recognised
to the right-hand side of me,

there's two Horizon
terminals on this workbench.

One of the guys not happy with my
presence gets up and walks out.

My chaperone said,

"This is my covert operations team
and my covert operations room."

He proceeded to enter into
this particular account,

and he started, er,
altering figures,

which I said to him,
"Is this real-time?"

He says, "Look,
I'll just prove it."

He says, "I'll alter the Euro
figures in this branch's accounts."

You're inside some subpostmaster's
Horizon, and he doesn't know?

In total disbelief, I said,

"Are you sure you can alter
these figures in real time?"

And he said, "Yes."

I said, "Well, for
your information..."

I've been telling my
members for years,

no-one else has access
to their branch accounts.

' "And here you are proving that
you've got remote access." '

At which there was an immediate
look of disdain on his face,

and then ushered me out,

and more or less thrown
out as though I was...

a thief.

I said to Michael, "Your story
is really, really interesting.

"But Post Office, of course,

"will ask for evidence to
support what you're saying.

"So we need to find
the visitors book."

The so-called visitors
book that I signed,

ironically, is the only visitors
book that's disappeared.

"So, Michael, you need to have a
look through your email records

"to see if you can find the
invitation that came through to you,

"so get to it, Michael, I need
it, and I need it quickly."

I had a telephone
conversation with Ron.

I said, "I have the evidence. Are
you in front of your computer?"

He said, "Yes."

I said, "Well, I'm
pressing send now." I did.

The reply came back.

"Oh, my effing good God.

"They are now going to
become a hostage to fortune."

The day after Michael's
visit to Fujitsu,

Post Office officials
paid him a visit.

What come as an
even greater shock

was the orders that then
came into my bedroom at 8:30

that following morning, sat on
the edge of my bed, and said,

"You've got a £44,000
shortage in your office."

My wife, Susan, who's
managing the branch,

ended up being convicted with
300 hours community service,

electronically tagged
for six months.

She had to live through
and endure that experience.

In 2013, Second Sight published
their initial findings.

With Ron's report in
the public domain,

Post Office management
changed their approach.

Paula Vennells
rang me up to say,

"What we're proposing
is a mediation scheme

"between the subpostmasters
and the Post Office,

"with a senior judge
as the mediator.

"And that will be able to get to
the bottom of all these cases."

And I said, "Well, that
sounds right and proper.

"Let's go ahead with that."

Alan put forward 150
cases for the new scheme.

The whole process was only meant to
take X amount of months in total.

It was running into years.

You're supposed to go to mediation
with a willingness to settle,

but it appeared that the Post
Office was sending two lawyers

who turned up and said,

"You're out of time to make a claim,
it's over six years old. Forget it."

I think they were actually
uncovering the real truth

of what had been going on,

and they didn't want to
come forward with it.

The Post Office has spent public
money on a mediation scheme

which they themselves
have set out to sabotage.

In Westminster, James Arbuthnot

was working hard to keep
the case in the public eye.

And they've broken their
word to Members of Parliament

in so many different respects
that it is frankly bewildering.

If you could just introduce yourself
for voice transcription purposes.

Paula Vennells, Chief
Executive of Post Office.

And then Paula was
called in to face MPs.

'People do not like appearing
in front of select committees.'

Because the select committee
may get to the bottom of things

that the witnesses may
prefer that they didn't.

Before the hearing,

Paula Vennells asked colleagues to
help clarify what she should say.

Here we go.

A copy of her email has
since come to light.

"Urgent: Accessing Horizon.

"Dear both, your help,
please, in prep for the SC,

"the select committee hearing."

That's obviously the
question she's being warned

she's gonna have to answer.

This is a system
that works well,

and it works well for the
vast majority of people.

For those it doesn't work
for, we are doing our utmost.

I've got Nadhim, and
then I've got Brian...

The MPs wanted to know why the
Post Office had been obstructive

during Second Sight's
investigation.

Paula, why don't you
give those files over?

What's the problem?
Erm, so, I...

I think the point I want to
pick up first, if I may...

No, just... No, answer
my question first.

Why won't you give Ian
Henderson those files? Why?

We have... As far as
I'm aware, Mr Zahawi,

we have shared whatever information
was appropriate on every single...

That's not what Ian
Henderson's saying.

It is the first time
personally I have heard that.

You're the head of
the organisation.

Will you provide it?
Yes or no? Simple.

I'm not prepared, on behalf
of the Post Office...

Right, I've got my
answer, so you won't...

No, you haven't got your answer,
you haven't heard a yes or no.

I'm simply saying
that at the moment,

I'm not able to
answer your question.

'It was pointed out
to her time after time

'that she was in charge and
the decisions were with her.'

But it just seemed
to wash over her.

Well, this sounds
like a shambles to me.

You came in here, opened by saying
the system's working beautifully.

You now realise why you're in front
of the committee, is that right?

The system... The
reason... Ian said...

ALAN: I just couldn't
understand why, even after that,

she didn't take things on board
and actually be honest and own up

and actually try and resolve it,

which she should've
done far earlier.

I'm very sorry that I
can't answer that. It's...

JO: When I listened to the
evidence from Paula Vennells...

I realised what we were
gonna be up against,

and just what it looks like.

I have been told that we're
providing information.

It looks like it's a
massive corporate cover-up.

Then, a few weeks after the
select committee hearing,

the Post Office changed
their approach again.

Post Office dynamited the
mediation working group

and fired everybody.

I think at that stage,

she decided it was preferable
to cover up the injustice

and to allow these
subpostmasters to go to the wall.

And I think that's shocking.

We were growing information,
we were growing data.

TOBY JONES: For
more than ten years,

Alan Bates and his
team of campaigners

had been carefully gathering
evidence bit by bit

against the Post Office.

Because we had those documents,

there was a possibility then of
starting some sort of litigation

in the civil courts
against the Post Office.

If we could find a legal firm
to take it on board for us.

REPORTER: 'The
headlines this morning.

'A report has criticised
the Post Office for sacking

'or prosecuting subpostmasters

'without establishing the
cause of cash shortfalls

'at their branches.'

Driving into work,
normal day, into Leeds,

and I heard a BBC
radio programme.

'If the cash recorded
by the computer system

'does not match up with the cash
that's actually held at the branch,

'then they are held
responsible for it.'

I thought, "There may be something
we could do about this to help,"

because it didn't sound right,
so I contacted Alan Bates.

I explained the case to him,

I showed him the type of
evidence that we had at the time.

And I explained we
had no money at all,

but we felt there
was a case there.

So I needed to weigh
up whether or not

we could raise the necessary
litigation funding.

There are specialist funders who
are willing to take the risk,

but only if there
are enough of you.

Because otherwise we knew that
Post Office would outspend us

and we would lose.

The only way that we were gonna
be able to break through this

and uncover it was a
full-scale group action.

Group litigation orders are used
when you've got very poor claimants

and they've got enough
similarity in their cases

that you can literally
fund one case

and solve a lot of
people's problems.

It was the only
way, and to do that,

we needed a much larger
group of postmasters.

How many would you need?

At least 500.

The meeting kicked off
a nationwide search

to find subpostmasters

who'd had problems with Horizon.

Eventually, 555 people pursued
a group litigation order

against the Post Office.

The case against Post Office
was very much to expose

the way individuals had
been mistreated in there.

The lack of information that
was available from Post Office.

The flaws in the system
they'd never owned up to.

The denial that had happened,
the bullying that had gone on.

The abuse of individuals, the way
that they'd raided people's houses.

The way they'd been so high-handed,
God almighty, didn't give a damn,

their Post Office and they
can do what they want -

that's what we wanted exposing.

Alan had found the lawyers,
they'd got the funding.

And we were on.

Alan and the Justice For
Subpostmasters Alliance

finally took the Post Office to
court to seek financial redress.

Well, I went four days
after my mum died.

She'd said to me,
"Please don't stop."

And she said, "I'll be with you.

"Wherever you are,
I'll be with you."

And, erm, yeah, four days
later, I went to court.

Among Alan's group
of 555 subpostmasters

were people whose lives had been
devastated by the Post Office.

Many had been bankrupted,
prosecuted or imprisoned.

Gathering enough evidence
at the beginning of the case

was challenging because Post
Office had the evidence,

which meant we were
having to build the case

with one arm tied
behind our backs.

But during the case, the Post Office
was forced to disclose evidence

they'd always claimed
was irrelevant.

So, what we've got here
is a known-error log.

So what this records is the fact
that there were internet problems,

network problems,

which were causing the
error in the system,

which in turn were
messing up the figures

and causing a
financial discrepancy.

This particular example showed that
the transaction that had gone wrong

needed to be manually corrected.

They had teams and teams of people
doing it all day long, year on year.

Quite often in litigation cases,
in court cases, lawyers will say,

"Well, very rarely are we ever
gonna find a smoking gun."

These were smoking guns.

Not just one smoking gun,
multiple smoking guns,

which prove to us and
prove to the court

that there were multiple
problems in the system,

there had been from day
one when it was installed.

And that was why Post
Office lost the court case.

At the end of the
court hearings,

Justice Fraser delivered
a 330-page judgement

outlining his findings
on the Horizon system.

On the day the judgement
was handed down,

our side was totally
crammed with people.

The other side of the court,
there were just two people.

They knew what was gonna happen,

they knew which way this judgement
was going to land, and it did.

Mr Justice Fraser's
Horizon Issues judgement:

"This approach by
the Post Office

"has amounted, in reality, to
bear assertions and denials..."

"that ignore what has
actually occurred."

"It amounts to the
21st-century equivalent

"of maintaining that
the Earth is flat."

SHE GIGGLES Good
old Justice Fraser.

The judge said there seemed
to be a culture of secrecy

and excessive confidentially
within the Post Office.

THEY CHEER

We couldn't be more happy with
the judgement from the court.

This has been the result
of many years' work

to achieve justice
for over 550 people.

It was overwhelming. It was utterly,
utterly damning of Post Office,

and it just vindicated everything
we'd ever said about them.

The win was one of the
best days of my life.

The civil justice system in
the UK had got to the truth.

But the win came at
huge financial cost.

Although the Post Office agreed
to pay £57.5 million in damages,

after legal costs,

the subpostmasters were left
with around £20,000 each.

But the civil court win did
enable the subpostmasters

to appeal their
criminal convictions.

These subpostmasters have not only
had their convictions quashed,

but they've been exonerated
by the Court of Appeal.

I'm not a criminal any
more, I'm a victim.

To date, 93 out of
736 subpostmasters

have had their names cleared.

The sun was shining,
and I was free.

REPORTER: How do you
feel now? Very happy.

At last, you could go home and
tell people you were innocent.

That emotion will...

It was like lifting
that big rucksack

with rocks on your back for
years, and getting rid of it.

Thank you, all. Let
him through, please.

You know, you could
just throw it away.

It was such a big, big relief,

cos the Post Office did a lot
of damage, really, to him.

It's something that we couldn't
fathom that was gonna happen to him.

I didn't have this many
people at my wedding.

But I'm seeing my dad coming
back now, you know, bit by bit.

So we are really grateful,

you know, that we've had this chance
to see that, cos not many have.

CHEERING

Well done. Well done.

God's got me through everything.

I just thought I wanted to bring
you here to show you as well.

I've built myself up.

I've made myself stronger,

and I want everybody to
know that I wasn't a thief.

I didn't rob the Post
Office, as they say.

That's what matters to
me, my name cleared.

And it needs to be told. Our
stories do need to be out there.

It's not just...

a little group of
people, it's hundreds.

Hundreds of people
have been through this.

Everybody ready?

A statutory inquiry has been set
up to find out what went wrong.

Would you not remember
something that significant?

I'm afraid I don't.

I'm sorry, I don't have an
awful lot of memory on that.

I don't remember that at all.

I know who should
be held to account.

I mean, it's the people who
have had a very cushy lifestyle

on vast quantities of money,

whilst they've made hundreds, if
not thousands of individuals suffer,

whilst knowing the real
truth of what's been going on

and denying the truth to
all these individuals.

Those are the people who
should be held responsible.

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