Hollinrake says Post Office Horizon inquiry has shown evidence of ‘not only incompetence, but malevolence’
Kevin Hollinrake, the minister for postal services, is now responding to the UQ about the Post Office Horizon scandal.
He refers to the announcement made by the PM earlier.
And he says 30 people who suffered wrongful convictions have now accepted the £600,000 upfront offer as an alternative to going through the detailed compensation assessment scheme. Previously only five people had accepted this.
He says, under the plan announced by the PM, people will be able to apply for a £75,000 upfront payment. But they will still be able to go through the detailed compensation scheme if they want.
He says the evidence from the inquiry has shown evidence of “not only incompetence, but malevolence in many of their actions” by the Post Office. This evidence was not available at the time of the prosecutions, he says.
Key events
Sir Bob Neill (Con), the chair of the Commons justice committee, says this move is unprecedented. He suggests he has concerns about overturning decisions of the judiciary like this and he asks if the government will publish a draft brill for swift scrutiny (by his committee, presumably) and if he will ensure that, because of its constitutional implications, it goes to a committee of the whole house (meaning all MPs can take part in the committee stage debates and votes, not just members of the bill committee).
Hollinrake says he will discuss these points with Neill.
This is what the PM’s spokesperson told journalist at the post-PMQs lobby briefing about the Post Office Horizon legislation.
We will introduce new primary legislation to quash all convictions that were based on erroneous Horizon evidence or the egregious behaviour of the Post Office in the period in question.
This will be done on a blanket basis, clearing people’s names and making sure they access the compensation they rightly deserve as quickly as possible instead of waiting for years for the courts to wade through hundreds of convictions.
We will in the coming days consider whether to include the small number of cases that already have been considered by the appeal courts.
We will also make sure that postmasters who played a crucial role in first exposing the scandal receive the compensation they deserve.
These individuals, known as the Group Litigation Order (GLO) cohort, who did not receive a criminal conviction but paid out considerable sums of money because of Horizon failures, will receive an upfront offer now of at least £75,000 of compensation.
Kevan Jones (Lab) says Kevin Hollinrake was not allowed to make a statement because Rishi Sunak wanted to announce the news himself.
When a minister is down to make a statement, the PM is normally expected not to give any details of it in advance at PMQs. In practice, if Sunak had confirmed that the government was going to legislate, but asked MPs to wait for half an hour before the minister set out the details, no one would have minded very much. But the announcement in parliament late morning that a ministerial announcement had been scheduled would have been seen by journalists as confirmation that legislation was coming. In the event, Sunak got to break the news himself.
Duncan Baker (Con) asks how much money the Post Office “stole” from people in this scandal.
Hollinrake says Baker is probably the only former postmaster in the Commons.
He does not have a number, but he will try to get one, he says.
He says, before Horizon was introduced, there were around five convictions of sub-post office operators a year. That went up to 60 a year after Horizon was introduced, he says.
Marion Fellows for the SNP says payments to victims should not be referred to as compensation. It is financial redress, she says.
In response to the questions from Labour’s Jonathan Reynolds, the shadow business secrary, Hollinrake says it may take some weeks to come up with the legislation.
And he says the scheme will cover victims who were penalised because of problems with the pilot version of Horizon.
David Davis (Con), who tabled the UQ, says some victims of the scandal are not happy about the idea of a mass exoneration because they feel that leaves them lumped in with the handful of people who might have been guilty.
And he asks if the government will recover compensation from Fujitsu, the company behind the flawed Horizon IT.
Hollinrake says it would not have been possible to do individual exonerations without “an exhaustive and time-consuming administrative process”.
And he says the government will consider recovering money from Fujitsu once the inquiry is over, and it has established who was responsible for what went wrong.
Sir Lindsay Hoyle, the speaker, says he allowed Hollinrake to speak for longer than is normal when replying to UQ. He says he understands that Hollinrake wanted to make a Commons statement, but was overruled. He says that is why he granted the UQ.
This is curious. It implies Sunak wanted to make an announcement at PMQs, but did not want to have a minister taking questions about the detail.
What Hollinrake told MPs about how legislation to quash unsafe Post Office convictions will work
Hollinrake is now talking about the legislation to exonerate the hundreds of post office operators whose convictions are unsafe.
He says the law will overturn the convictions of all those convicted in England and Wales on the basis of Post Office evidence.
He accepts there is a risk of people rightly being convicted being let off. But the only alternative would be to consider every case, and that is impractical, he says.
He says people who accept the exoneration will have to sign a statement saying they are innocent. He says that if it turns out subsequently they were not telling the truth, they will be at risk of prosecution for fraud.
UPDATE: Hollinrake said:
We are being faced with a dilemma: either accept the present problem of many people carrying the unjustified slur of conviction, or accept that an unknown number of people who have genuinely stolen from their Post Office will be exonerated and perhaps even compensated.
I can therefore announce that we intend to bring forward legislation as soon as we can to overturn the convictions of all those convicted in England or Wales on the basis of Post Office evidence given during the Horizon scandal.
The government will, in the coming days, consider whether to include the small number of cases that have already been considered by the appeal courts and the convictions upheld.
We recognise this is an exceptional step, but these are exceptional circumstances …
As far as possible we want to avoid guilty people walking away with hundreds of thousands of pounds of public money, but we cannot make the provision of compensation subject to a detailed examination of guilt.
All we ask is that as part of their claims of compensation postmasters sign a statement to the effect they did not commit the crimes of which they are accused. Anyone subsequently found to have signed such a statement untruthfully will be putting themselves at risk of prosecution of fraud.
I do not pretend to the house that this is a foolproof device, but it is a proportionate one which respects the ordeal which these people have already suffered.
It means that an honest postmaster will have his or her conviction overturned and just by signing one document can secure compensation.
Hollinrake says Post Office Horizon inquiry has shown evidence of ‘not only incompetence, but malevolence’
Kevin Hollinrake, the minister for postal services, is now responding to the UQ about the Post Office Horizon scandal.
He refers to the announcement made by the PM earlier.
And he says 30 people who suffered wrongful convictions have now accepted the £600,000 upfront offer as an alternative to going through the detailed compensation assessment scheme. Previously only five people had accepted this.
He says, under the plan announced by the PM, people will be able to apply for a £75,000 upfront payment. But they will still be able to go through the detailed compensation scheme if they want.
He says the evidence from the inquiry has shown evidence of “not only incompetence, but malevolence in many of their actions” by the Post Office. This evidence was not available at the time of the prosecutions, he says.
Rosena Allin-Khan (Lab) says some children in Gaza are having to have limbs amputated without pain relief. She asks for more aid for Gaza and for Israel to stop attacking health facilities.
Sunak says that he wants more aid going into Gaza, and that he has raised the plight of civilians with Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli PM.
Katherine Fletcher (Con) asks about trains in her constituency, and a local station. Sunak says Fletcher is a fantastic advocate for her constituents, and that this sounds like a good idea.
Marian Fellows (SNP) asks what may be the final question of PMQs. She asks if the government will back a social tariff for energy bills.
Sunak says he will ensure Fellows gets a meeting to discuss this. The government is working to ensure vulnerable people this winter get support, he says.
PMQs – snap verdict
It’s always good to admit your mistakes, so here goes. This morning I said Rishi Sunak would want to announce Post Office Horizon legislation because a big story like this can be “a very useful defence mechanism at PMQs”. (See 9.28am.) He did give us the story, but, as a defence mechanism, it turned out to be hopeless. Keir Starmer left Sunak bouncing off the ropes after one of his most comprehensive PMQs goings-over probably ever.
Arguments work well at PMQs, but nothing is more deadly than ridicule. Gordon Brown’s reputation was never quite the same after Vince Cable described him as going “from Stalin to Mr Bean” and at times Starmer’s withering descriptions of the PM were laugh-out-loud funny. At one point Labour was wary of attacking Sunak over immigration, traditionally a Tory issue, but increasingly Labour is taking the view that the Rwanda scheme is a policy albatross. It was telling that Sunak could not convincingly deny originally having doubts about the idea. Starmer has repeatedly denounced Sunak as out of touch, but today the accusations sounded more plausible than ever. And Sunak was strikingly short on retaliatory material. At one point Sunak and CCHQ were obsessive about the Labour £28bn green plan being a ladder to higher taxes, but Starmer’s repeated denials on this front may have closed that down a bit.
Instead Sunak was left primarily with the “don’t let Labour take Britain back to square one” line he deployed on Monday. In a country where square one sounds like an improvement on what we have, that did not work then, and it did not work today.
Alex Norris (Lab) asks if Sunak had a meeting with a donor who gave him £38,000 for the use of a private jet. He is referring to this story.
Sunak says all his donations are declared in the normal way.
Sunak says the government thinks there is a “very good basis” for the power-sharing executive to be restored in Northern Ireland.
Caroline Ansell (Con) asks about the concerns of those who object to children being told they can be born the wrong sex. She asks if parents will be involved in the consultation on the new trans guidance for schools.
Sunak says parents are being consulted. And people should be free to stress the importance of biological sex, he says.
Stephen Flynn, the SNP leader at Westminster, says post office operators never stood a chance against the Westminster establishment.
Sunak says this is one of the greatest scandals in history. The government has set up an inquiry, and set up three different compensation schemes. But the government is going further. That is why it has announced a new law today.
Flynn says this is not just about subpostmasters. Ask the Waspi women, or the victims of the infected blood inquiry, or the victims of Hillsborough. The government only responds when it has no choice.
Sunak says he is sad Flynn is trying to politicise this.
(He did not say that to Lee Anderson – see 12.03pm.)
Starmer says Sunak is out of touch. He just sees the country from his private jet, and does not know schools where pupils don’t turn up.
Doesn’t the country deserve so much better than a prime minister who simply doesn’t get Britain?
Sunak says the government has just cut tax. Starmer does not have a single idea, he says. He says the Tories have a plan, and Labour would just take Britain back to square one.