GMB’s Susanna Reid Grills Cabinet Minister Over Government Role In Post Office Scandal
ITV’s Good Morning Britain host Susanna Reid grilled Pensions Secretary Mel Stride Tuesday over the government’s role in the Post Office scandal, blasting the government’s direct involvement, noting that it “is the sole shareholder” and is “responsible.”
The scandal gained renewed attention in the wake of the ITV drama Mr Bates vs The Post Office, highlighting the miscarriage of justice, where numerous postmasters faced wrongful accusations of theft and fraud due to faulty IT software. The false allegations led to dire consequences for the accused, including bankruptcy, imprisonment, with some individuals even taking their own lives.
Reid interrogated Stride on the extent of the government’s responsibility.
“Hundreds and hundreds of these people were prosecuted on the basis of – as David Davis, a colleague of yours said – a single lie,” she said. “How come the government didn’t notice? You were asleep on duty, weren’t you?”
“I wouldn’t accept that, Susanna, because we did, well, we did set up some years back now an inquiry under Sir Wyn Williams, who’s a very distinguished former High Court judge, to get to the bottom of exactly what happened. And we’ve recognized that issue,” Stride said.
“Yes, but it carried on happening while you were in government for a number of years,” Reid interjected.
The minister continued: “We’ve also, as I said we have already made, for example, £138 million worth of compensation payments to 2,700 people. So it’s not that we’ve just suddenly come to this issue.”
The host pressed harder: “We’re talking about 13 years of government, five years of which these prosecutions carried on taking place. I ask again, why didn’t the ministers in charge of the Post Office when you first came into government go, ‘Hang on a minute. There are 100 people being prosecuted here, they can’t…’ — 700 people, and those are the ones who are convicted — ‘…they can’t all be criminals. What’s going wrong here?’”
“Well,” Stride replied, “you’re quite rightly asking really fundamental and important questions, and there are many others. And that’s why we’ve set up the inquiry. So the job of inquiries is to get to the bottom of exactly those issues: who knew what, when, what action was taken, what action was not taken, who is responsible.”
The Metropolitan Police have confirmed that the Post Office is under criminal investigation. Scotland Yard is investigating potential fraud offences related to the prosecutions, including the recovery of monies from sub-postmasters.
