In the United Kingdom, the “real” heroes of the Post Office scam were heard by a parliamentary committee.

ITV/AFP

Former postal worker Alan Bates is the “real” hero of the ITV series about one of Britain’s biggest scams.

United Kingdom – In 1998, Alan Bates was a simple post office manager in the small town of Llandudno in Wales. Today his name is associated with the struggle of hundreds of British postal workers who were wrongly accused in one of the biggest miscarriages of justice in UK history. A scam called the TV series adaptation Mr Bates v Post OfficeAired by the ITV channel in early January (and for which you can watch the trailer below), it sparked outrage across the channel and even had political repercussions in the British Parliament.

A parliamentary commission, with Alan Bates called to testify, met this Tuesday, January 16, to try to provide new answers to the matter, which is suddenly attracting renewed interest.

“They convinced me it was my fault”

Between 1999 and 2015, nearly a thousand managers of post office agencies were charged with theft by the public company. Every time, the latter points out deficiencies in the branch accounts, the deficit is brought to light by its accounting software called Horizon. 700 agency managers are being prosecuted for theft. Some are imprisoned. Others ruin themselves to pay. Four commit suicide.

For years, the Post Office ignored the challenges of the accused employees and denied any errors in the software. The company also employs accountants; When they suspect Horizon’s failure, the Post Office ends their mission.

That error was not recognized until 2019: a group of postal workers, led by Alan Bates, won a case before the High Court of Justice, which recognized their innocence and Horizon’s responsibility.

“They assured me it was my fault, I didn’t know anything about technology”John Hamilton, 66, a former office manager in Hampshire County, told Parliament this Tuesday.

“They literally manipulated me for three years and drained me financially”, she testified, explaining that she had to remortgage her house twice to pay the 36,000 pounds (currently around 41,900 euros) that she was accused of stealing. Opting to plead guilty rather than be sent to prison, she was found guilty of false accounting in 2008, before a joint legal action led by postal workers overturned the decision in 2021.

Alan Bates also lost his contract with the Post Office in 2003. He then looked at the Horizon software installed by Fujitsu and noticed that many transactions were duplicated in his account for no reason. He launched a website that allowed him to collect testimony from other office managers who had faced the same problem: the start of a class action that would bring these 555 postal workers to justice.

The 68-year-old man, played on screen by actor Toby Jones (notably Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets), are now fighting to ensure that all victims of this injustice receive the promised compensation. Because so far only 93 convictions have been overturned and 21 million pounds sterling (24 million euros) have been paid to the employees concerned.

“No reason can explain why all financial compensation has not been madeHe expressed regret in Parliament, testifying via video conference on Tuesday. It has gone on too long, people are suffering, they are dying. » Criticism of recession “Bureaucracy”, Alan Bates notably cites the case of a wrongfully accused postal worker, now 91 years old. “How many years does he have to wait?” Should she wait for the King’s telegram? »he asked.

In response, an extremely rare law promulgated by the government

The airing of the mini-series in early January caused a wave of sympathy for the victims of the scandal, which was nevertheless regularly covered by the British press. Countering this sentiment, Rishi Sunak’s government promised last week that the law would be enacted “immediately” Presented to exonerate and compensate all the victims. A measure (extremely rare) that makes it possible to overturn convictions on a large scale and avoid lengthy individual legal proceedings.

Parliament heard on Tuesday that Japanese IT group Fujitsu had apologized to the victims, acknowledging it. “Moral Responsibility” To participate in compensation. “We were involved from the beginning. There were errors in the system. And we assisted the Post Office in prosecuting its postal employees. We are deeply sorry.”said Paul Patterson, the company’s director for Europe, who has worked there since 2010.

Another consequence of this collective awareness of the scale of the scandal: Paula Vennells, who led the Post Office between 2012 and 2019, on January 9 returned her decoration as a Commander of the Order of the British Empire, the equivalent of our Legion of Honour. which was awarded to him by Elizabeth II in 2018.

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