09 Jan 2024
St Albans MP Daisy Cooper has accused the Government of using the Post Office Horizon scandal as a “political football” in the run-up to a General Election.
She was speaking exclusively to the St Albans Times following days of damning attacks on Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey for his perceived role when he was Postal Affairs Minister between 2010 and 2012.
National media coverage over the past few days claimed Mr Davey had been informed about concerns with faulty software before any prosecutions took place, and then only parroted the Post Office’s assurances that the Horizon system was not at fault, ignoring warnings over financial liability. He was also accused of refusing to meet with former subpostmaster Alan Bates to discuss the controversy.
In response to criticism of his role, Mr Davey insists he was misled by the Post Office, and said this week: “I wish I had known then what we all know now, the Post Office was lying on an industrial scale to me and other ministers.”
As deputy leader of the Liberal Democrats, Daisy has a close working relationship with Mr Davey, and was keen to put across her side in light of recent media reports.
She said: “The Post Office Horizon scandal is a devastating miscarriage of justice lasting almost 25 years.
“Since 2000 hundreds of sub-postmasters across the country were wrongly convicted, because of faults with the Post Office’s Horizon IT system that it shamefully covered up for years. It took until 2019, and a High Court battle, for the truth to come out. An independent, statutory inquiry into the scandal is underway, and the Met Police are now investigating potential criminality by the Post Office.
“I believe that it is critical that the inquiry and the police urgently get to the bottom of this, that the Post Office executives responsible are held to account, and that sub-postmasters and their families finally get the compensation they unquestionably deserve.
“As we head towards a much needed General Election, the Conservative Party and their cheerleaders have shamefully decided to use this awful tragedy as a political football: instead of listening to the voices of the victims, they are busy manufacturing political attacks on Ed Davey and other Liberal Democrats who served as Postal Affairs Ministers between 2010 and 2015.
“As a result, there’s a lot of misinformation flying around.
“Ed Davey was the first Minister on record to meet with Alan Bates, just five months after becoming a Minister. That was seven years after Mr Bates’ first contact with Labour Ministers in 2003. Between 2015-2019, four Conservative post office ministers recorded no meeting with Bates and the campaign group in their official disclosures.
“To be clear, when Ed Davey became Postal Affairs Minister in May 2010, he was advised not to meet Alan Bates of the Justice for Subpostmasters Alliance – just as none of the previous Labour Ministers had met with him or anyone from the campaign in the years before 2010. Ed has said many times that in hindsight he wishes he could have done more, and that he bitterly regrets that the Post Office lied to him at the time.
“Alan Bates himself has said that sadly Ed could not have secured justice more quickly for sub-postmasters because of the way the Post Office was acting. The true picture finally started to emerge through the sub-postmasters’ court cases. Remote access was described by the High Court judge in Alan Bates’ case as ‘a very important central element of the whole dispute’ but that ‘the truth concerning remote access has now emerged in 2019’ after a whistleblower came forward.
“Liberal Democrats no longer have access to official correspondence between Ministers and Post Office officials as that is all held by the government but the inquiry may reveal further details of why no other Ministers met the campaign.
“Ed and other Liberal Democrat MPs – myself included – joined campaigners in calling for a full, independent, statutory inquiry into the scandal – even as Conservative Ministers refused. Eventually, in May 2021, those calls were successful and the current inquiry was established. However, the Post Office is still dragging its feet – delaying the progress of the inquiry by failing to provide crucial documents on time. This Conservative government must put a stop to that so the inquiry can get to the bottom of this scandal as quickly as possible, and those responsible can be held to account.
“As the MP for St Albans, I have also raised this appalling injustice with this Conservative government a number of times including supporting an Early Day Motion calling for a judge-led inquiry to be set up, signing a cross-party letter to the Secretary of State about the failures of the compensation scheme, and tabling written parliamentary questions. If any constituents have been directly affected by this scandal and have not already contacted me, I would encourage them to get in touch and I will do everything I can to help them get justice.
“I’ve no doubt that this increasingly desperate Conservative government will continue their unfounded political attacks ahead of the General Election. We’ve seen this from them before. Ed has my full support as Leader and the Liberal Democrats say bring on the General Election now and let the people have their say.”
James Spencer, the Conservative Prospective Parliamentary Candidate for St Albans said: “The Post Office/Horizon scandal ruined innocent people’s lives, and no stone should be left unturned until the victims get justice.
“Whilst it is clear that the leader of the Lib Dems is not entirely to blame for this scandal, he should, at the very least, make a formal apology for his lack of action as post office minister. Saying ‘I regret the situation’ is very different from saying sorry, and it is the latter that people want to hear.
“Personally, I think the reason why there are so many calls for Ed Davey to resign is because of the hypocrisy and lack of self-awareness we have come to expect from the Lib Dems. Since 2019, Mr Davey has called for the resignation of more than thirty high-profile individuals as well as calling on every Conservative MP to resign.
“Now the spotlight is focused on his actions, he and his deputy are singing a very different tune. Where is the integrity in that?”
