Ex-Publish Workplace chair expresses ‘honest remorse’ over Horizon scandal

The previous chair of the Post Office has expressed “honest remorse” for the state-owned physique’s failings within the Horizon IT scandal and stated it was a mistake to not present a key report on the issue to its board.

Tim Parker, who was chair of the Publish Workplace between 2015 and 2022, advised a judge-led public inquiry that he felt “deep sympathy” for the Publish Workplace operatives affected by what MPs have described as one of many largest miscarriages of justice in UK historical past.

The Publish Workplace wrongly prosecuted a whole bunch of operators due to monetary shortfalls recorded of their branches but it surely has since emerged that the Horizon IT computer system was unreliable and suffered bugs, errors and defects.

Parker advised the inquiry that there have been “failures in any respect ranges” of the Publish Workplace over the way in which it defended the excessive court docket lawsuit introduced in opposition to it by Sir Alan Bates and 554 different Publish Workplace operatives, and it “could have relied too closely on the recommendation of legal professionals in the way in which the case was performed”.

Bates’ group gained a significant victory in 2019 when a decide dominated in its favour, discovering points with the IT system.

Parker – a former personal fairness veteran whom unions as soon as dubbed “the Prince of Darkness” due to his cost-cutting ways – stated that when he took over as chair the enterprise was in “deep disaster”. He stated it “absorbed billions of kilos of taxpayer cash and was nonetheless dropping cash”.

After he took over, he commissioned a report from barrister Jonathan Swift wanting on the Publish Workplace’s dealing with of complaints made by operatives in regards to the Horizon system after authorities ministers raised considerations.

Parker advised the inquiry that, after Swift accomplished his report in January 2016, it was not given to the Publish Workplace board as a result of he had been advised by Jane MacLeod, then the Publish Workplace’s normal counsel, that the Swift report was confidential and lined by authorized privilege.

“I felt erroneously that authorized privilege meant that the report successfully was circumscribed,” he stated.

Ministers have been additionally briefed on the report however weren’t given a tough copy amid fears the doc may change into publicly disclosable by way of freedom of data requests, the inquiry heard.

The Division for Enterprise, Vitality and Industrial Technique later wrote to Parker in October 2020 telling him it had been a “mistake” to not have proven the Swift report back to the board.

“On the time I used to be suggested and I took that recommendation,” Parker advised the inquiry, including that, in 2016, he believed he was prevented from sharing the report with different board members.

He accepted that if the Swift report had been mentioned at board stage it may have led to a “totally different method” by the Publish Workplace to the excessive court docket lawsuit.

“May now we have shared it? I want we had in a method,” he stated. “What attainable motive would I’ve on the time from hiding this report from my fellow board members apart from receiving recommendation that I shouldn’t share it?… I had no vested curiosity in making an attempt to guard the Publish Workplace. It was merely the recommendation I obtained and I adopted it.”

He added: “I might settle for with hindsight [this] was a misjudgment. I’m not a lawyer and I obtained very sturdy authorized recommendation which I took … I did that in good religion. I had no purpose to intentionally cover this factor or chuck it into the lengthy grass.”

He stated the board had been briefed by former chief government Paula Vennells about suggestions from the Swift report and the federal government “actually knew of the report”.

Parker is a high-profile determine within the enterprise world and is the previous chief government of shoemaker Clarks, Kwik-Match, the AA and baggage agency Samsonite, and a former chair of Nationwide Belief.

The inquiry heard that, when Parker took over as chair in 2015, he was working a minimal of 1.5 days per week however by November 2017 he had requested for that to be lowered to 2 days a month.

Parker advised the listening to he would “actually rebut” any suggestion that he had not spent sufficient time on the Publish Workplace. “I might say I used to be an lively, energetic chair who took plenty of time and frolicked with folks to know the enterprise,” he stated.

The inquiry continues.