Fundraising Hits Target
If you have read the fundraising page you would have seen that we now have the funding to move forward with our submission of maladministration by the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy. Once again it is down to the group to pursue the injustice of a corporate, this time Government, body that thinks it is too big to be held account for its failings that have been at the root cause of the devastation of so many lives.
Once again it is going to be down to us to expose, in the full glare of the media, the incompetence and failures of those who prefer to lurk in the shadows. We know who most of them are and where they fell down on their jobs, they don't want to talk sensibly to us about how the Department could make amends, all they want to do is deny, deny, deny it has anything to do with them - but we know different, and we will prove it beyond any shadow of doubt.
Once again it is going to be down to us to expose, in the full glare of the media, the incompetence and failures of those who prefer to lurk in the shadows. We know who most of them are and where they fell down on their jobs, they don't want to talk sensibly to us about how the Department could make amends, all they want to do is deny, deny, deny it has anything to do with them - but we know different, and we will prove it beyond any shadow of doubt.
Judge Led Public Inquiry - nothing less will do!
The MPs want it, we want it, it will happen in the end, so lets get on with it.
The JFSA will never engage with anything less.
The JFSA will never engage with anything less.
The Campaign goes on.........................
Following the outstanding court victories of the Common Issues and the Horizon Issues trials, the process entered into Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) late November 2019. Why this came about and what this meant and what took place, can be found on the ADR page. Yet, as explained in detail on that page, the outcome meant that only £11m was left to be apportioned by the 555 claimants, when as previously explained, a prior examination of a number of these claimant cases had identified a figure of closer to £700,000 (2015 figures) being the average loss to each claimant and something Post Office would have been aware of.
Furthermore, since the Settlement Agreement was signed, according to comments made in Parliament, Post Office has settled individual Subpostmasters cases at £300,000 for those who had not taken part in the legal action. Obviously a move by Post Office to punish further those who had dared take legal action against it.
So the campaign continues, and first on the list is the recovery of the £46m (plus interest at the court agreed rate of 8% from the date of the Settlement Agreement – 10th December 2019), costs the 555 claimant group have had to pay to uncover the lies and cover-up in the court. Recovering that money would mean that each in the claimant group would then receive probably 4 or 5 times the few thousands they will receive from their share of apportioned £11m, nowhere near what they lost, but at least something.
This bill now rests at the door of BEIS, the Government department that had failed its statutory duty to manage and oversee Post Office, resulting in the Claimants having to bring a legal action in the first place. Not only has BEIS failed in its duties, but it has found great use and value in the judgments from our two court cases and has echoed that point more than once – but still refuses to pay what it owes.
Next on the list is the judge-led public inquiry, and it can only be a judge-led public inquiry, nothing else would have any merit or any value to the JFSA or the claimants. Why judge led? What has become clear to the JFSA and many of the MPs who have supported us over the years, is that Post Office cannot be trusted. For years Post Office has written numerous assurances and has robustly given and stood behind statements that were untrue. Whether this was deliberate deceit or just plain incompetence has yet to be established, but the only time the real truth has ever started to appear was during the two court cases, and it was only the weight of the judiciary that has managed to achieve this.
So whilst the issue is back in limbo for the present, once the pandemic has passed through, the campaign will be back in force, and with so much support from MPs before the recess of Parliament, no doubt our voices will continue to be heard in Westminster until we have succeeded.
Furthermore, since the Settlement Agreement was signed, according to comments made in Parliament, Post Office has settled individual Subpostmasters cases at £300,000 for those who had not taken part in the legal action. Obviously a move by Post Office to punish further those who had dared take legal action against it.
So the campaign continues, and first on the list is the recovery of the £46m (plus interest at the court agreed rate of 8% from the date of the Settlement Agreement – 10th December 2019), costs the 555 claimant group have had to pay to uncover the lies and cover-up in the court. Recovering that money would mean that each in the claimant group would then receive probably 4 or 5 times the few thousands they will receive from their share of apportioned £11m, nowhere near what they lost, but at least something.
This bill now rests at the door of BEIS, the Government department that had failed its statutory duty to manage and oversee Post Office, resulting in the Claimants having to bring a legal action in the first place. Not only has BEIS failed in its duties, but it has found great use and value in the judgments from our two court cases and has echoed that point more than once – but still refuses to pay what it owes.
Next on the list is the judge-led public inquiry, and it can only be a judge-led public inquiry, nothing else would have any merit or any value to the JFSA or the claimants. Why judge led? What has become clear to the JFSA and many of the MPs who have supported us over the years, is that Post Office cannot be trusted. For years Post Office has written numerous assurances and has robustly given and stood behind statements that were untrue. Whether this was deliberate deceit or just plain incompetence has yet to be established, but the only time the real truth has ever started to appear was during the two court cases, and it was only the weight of the judiciary that has managed to achieve this.
So whilst the issue is back in limbo for the present, once the pandemic has passed through, the campaign will be back in force, and with so much support from MPs before the recess of Parliament, no doubt our voices will continue to be heard in Westminster until we have succeeded.