3 July 2024 – Timothy Parker
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(9.48 am)
Mr Beer: Good morning, sir. Can you see and hear us.
Sir Wyn Williams: Yes, thank you very much.
Mr Beer: May I call Tim Parker, please?
Sir Wyn Williams: Of course.
Timothy Parker
TIMOTHY CHARLES PARKER (affirmed).
Questioned by Mr Beer
Mr Beer: Sir, before I ask questions of Mr Parker, I should say that there is a fire alarm drill today at 10.00 and, in accordance with our usual practice, we’re going to sit through it.
Sir Wyn Williams: Sure.
Mr Beer: Thank you.
Good morning, Mr Parker.
Timothy Parker: Morning.
Mr Beer: My name is Jason Beer and I ask questions on behalf of the Inquiry. Can you tell us your full name, please?
Timothy Parker: My name is Timothy Charles Parker.
Mr Beer: Thank you. You’ve provided kindly a witness statement for us which is 136 pages long, the URN for that is WITN00690100. You should have a hard copy in front of you there. Can you turn up, please, page 126. Do you have that?
Timothy Parker: I do.
Mr Beer: Do you see in paragraph 268(iii), it says “POL appointing a criminal with extensive experience to work alongside Brian Altman QC”?
Timothy Parker: I do.
Mr Beer: Should have that have the word “silk” inserted between the word “criminal” and “with”?
Timothy Parker: Most certainly.
Mr Beer: So that, rather than the Post Office appointing a criminal, the Post Office would appoint a criminal silk?
Timothy Parker: Absolutely. Correct.
Mr Beer: Thank you very much. Can we go to the last page, please, which is page 136. Is that your signature?
Timothy Parker: It is.
Mr Beer: With that correction brought into account, are the contents of the witness statement true to the best of your knowledge and belief?
Timothy Parker: They are indeed.
Mr Beer: Thank you very much. It’s a very detailed witness statement of 136 pages, it will be uploaded to the Inquiry’s website and therefore I’m not going to ask you questions about all parts of it.
Timothy Parker: Okay.
Mr Beer: Can I start with your background, please. You were Chairman of the Post Office from 1 October 2015 until September 2022 so about seven years; is that correct?
Timothy Parker: Correct, yes.
Mr Beer: You took over after Alice Perkins was Chair of the Post Office, albeit there was an interim chair?
Timothy Parker: That’s correct too.
Mr Beer: At the same time, I think you were Chair of Samsonite. I think you became Chair of Samsonite in 2014; is that right?
Timothy Parker: I was, in fact, Chair and Chief Executive of Samsonite from 2008 until 2014 and then I stepped down as CEO and remained as Non-Exec Chair.
Mr Beer: So Chair of Samsonite from 2014 until the present day?
Timothy Parker: Today, yeah.
Mr Beer: Yes, and so concurrently with your term in the Post Office for seven years?
Timothy Parker: Correct.
Mr Beer: You were concurrently Chair of the National Trust, I think, from 2014 to 2022; is that right?
Timothy Parker: That’s also correct.
Mr Beer: So, again, concurrently with you being the Chair of Post Office?
Timothy Parker: Indeed.
Mr Beer: From April 2018, I think you were Chair of Her Majesty’s – now His Majesty’s – Courts and Tribunal Service until 2022; is that right?
Timothy Parker: That’s also right.
Mr Beer: So concurrently with your chairmanship of the Post Office for a period of four years?
Timothy Parker: Correct.
Mr Beer: Thank you. Can you tell us in general terms your view of the company, the Post Office Limited, that you inherited when you took over as Chair in October 2015?
Timothy Parker: Yeah. The Post Office has a turnover of just under £1 billion, which makes it a sort of medium-sized company, but in fact it is an incredibly complex business: it’s complex because it operates a network of around 11,500 sites; it’s complex because it has a very wide range of products; it’s complex also because it deals with cash, and cash has a big security element to it; it’s complex because it’s in the public sector.
So this is an organisation that is incredibly complicated and at the same time faced some very significant commercial challenges. Sorry, I’m going on a bit here but it’s quite important that I can set the scene to the Post Office.
This is a business which had absorbed billions of pounds of taxpayers money and was still losing money. It was a business that faced significant challenges because it had an exclusive arrangement with the Royal Mail, and the Royal Mail itself was suffering from increasing competition in the parcels market and a declining letters market.
The Post Office had previously had a significant amount of business from the Government, so driving licences, benefits, that kind of thing. That had all moved online and so the Post Office was bereft a significant chunk of its contribution.
The Post Office had a range of products which it attempted to sell, with varying degrees of success, and it also had a very complex structure in terms of its overheads and management. So when I turned up, I felt and I believed that I could somehow help to improve an organisation that was in – I don’t think it’s any exaggeration to say it was in deep crisis.
Mr Beer: Thank you. I think it’s right that, before you took up your position, you made enquiries as to the accounts or figures of the Post Office before accepting the role; do you remember that?
Timothy Parker: I don’t but I probably would have done.
Mr Beer: Let’s look at some emails to jog your memory if we can, please. UKGI00019884. If we look at the second page, please, and the bottom half of the page. That’s it. This is an email not sent to or by you, but it’s about something that you are said to have said. It’s from Laura Thompson, who was an assistant director within ShEx, the Shareholder Executive?
Timothy Parker: Sure.
Mr Beer: It’s to the, essentially, private office of the then Secretary of State, Sajid Javid, and you’ll see it’s dated 17 June 2015 –
Timothy Parker: Mm-hm.
Mr Beer: – so three or four months before you took the post?
Timothy Parker: Mm-hm.
Mr Beer: If we just read it:
“We spoke – Baroness Neville-Rolfe …”
Who I think you’ll remember was the relevant minister at the time?
Timothy Parker: Mm-hm.
Mr Beer: “… met the two appointable candidates earlier today. We spoke to the Minister after her meeting. She confirmed that she would be happy to appoint Tim Parker to the role but did not feel Simon Burke was suitable – while he had some very good experience, he did not give her the confidence that he would be a strong chair, she felt she would need more support from Government in steering the business.”
Then the second paragraph:
“I would be grateful if you could therefore seek the Secretary of State’s views on the appointment. Please note that Tim Parker expressed an interest in seeing some more up-to-date figures on Post Office before accepting the role, if he were to be offered it. We believe this is just thoroughness on his part – he needs to be confident what he is getting into – and we are following this up with Post Office and with the public appointments assessor so that we can answer his queries …”
Then I’m not going to read the third paragraph.
Timothy Parker: Mm, mm.
Mr Beer: What were your concerns about the finances of the Post Office; what were you concerned about getting yourself into?
Timothy Parker: Well, as I think I’ve described to you, it was, I felt, in a very difficult situation, compounded by the fact that it relied, obviously, on agreeing financing, usually on an annual basis, with the Government, and needed a subsidy really to keep everything in order. So I mean, I – I thought it was a difficult situation and it certainly wasn’t going to be very easy but I felt that, however things turned out, the Government would obviously need to stand behind the Post Office and so I would be trying to help the Executive Team tackle things from the commercial end of the business with the customer and, at the same time, try to manage the Government and its willingness to finance the Post Office.
Mr Beer: So is this is an oblique reference, then, to whether the Government would continue properly to subsidise the Post Office?
Timothy Parker: Yeah, I believe that post offices are very politically sensitive and keeping a network is usually of significant importance to ministers. So I always felt that, you know –
Mr Beer: If you just pause there.
(Pause for fire alarm test)
Mr Beer: Mr Parker, you just said:
“I believe that post offices are very politically sensitive and keeping a network is usually of significant importance to ministers. So I always felt that …”
Timothy Parker: Yes, and I was going to go on and say so I always felt that, although there would be some very difficult discussions, the Post Office would always be there in some form or another. The challenge was to try to, essentially, make it more sustainable.
Mr Beer: When you were essentially doing this pre-appointment due diligence, were any concerns expressed to you about the performance and capabilities of the then CEO?
Timothy Parker: I don’t recall that being expressed to me at the time.
Mr Beer: Can we look, please, at UKGI00042677. This is a presentation about Post Office Limited Senior Management to the Risk and Assurance Committee of the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills and the Shareholder Executive. You’ll see it’s dated February 2014, so a year and a half or so before your appointment?
Timothy Parker: Mm, mm, mm.
Mr Beer: Can we turn, please, to the second page, and do you see down the left-hand side, underneath the number 1:
“Advice from the recent Annual Review suggested that the [Post Office] team give careful consideration to the continued suitability of Paula Vennells as CEO.”
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: “There is a general consensus that Paula is no longer the right person to lead the Post Office but justification is anecdotal. This short paper aims to examine the options available to the [Shareholder Executive].”
Was anything like that brought to your attention upon your appointment?
Timothy Parker: Not that I can recall.
Mr Beer: Can we go forwards, please, to page 6. Again, on the left-hand side, I should say there’s a series of options in this paper, one of which is removal of Ms Vennells and this is the slide that addresses this issue. On the left-hand side:
“There is a general feeling that Paula is not the optimal person to lead [the Post Office] to develop its commercial strategy.
“Paula has not been able to establish good working relationships with Jo Swinson.
“She has been unable to retain key staff.”
Then on the right-hand side, “Performance as CEO and delivery of strategic plan”:
“[Post Office] failed to deliver its 2010 strategic plan, and refused to keep [Government] properly appraised of developments in the [Network Transformation] programme, requiring difficult revisions in 2013. She has shown a worrying lack of knowledge about the detail of the new plan.
“Paula’s people management has caused concern as she appears unable to work with personalities and approaches that differ from hers, and has failed to build relationships with key Directors.
“Paula’s performance as CEO has been questioned by the [Post Office] Chair, and by members of the Board.”
Were you aware of this view held by the department and/or ShEx when you joined the company?
Timothy Parker: To be honest, I mean, looking back from here, this would have been 2015, so we’re talking nine years ago, I can’t recall a conversation that I had about the capability of Paula Vennells at the time I became chair.
Mr Beer: Would you expect, as the incoming chair, to be told, by the outgoing chair, that she had questioned the Chief Executive’s performance as Chief Executive?
Timothy Parker: I think it’s obviously of some value if, when you arrive in a business, you are well appraised of the views of your key shareholders, whether it’s a publicly owned business or not.
Mr Beer: That’s a statement in general terms. I’m asking: were you, in fact, told by or on behalf of the outgoing chair of this view that is recorded here that she held in relation to Paula Vennells?
Timothy Parker: The honest answer to that is I can’t remember.
Mr Beer: Was there a handover?
Timothy Parker: I met Alice for lunch before I began.
Mr Beer: Was that handover?
Timothy Parker: As far as I can recall, that was the conversation that I had with her.
Mr Beer: Was there anything more formal than lunch, in terms of a handover?
Timothy Parker: Again, I’m sorry not to be of more help but I can’t recall.
Mr Beer: When you walked into the company we saw that you did some work in the months before your actual appointment. Did you make any enquiries about this issue, namely the performance of the CEO and/or the Board’s view of her and/or the shareholders’ view of her?
Timothy Parker: I can’t recall. Can I make a comment on that? Because it has struck me, and this is something I hope might be of use to the Inquiry, that whether or not I received a view or whether I took on board a view, it is very important that when you take over as chair, that you are well appraised and you understand, as best as possible, the views, positive and negative, of the CEO. This, I think, can help to frame things. As far as I can recall – and I’ve got quite a lot of experience working with CEOs and I’ve been a CEO for over 30 years – I mean, my take was that the business had someone who needed some help and assistance and coaching on the commercial front, which is what I aimed to provide Paula.
My impression, looking back, was that she was quite well thought of and so much so that, as you probably know, I mean, a few years later she was made a Non-Exec Director of the Cabinet Office, and – you know, so, my sort of feeling was although – whatever my own views were of her ability in terms of running a business, I didn’t get the impression that there was some enormous doubt and, you know, the starter for ten was actually you need to look at Paula.
Mr Beer: Okay, that was my next series of questions. When you did become Chair of the business, was anything like this raised again with you by Government or the Shareholder Executive?
Timothy Parker: Yeah, and, again, I’m sorry at this length of time I simply cannot confirm anything.
Mr Beer: Can we move on, please, by looking at UKGI00005361. At the moment, I’m just looking at a series of events that happened before your appointment. If we can go to page 4, please. This is a series of emails that again doesn’t involve you but there are, within the emails, comments/views attributed to you and I want to ask you about them?
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Beer: Below this page, there’s a note about an upcoming Panorama programme and there was a significant Panorama programme about Post Office and the Horizon system, due to air on 17 August 2015. If we go to the bottom of page 3, please, Alwen Lyons to Richard Callard – that will be a name familiar to you – within the Shareholder Executive, exchange an email copied to Ms Vennells.
“Richard
“Paula and I are [considering] how and when it is best to brief Tim on Panorama.
“Would you let me know when Baroness Neville-Rolfe is planning to speak to him, as she was going to mention Sparrow. Notification re Panorama would come better after that, as we could refer her to her conversation and offer a more immediate brief if he would like one.”
Then further up the page, please, the reply:
“BNR [Baroness Neville-Rolfe] is speaking to him [that’s you] at [2.45 today]. I spoke to him … He is pretty robust on Sparrow (ie if we have done nothing wrong then we stuck to our guns), but is happy to agree for [Baroness Neville-Rolfe] to say to Bridgen and co that the new chair will of course take a critical and independent look at the issue. He did also offer to sit with her in her meeting with Arbuthnot, which was arranged late yesterday for [the 17th] – we should all mull that one.”
So, essentially, consideration is being given as to how to brief you about an upcoming Panorama programme, which is very significant for the business. Do you recall receiving briefings before you formally began your role a couple of months beforehand?
Timothy Parker: Candidly not, no.
Mr Beer: It’s attributed to you that you are “pretty robust on Sparrow”; was that your view?
Timothy Parker: I have no idea. I mean, at this stage, I’m not sure what I would have known about Sparrow or indeed what “pretty robust” actually means. I think probably what it means is, you know, I obviously had been briefed up to a point but I wasn’t going to say anything negative or positive at that stage because I was very new, and maybe that was interpreted as “pretty robust”.
Mr Beer: I was about to ask you: on what basis would you have formed a view two months before you joined the business?
Timothy Parker: I don’t think I would have done.
Mr Beer: Because you hadn’t read or received any relevant information, presumably?
Timothy Parker: I have no idea but, I mean, I’m not a person generally who takes a pre-disposed view to anything until I, you know, have had a chance to understand it properly.
Mr Beer: If we go up the chain, please, to page 1 and the foot of the page. Later on the 6th, again, Laura Thompson to Alwen Lyons and Richard Callard:
“I’ve just come off the call between the Minister and Tim Parker. Nothing significant to report.
“On Sparrow, the Minister informed Tim that she would like him to look at things with fresh eyes when he arrived, which he was happy with. Tim confirmed he would be happy to meet MPs, etc, on the matter but once he was up to speed. The Minister mentioned that Panorama was happening but it wasn’t discussed.”
Then there’s another issue about the Audit and Risk Committee, which I’m not going to ask you about.
Do you recollect the Minister, Baroness Neville-Rolfe, asking you to look at things, ie connected to Horizon? That’s the shorthand for Sparrow that the Post Office used.
Timothy Parker: I don’t recall. I mean, I presume this is a fair reflection of what I might have discussed. I mean, I think she would have just notified me it was an issue.
Mr Beer: Do you have a recollection of going into the job with a request from the Government to have a fresh look at Horizon?
Timothy Parker: I don’t recall whether I, as it were, went into the job but I do know that the letter turned up pretty soon after I arrived.
Mr Beer: So that’s the thing that sticks in your memory, the letter from Baroness Neville-Rolfe?
Timothy Parker: I got a letter and it was clear, you know, “Have a look into these issues”. Exactly.
Mr Beer: Okay, we’ll come to that in a moment. Can you recall anything as to what the concern was in Government about Horizon?
Timothy Parker: Not specifically.
Mr Beer: Can we move forwards, please, to POL00319054 and if we go to page 2, please, and scroll down. This looks like the genesis of a briefing note for you about Horizon – again, it’s called Sparrow – in readiness for your joining.
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: We’re going to track through what you were told, and if we just read some parts to it, this is Mark Davies; do you remember him?
Timothy Parker: I do.
Mr Beer: The Corporate and Communications Affairs Director –
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: – in the Post Office:
“See below … a first draft of a note for Tim.
“For the last three years [this is the text of the note] the Post Office has been investigating the cases of a small number of postmasters …”
Then we see somebody has added “I WOULD ADD HOW MANY”:
“… who have suggested that the Horizon … system used in branches might be faulty.
“They have suggested it may have caused losses in branch which in some cases led to them being prosecuted [again added] (AGAIN MIGHT BE WORTH SAYING HOW MANY).
“No evidence has emerged to support these claims: indeed thorough investigation has underlined that the system is efficient and robust.
“It deals with six million transactions every day and has been used by almost 500,000 people since it was introduced: the vast majority doing so without difficulty.
“The Post Office has nonetheless taken its responsibilities to its people very seriously. It is very sorry that this small group of people feel they have been treated unfairly and has gone to enormous lengths to get to the bottom of their cases.
“It held a review by independent forensic accountants, set up a Mediation Scheme overseen by independent mediators and reign investigated every complaint in huge detail.
“We have also asked our external lawyers to review all the cases involving prosecutions.
“Throughout all this no evidence has emerged to support the very serious allegations being made, which in some cases have stretched to claims that the Post Office has abused the prosecution process.”
Over the page:
“We do take forward prosecutions where it is right to do so. Post offices are dealing with public money. We would be heavily and rightly criticised if we did not deal with the very small number of cases where false accounting and theft takes place.
“But we only prosecute where there is clear evidence of wrongdoing and we can meet the bar set for bringing prosecutions: the evidential and public interest tests. We do not prosecute people for making mistakes. We prosecute where people dishonestly cover up the loss of money.”
Then keep scrolling, and the fourth paragraph from the bottom there:
“The campaign has secured the support of some MPs – with whom the Post Office has engaged at length – which has in turn led to Parliamentary and media activity.
“We have been robust in rejecting the serious allegations made in Parliament and media, particularly in recent months. The allegations have suggested wrongdoing by senior management, bullying, deliberate cover-up and abuse of prosecutor powers.
“A Panorama programme is due to be aired on 17 August. We have challenged the programme at length but expect it will go ahead. We have provided detail on every allegation put to us. We are not appearing on the programme for interview because the programme is focusing on individual cases and has not provided evidence to support its allegations.”
Is this the kind of note you would expect to receive as the incoming chair?
Timothy Parker: I think it’s obviously a note that is designed to tell a story. And what would I say? I mean, it’s a briefing note obviously told from the perspective of the people providing the briefing, which is what usually happens with briefing notes, I have to say.
Mr Beer: If we just go forward to page 1, please. Just look briefly at some of the drafting process, foot of the page.
Alwen Lyons to Mark Davies and General Counsel, Jane MacLeod:
“I think this is very clear.”
She has added some points in capitals:
“I think this note should come from Jane, or Paula if she wishes, and be sent via me to start getting him used [that’s you] to that way of communicating and to make it as ‘normal’ as Sparrow can ever be!!”
Then scroll up the page:
“We need to send a note to the new chairman and I have drafted a first go … and asked … for comments.
“… I would now like … your comments and whoever is standing in for Rod?
“Clearly this is about the most important note we will send on this issue in the weeks ahead so [we] want it to be spot on!
“Your input very welcome.”
When you were joining, was the Horizon issue, the Sparrow issue, the most important issue for you?
Timothy Parker: I’ve tried to set the background to the Post Office and I would say I can’t prioritise things exactly. I would say that this is one of, actually, a number of very significant and pressing issues.
Mr Beer: If we go forwards, please, to POL00231055, and if we just blow that up a little bit, this is a later iteration of the note –
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: – after an external lawyer, Andrew Parsons, from Womble Bond Dickinson – as I think they were by then – with his comments on it. He makes quite limited comments on the note, we can see one on the right-hand side there. If we go over to page 2, please – thank you – there’s some discussion about destruction of material. The note said:
“We are not destroying any information that we, and external lawyers, hold on these cases, as has been alleged.”
Then he commented:
“[The Post Office] has historically destroyed [information] where it went beyond normal retention periods which means some info is not available for the CCRC.”
Now, of course, you wouldn’t see all this background, would you? You wouldn’t see the process by which the note was created or, indeed, who had contributed to it, right?
Timothy Parker: Yes, I mean, absolutely.
Mr Beer: You just get the final product?
Timothy Parker: I get the final product. Exactly.
Mr Beer: Let’s look at that, then. POL00174396. 11 August 2015, so nearly two months before you joined the company, from Alwen Lyons:
“Please find attached a note from Paula, in advance of the Panorama programme”, and then some other information.
So, ultimately, it’s a note from the Chief Executive –
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: – being sent to you by Alwen Lyons, the Company Secretary.
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: If we look at the note itself, POL00174397 – thank you:
“For the last three years the Post Office has been investigating claims made by a small number of largely former postmasters …”
Then you see the figures have been inserted, 136:
“… that faults in the Horizon computer system were the cause of losses in their branch. Of these 136 people, 43 have criminal convictions …
“However, thorough investigation has not produced any evidence to support the claims: indeed it has underlined that the system is efficient and robust. In the cases involving criminal convictions, nothing has medicine to suggest that any are unsafe.”
Then it continues as per the previous draft.
Again, how would you view a document like this? You described it earlier as a story –
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: – which might, to my ears, sound as if you’re being wary as to its authorship and it’s setting out a narrative, rather than be completely objective. Is that what you were intending by the word “story”?
Timothy Parker: Not especially. But here’s my view, with hindsight, about one of the main issues with the whole thing, is that, as I sort of looked at this, it seemed to me that it was an issue, but of course you ask yourself the question: well, on how big a scale is this issue? And of course, what we have here is the Horizon system deals with 6 million transactions used by 500,000 people. So it sounds as if you’ve got a system doing millions of transactions and a few people who are complaining, and that was the sort of perspective that you’re drawn to.
What – and I say this in the spirit of, you know, this thing ever happens again – is had we – had the thing been put in the context of not just the people who are complaining but the totality of the people who had been prosecuted over, you know, whatever it was, 15 years, that would have put a very different complexion on the note. So if the note had read, you know, that we have 43 criminal convictions related to these losses but, actually, over the last however many years, so many people have been convicted, that would have told a slightly different story. And I also think that there could have been more to this potentially around how many people had been affected through potentially, you know, any other sort of employment related issue.
So it’s – we’ve looked at the Horizon problem from the point of view of, well, what was – you know, did the computer have bugs or whatever? But, actually, another way of looking at it might have been to say: we’ve got an organisation, over 15 years 900 people have been convicted, or whatever, how does that look? Does that look statistically sensible? We’ve had, you know, so many people who have been terminated, or whatever, how does that look, proportionately? So I looked at this, to be honest, and not only did we have millions of transactions but I happened to know over the last – you know, there were tens of thousands of postmasters and assistants. So it looked vaguely credible but there was a sort of a problem that affected, relatively speaking, quite a small number of people.
Mr Beer: The reflections that you’ve just given there, are they things that have occurred to you now in the light of the events which have happened, rather than things that occurred to you at the time?
Timothy Parker: Well, I didn’t have that information at the time and, actually, it was quite late in the day, and I think quite a lot of people at the Post Office were quite surprised by how many people had been prosecuted. And if you look at the sort of list of when the prosecutions occurred, you go back to, I think – I looked at this list, and it sort of, from – I think it was ‘98 or ‘99, the numbers of people being prosecuted suddenly went up, so it went up from 20 to 50 and, effectively, what you’re looking at is a record, from about 2000, I think, roughly speaking, until 2012 or ‘13, something like that, where roughly speaking 50 people are prosecuted every year.
So my point is, obviously, that’s something that might have raised some question marks. Now, you have to recognise, as well, that the Post Office, you know, it’s not selling cans of Coke. It’s actually an organisation that deals in cash and so you have to be aware of the fact that, obviously, when people are dealing with cash, there are issues with security and there are temptations to people, and so on and so forth.
Notwithstanding that, I think, had that picture been evident, it might have sort of made people, certainly would have made me, look at this in a slightly different context.
Mr Beer: Would other things that may have made you look at this in a different context include, rather than focusing on the number of subpostmasters that were presently alleging faults being only 136, to look back at the number of subpostmasters over the relevant period that had alleged faults?
Timothy Parker: I think that’s the point I’m trying to make. It was quite difficult to frame the scale of the problem.
Mr Beer: Or mention of the operation of a series of helplines which recorded tens of thousands of complaints of fault?
Timothy Parker: That wasn’t dealt with, clearly, in this context.
Mr Beer: Did you know at the time that this note had been drafted by the Post Office’s communications man, Mark Davies?
Timothy Parker: If it didn’t have Mark Davies’ name on it, then I’m not sure I would have adduced that it was him who raised it, no.
Mr Beer: I mean, you were told in the covering email, “This is a note from Paula”?
Timothy Parker: I think so, yeah – yeah.
Mr Beer: Would it have surprised you if had been revealed that the note had been drafted by the communications man?
Timothy Parker: That’s an interesting question to which – I mean, it’s very hard for me to say now how I would have felt because, when you’re new in an organisation, you’re never quite sure, you know, who’s got a handle on what. So I think, had I had a list of all the executives and, you know, Mark Davies was identified as the comms man, I might have wondered a bit.
Mr Beer: As it was, you were told this was Paula Vennells’ note in the covering email, as we saw. Can we turn, please, Mr Parker to the letter you mentioned earlier from Baroness Neville-Rolfe. POL00102551. This about three weeks before you joined, 10 September 2015 and I’m going to read it all:
“I am writing to you ahead of your taking up the role of Post Office Chairman to confirm our conversation last month regarding the Post Office Horizon system.”
I suspect that’s a reference back to that mention we saw in that email exchange.
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: “The issues surrounding the Horizon IT System have not been resolved. Indeed, some of the MPs concerned have written to me again following the Panorama programme pressing the case for an independent investigation.
“The Government takes seriously the concerns raised by individuals and MPs regarding the Post Office Horizon system and the suggestions that there may have been miscarriages of justice as a result of issues with Horizon. The Government also recognises the commitment that Post Office have demonstrated to resolving those issues, including through creating a mediation scheme and appointing independent investigators to scrutinise the system.
“As you will be aware, there have been some three years of scrutiny of Horizon and the Criminal Cases Review Commission is considering a number of cases which have been brought to it by individuals, and the Government cannot intervene in that independent process.
“As the sole shareholder of Post Office, the Government wants to make sure that the Post Office Network is successful and sustainable across the country. We recognise that the Post Office is a commercial business and we allow it to operate as such, but of course, we expect it to behave fairly and responsibly in doing so. I am therefore requesting that, on assuming your role as Chair, you give this matter your earliest attention and, if you determine that any further action is necessary, will take steps to ensure that happens.
“I look forward to hearing your conclusions and to working with you to secure the future of the Post Office Network.”
Then Paula Vennells is copied in.
So this letter, if we go back to page 1, draws to your attention that there were unresolved issues regarding Horizon –
Timothy Parker: It does.
Mr Beer: – and that those unresolved issues include potential miscarriages of justice?
Timothy Parker: Indeed.
Mr Beer: This must be a slightly unusual letter to receive when taking up a new job?
Timothy Parker: It’s very unusual. I mean, I’m not a lawyer, obviously, and I think, again, in the spirit of trying to be helpful to the Inquiry, I’ve had sort of legal issues to deal with but nothing, you know, on this sort of scale that involves activities ultimately that have affected, you know, people, contracts, going to jail and all of that. I mean, yeah, it’s just not usual in the slightest.
Mr Beer: Your witness statement – I’m not going to turn it up, I’m just going to read from it – says at paragraph 28:
“When I was appointed as Chair I was aware that concerns had been raised about Horizon, including those relating to Fujitsu. I do not believe that I had detailed knowledge of the specific nature of the complaints at the time and I do not believe I’d formed any views on how to handle the Sparrow issues at the time. However, as I describe below, Jonathan Swift QC and Christopher Knight were being instructed in relation to the Swift Review. My recollection is that there was a general assumption within the Post Office that there were no systemic issues with Horizon, and that it was robust, and this is consistent with the statements made publicly by Post Office at the time”?
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: So, “My recollection is that there was a general assumption within the Post Office that there were no systemic issues with Horizon”; where did you get that belief from?
Timothy Parker: I can’t tell you. I’m looking back, you know, nine years, trying to sort of assess how I felt at the time and I think, of course, it comes back to this question of: what do you mean by systemic? You know, systemic and perhaps, you know, in a computer system, means different things to different people and I think you probably had quite a few people pass through here. And I think “systemic” became shorthand – and I was probably, you know, affected by this as much as anybody to say, yeah, the system worked fine, and how do you – what do you mean? It means that there are a few bugs, they’re not very frequent, they’re discovered, and, you know, so basically you’ve got something that’s okay. That sort of thing.
Mr Beer: So you’ve got no recollection particularly now, as to where you secured the belief from that Post Office had a general assumption that there were no systemic issues with Horizon and it was robust. Presumably, that would include, however, the briefing note that Mark Davies had drafted?
Timothy Parker: Yeah, I mean –
Mr Beer: That must have –
Timothy Parker: I honestly can’t – you know, it’s just hard for me to reflect accurately on a generalised picture that I would have had at the time. I have probably gone as far as I’m able.
Mr Beer: You were presented with something of two pictures, then, would you agree: one a general somebody’s within the Post Office that there were no systemic issues –
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: – and the system was robust; and the Government saying the issues around the Horizon IT System have not been resolved, we, the Government, take seriously the concerns that are being raised, and those concerns include potential miscarriages of justice?
Timothy Parker: I think that’s a fair description, yes.
Mr Beer: When you joined the company, were there any specific discussions that you can now recall – this is in October time – about Horizon issues, whether as part of an induction or otherwise?
Timothy Parker: I can’t.
Mr Beer: Were you provided with the report or reports by Second Sight, either an interim report of July 2013 or two final reports in 2014/15?
Timothy Parker: I can’t.
Mr Beer: Were any concerns raised with you upon joining, or immediately thereafter, about the use by the Post Office of a man called Gareth Jenkins, a Fujitsu employee, as a witness in criminal prosecutions?
Timothy Parker: No.
Mr Beer: When did you first learn about the issues that there were – I’m putting it broadly – with the use of Mr Jenkins as a prosecution witness?
Timothy Parker: Oh, I mean, some – I mean, way past this sort of timescale. I mean, I’m talking – yeah, I mean, I can’t tell you exactly when but this – my sort of awareness of the definitive situation, I think, where – of Jenkins and evidence and all of that, that was sometime afterwards.
Mr Beer: In the context of the Group Litigation, or even later than that as part of the criminal appeals to the Court of Appeal?
Timothy Parker: I can’t tell you, to be honest.
Mr Beer: What did you think upon receiving this letter?
Timothy Parker: Time to get moving, which I did.
Mr Beer: What did you need to move to do?
Timothy Parker: To find somebody – because I was certainly not equipped personally to do this – but to find somebody to carry out what I was asked to do.
Mr Beer: Was it always your intention from the start that another person would conduct some form of exercise and that person would not be you?
Timothy Parker: Yes, I think so. I think so because there were a lot of issues here that I wasn’t really familiar with. So I’m – again, I’m not a legal person, I’m not an IT person and I’m not somebody who has got a lot of experience dealing with this sort of, if you like, non-commercial area. So my first instinct, yes, was, you know, what sort of person could do this job?
Mr Beer: Can we turn, please, to POL00065606 and if we scroll to the email at the foot of the page, again, an exchange not involving you, from Rodric Williams; do you remember him?
Timothy Parker: I remember the name, yes.
Mr Beer: A solicitor in Corporate Services –
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: – or specialising in Corporate Services within Post Office Legal. To Jane MacLeod, do you remember her?
Timothy Parker: I certainly remember –
Mr Beer: That’s General Counsel?
Timothy Parker: I certainly remember Jane MacLeod, yes.
Mr Beer: Mark Underwood, do you remember him?
Timothy Parker: The name rings a bell but not a big one.
Mr Beer: And Patrick Bourke?
Timothy Parker: I remember Patrick.
Mr Beer: Performing what function, do you remember?
Timothy Parker: He was in Jane’s team. I don’t recall specifically what his role was.
Mr Beer: In any event, this is a fortnight or so – yes, it’s exactly a fortnight – after that letter of 10 September, and it concerns speaking notes for a Jane MacLeod and Tim Parker meeting on the 25th, so the next day. Can you see that?
Timothy Parker: Mm-hm, mm-hm.
Mr Beer: “… please see below my starter for ten speaking notes for your meeting with Tim Parker tomorrow …
“Draft speaking notes …
“[Post Office] can’t influence or predetermine the outcome of [Tim Parker’s] ‘review’ BUT
“It’s reasonable to assume that the findings will be challenged unless they deliver what [James Arbuthnot] wants (quashing of convictions and payments of compensation – see [James Arbuthnot’s] attributed comments about the CCRC review of [Josephine] Hamilton’s case)
“However, if the purpose of the review is to instil confidence in BIS … with the actions taken, it will be creditable if it is:
“a. undertaken independently from the existing [Post Office] team;
“b. logical in its approach; AND
“c. delivered against stated objective/s.
“This will help defend any criticism of the work undertaken (eg that it’s ‘just another whitewash’), and ideally curtail further involvement.”
Just stopping there, did you understand that there were two alternatives to what the review might seek to achieve; (1) to actually deliver what James Arbuthnot wanted; or (2) instilling confidence in the Department, principally Baroness Neville-Rolfe?
Timothy Parker: Mm, I think we’re talking about – I mean, it’s just my take, looking at this, two different things, here. I mean, if you read (2), it says:
“It’s reasonable to assume that the findings will be challenged unless they deliver what JA wants …”
So that’s an observation about findings, isn’t it, and, you know, finding an assumption that the review would lead to those findings, whereas (3) is about the purpose of the review. And it seems to me that it’s, you know, it – one is in danger of sort of confusing two things: one is what the review comes to; and the other is what kind of review. Now, if you hadn’t seen paragraph 2, you might say, well, (3) seems, actually, it’s pretty reasonable.
Mr Beer: Was the review to find out the facts, or was its purpose to instil confidence in the Department?
Timothy Parker: So, again, if you read (3), it says:
“However, if the purpose of the review is to instil in BIS (principally …) with the actions taken …”
So that’s slightly different from just general confidence. I would see that as – you know, I could read that genuine desire to ensure that whatever actions were taken, they looked to be on the basis of the a proper independent review.
Mr Beer: What was your purpose in commissioning the review?
Timothy Parker: So, I had a letter that asked me to look into these various issues and my purpose, ultimately, was to find somebody I felt qualified to do that and to agree with them terms of reference which received to broadly tackle the challenge laid down in the letter.
Mr Beer: If we read on:
“5. Defining the review’s scope will be key:
“a. What has [Tim Parker] been asked to do?”
Then over the page:
“If it’s unclear, [Tim Parker] should now set out in writing his understanding of the task (ie rewrite the exam question).
“b. What will Tim Parker actually do?
“[Tim Parker] should state what he wants to achieve, ideally by reference to a clear question, eg ‘Has Post Office Limited responded to allegations about the integrity of Post Office’s Horizon system and related business processes in a manner appropriate for a business which desires to maintain a reputation for high standards …”
Then there’s a comment about a paraphrase of 3.4(e) of the letter of appointment being “clunky”:
“[Tim Parker] should be able to demonstrate that he has addressed his stated aim by reference to a logical method of investigation
“both elements should be matters for Tim Parker in his sole discretion as Chairman, eg they are NOT for negotiation with [Post Office, Baroness Neville-Rolfe or the Department, et cetera].”
We can read (c).
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Beer: “6. Given the volume of material, [Tim Parker] is likely to need ‘independent professional assistance’:
“He’s entitled to this under [his] letter of appointment …
“… this could be:
“a solicitor …
“a barrister …
“a management consultant …
“a former civil servant …”
Then the pros and cons are set out for each of them.
This plan, it seems, was to have you carrying out the review but assisted by some professional or professionals; do you agree?
Timothy Parker: I’m not sure I’d draw that conclusion, actually. If we go – I mean, I’m not sure even if this piece of paper makes it very clear how, as it were, the workload would be divided between whoever was going to do the assisting, as it were, and myself.
Mr Beer: Did you ever think that you would perform any role or were you always of the view this was going to be subcontracted out to some other person?
Timothy Parker: Yes, I felt that the task at hand, carried out by somebody independent, because although potentially I could be independent, what was quite important here was to have not only somebody who was independent but might have a few of the skills around the subject matter that I lacked.
Mr Beer: When you were engaging in discussions with, for example, Jane MacLeod and Rodric Williams, did you realise that they may themselves be implicated in the matter to be investigated?
Timothy Parker: So I think that’s a fair enough observation but here are two things – and I suppose quite a lot of this Inquiry is dealing with this kind of issue, which is, if you are board member, a chair or chief executive, to what extent are you entitled to assume that your advice is coming from people who are, first of all, qualified and, secondly, competent? And my take, perhaps naively, because, you know, the one thing that I found in most businesses is that, although people have got different points of view, they’re generally trustworthy, is that I was being given advice by people who were qualified on that basis. And so was my – you know, was I kind of a little – did I feel that this advice would somehow be potentially tainted? I don’t think I did feel that at the time, if I’m honest.
Mr Beer: Did the thought occur to you or is that a reflection now, after the event?
Timothy Parker: It’s a reflection after the event. I think, obviously, after what has happened, it’s likely to throw into doubt quite a lot of the advice that was given and taken in good faith. I mean, if you go back – am I allowed to do this?
Mr Beer: Yes, you can do whatever you want.
Timothy Parker: Well, if you go back to the beginning of this note, I just want to give you an illustration of that.
Mr Beer: Yes, go back to page 1, please –
Timothy Parker: So –
Mr Beer: – and scroll down.
Timothy Parker: To move up – scroll up a little bit – a little bit further. I’m not seeing what I wanted to show – I’m sorry, I beg your pardon. Just keep scrolling up.
Mr Beer: When Mr Parker says scroll up, I think he means scroll down.
Timothy Parker: I’m sorry. Yeah. So it’s under the “What has TP been asked to do?”, I think. Number 5, if we move on to that. Okay. So, you know, I mean, without the benefit of hindsight and with no knowledge of this, you could read (b) as actually, you know, a pretty fair-minded kind of view on what needs to be done. You should, you know, just read it. It should state what he wants to achieve, ideally by reference to a clear question, and so on, and so on, and so on.
And another factor, I suppose, in all of this, perhaps, you know, wrongly, was that Jane MacLeod joined the Post Office, I think, in 2015. So, you know, I’m not sure – I sort of felt she was a kind of, you know, she was a fairly new arrival, and she seemed competent, to me. Yeah.
Mr Beer: Are you saying that that first bullet point, “TP should state what he wants to achieve, eg …” –
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: – and then the exam question is rewritten, you could read that in a benevolent way now to be an appropriate question to ask and to answer, or you could read it as a reframing of the issue, so as not to look at the substance of the issues but, instead, to look at the response of the Post Office to the issues? They’re very different things, aren’t they?
Timothy Parker: No, I understand your point and, with hindsight of course, you might say, well, the problem with Swift was that it was really just about the complaints. I understand that. But, at the time, it seemed to me, you know, a reasonable place to go.
Mr Beer: Is that distinction, the one that was just drawn, that what was required by the Minister’s letter was to look at the substance of whether the system had integrity and whether the prosecutions made on the basis of Horizon data were safe, is a very different question to examining the Post Office’s response in the past to allegations?
Timothy Parker: So I think – I mean, again, with hindsight, you might say, well, the Minister’s letter was all about the system and we should have just done an IT check and, you know, a contract check and everything would have been fine, but, actually, the way the Minister’s letter read, and the way I interpreted it, and felt we were interpreting it appropriately, was to look into the complaints and the issues raised by the complaints and, essentially, you know, that’s where Swift went.
Mr Beer: Can we move forwards a little bit to the same part of the narrative, but post-appointment, to POL00117516. Bottom half of the page, please, an email to you directly from Paula Vennells, sent by her Executive Assistant:
“Dear Tim
“While you have been away, two matters have arisen affecting Post Office which you should be aware of.”
I should say this is 9 October 2015:
“I am grateful to Jane [Jane MacLeod’s] for the following brief summary …
“Sparrow
“The Minister is under pressure to speak to various parties including representatives Second Sight (forensic accountants) and Sir Anthony Hooper (former Chairman of the Working Group). We believe that as part of your investigation you should meet with each of these parties, and we have therefore recommended to the Minister that she should not meet with them until (at least) the conclusion of your enquiry (I have a call with her this morning and will recommend that she should await the conclusion of your enquiry before deciding whether to meet with them).
“There are number of reasons why we are reluctant for the Minister to speak to these parties (particularly Second Sight) at this point:
“By speaking to these parties, the Minister undermines the rationale for your own independent investigation. Second Sight are active on social media and we believe they would make public the fact of any such meeting. This will only encourage expectation of some form of government intervention. We now have the majority of outstanding (non-criminal) cases scheduled for mediation. Any expectation of government intervention is likely to cause Applicants to withdraw from the Mediation Scheme. I will send you an update …”
Then the email turns to another topic, like a mobile, which is something, over the page, about an entirely different issue.
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: So Paula Vennells was seeking to delay the Minister from meeting with Second Sight and Sir Anthony until after your enquiry had concluded; did you have a view as to this?
Timothy Parker: If I did, I can’t recall it now.
Mr Beer: Did you see the two issues as linked, Second Sight and Sir Anthony, seeing Baroness Neville-Rolfe and the conduct of your independent investigation?
Timothy Parker: Knowing me, probably better than anyone, I suppose I would have at the time said to myself, “Look, this is all part of a sort of, you know, the public sector type how do you handle the Minister with this and that?” And I would have said, “Well, if that’s a concern and these people have been here for some time and it’s to do with these people meeting the Minister, that’s the Chief Executive having a view”. And it’s probably something that I would have said “I’m not” – you know, I’m going to focus on what I’m doing and this isn’t something I am going to make a particularly, you know, big fuss about.
Mr Beer: Thank you. That can come down.
Ultimately, the person that you asked to conduct the review was Jonathan Swift QC, assisted by Christopher Knight, another barrister. Why was a decision taken to make this a lawyer-led review rather than something more technical?
Timothy Parker: I suppose the answer to that is partly around the framing of the review, back to your previous point about responding to the complaints, and partly, I think, because the issues were not exclusively technical and so the – what was a QC at the time ended up looking at four strands to the problem, as it were.
Mr Beer: Were the issues to be considered only legal issues?
Timothy Parker: Well, I think it’s fair to say that, out of the Swift Review, came some recommendations that were not exclusively legal.
Mr Beer: Looking at it at the beginning, rather than at the end, did you think, when you were deciding, “We’re going to get a lawyer to undertake this task” – never mind the personality, in fact, involved – that the issues required to be examined were exclusively or predominantly legal ones?
Timothy Parker: I don’t think I could comment on whether I had a specific view but –
Mr Beer: Mr Parker, I’m just trying to pick away a little bit at why a lawyer was chosen.
Timothy Parker: Okay.
Mr Beer: It could be because there were legal issues to be addressed –
Timothy Parker: So I –
Mr Beer: – hold on – or it could be, “I want somebody with a first class mind who is independent”, and it doesn’t matter whether or not the issues to be examined are legal?
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Beer: Can you help us?
Timothy Parker: Yeah, I’ll try. I think I had some CVs and, from what I can recall, Jonathan Swift had a very broad range of experience and seemed to be a person who was used to dealing with a number of different settings and I believe, from memory too, that Christopher Knight had quite a lot of experience in the sort of – you know, I wouldn’t say IT world but he had done work in that sort of area.
So I wouldn’t say the QC was in the frame just because he was a lawyer. I would say it was a mixture of things. A lawyer is someone who was used to investigating and somebody who could, I think, with some help, organise a good sort of report, yeah.
Mr Beer: So it was more that they were independent and that the faculties in order properly to investigate the issues, rather than answer a series of legal questions?
Timothy Parker: I think that’s a fair reflection.
Mr Beer: Can we look, please, at the instructions to counsel. POL00114270, page 3, please. These are the instructions to counsel, in fact, initially to advise in consultation on 8 October. So you’d done this quite swiftly, ie within a week or so of joining the company?
Timothy Parker: I got on with the job pretty fast, yeah.
Mr Beer: If we just see the authors of the instructions, by going to page 15, foot of the page. We’ll see that they are co-authored by Jane MacLeod and Rodric Williams and, again, I take it that you wouldn’t have seen any issue with lawyers who were themselves directly involved in the underlying events being the ones to instruct Mr Swift?
Timothy Parker: I’ve answered that question kind of before. I don’t think I’d have a different view.
Mr Beer: In your witness statement – I’m just going to read it, rather than getting it up on the screen – paragraph 40, you say:
“It seemed to me that Post Office’s General Counsel understood the complexities of the task when identifying suitable candidates. Jonathan Swift QC was a senior barrister, he had worked as part of the Treasury Counsel team prosecuting complex cases.”
Did you think he was a criminal barrister?
Timothy Parker: I can’t recall.
Mr Beer: Presumably, if it’s in your witness statement, that is your current memory: that he was a member of the Treasury Counsel team that prosecuted cases?
Timothy Parker: I presume so, yes.
Mr Beer: If we go back, please, to page 3, please. There’s an introduction. We’ll see a reference in paragraph 2 to the letter from Baroness Neville-Rolfe asking you to:
“… determine whether ‘any further action is necessary’ … to respond to the concerns about Horizon raised by individuals and MPs. These concerns include that [Post Office’s] reliance on Horizon has resulted in miscarriages of justice.”
Then scrolling down:
“With the assistance of [Post Office’s] General Counsel, Jane MacLeod, the Chairman considers this to be a request …”
This was to form the basis of the review, you’ll see the words “review” in brackets afterwards:
“To review the Post Office’s handling of the claimants made by subpostmasters regarding the alleged flaws in its Horizon electronic point of sale and branch accounting systems, and determine whether the processes designed and implemented by Post Office to understand, investigate and resolve these complaints … were reasonable and appropriate.”
Looking at that now, can you see a shift from the open question in the letter of 10 September from Baroness Neville-Rolfe to a question that focuses instead on the reasonableness of past processes?
Timothy Parker: I think, with hindsight, it does look that way. At the time – and again, I’m sorry to keep reminding you, but there are a lot of things going on at the Post Office, and this response to this request at the time seemed to me to be not unreasonable.
Mr Beer: Did you review the instructions at the time?
Timothy Parker: In what sense? Did I think – did I – I mean I looked –
Mr Beer: Did you look at the document we’re now looking at?
Timothy Parker: Oh, I see. Was I aware what the review was about? Yes. Yeah. And was I aware that these were the terms of reference and this was the question that was going to be addressed? Yes.
Mr Beer: Is it right that you considered the request in the Baroness Neville-Rolfe letter of 10 September to mean what is in inverted commas and italics?
Timothy Parker: So, you know, with hindsight, one is apt to see that there are forces at play here trying to subtly shift the emphasis on things and, at the time, at the beginning of this review, it seemed to me that – and, again, I’m probably not a person who is greatly experienced in setting up reviews – that a review with a sort of quite a good general brief was capable of going after quite a lot of different areas.
If you look at it, you know, out of that particular group of references, you could see that a good investigator would cover off most of the key points that were at issue, and that was my sort of take. I think, you know, because there’s been such a terrible subsequent situation, it’s very easy to look back and sort of dissect and say, well, could it have been this or could it have been that? As things looked at the time – and perhaps I was a little naive about where the advice was coming from but I’ve mentioned, you know, I’ve talked about this – it didn’t look a bad set of terms of – well, not the terms of reference, but it didn’t look a bad sort of brief, if you see what I mean.
Mr Beer: Thank you. If we just continue, paragraph 4:
“In order to be credible, the Review will need to be carried out independently of the team which has been managing [Post Office’s] response to these concerns to date. The Chairman therefore requires the assistance of Leading Counsel to provide him with advice on:
“1. The scope of the review and how this is framed;
“2. The process by which the review should be conducted (including what materials should be reviewed and who should be interviewed); and
“3. The nature of his final report to the Minister.”
Again, looking at that paragraph there, these seem to be instructions to a barrister to ask him to advise you on scope of the review, how the review should be conducted and what the nature of the report finally to the Minister should be?
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: You’re not actually asking him to conduct the review?
Timothy Parker: Sorry, what’s – I’m being a bit dense here but –
Mr Beer: Yes. You could have a set of instructions which say, “Dear Mr Swift, we would like you to carry out an independent review”?
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: Or you could have a set of instructions which say, “Can you provide assistance on the scope of a review and how this is framed, the process by which the review is undertaken, and the scope of his [ie your] final report”?
Timothy Parker: I think both. I mean, the way certainly I think we set this up was to say “Look, Mr Swift, we want to conduct a review. We’d like you to conduct it and I will work with you on the terms of reference”. And I think – I mean, I’m skipping ahead a little bit but, subsequent to this, we met various people and, as a result of those meetings, the terms of reference were put together.
Mr Beer: Can we move forwards, please, to page 15 and under “Instructions”:
“Leading Counsel is therefore asked to consider these instructions … prior to meeting [Post Office’s] General Counsel …
“The aim of the meeting is to settle the Review’s scope and agree a process for conducting, concluding and reporting on the Review within the desired time frame. A further meeting will then be arranged at which Leading Counsel would present this scope and process to [Post Office’s] Chairman for his consideration.”
By this time, was it always envisaged that Mr Swift, as well as advising on the process issues, would himself conduct the review?
Timothy Parker: I think – and, again, I’m looking back nine years ago – that my starting point on this, as I explained, was that I’m probably not the person to actually conduct the review, therefore, you know, it was going to be this individual who would actually conduct the review on my behalf. And that made a low of sense, if you think about it, because I had a lot of other things to do and we could actually get the undivided time and attention of a very well-qualified and senior barrister with his assistant to go and do the work, essentially.
Mr Beer: Thank you.
Sir, it’s just coming up to 11.15 now. Can we take the first morning break between now and 11.25?
Sir Wyn Williams: Yes, of course.
Mr Beer: Thank you very much, sir.
The Witness: Thank you.
(11.13 am)
(A short break)
(11.28 am)
Mr Beer: Good morning, sir. Can you see and hear us?
Sir Wyn Williams: Yes, thank you.
Mr Beer: Thank you very much, sir.
Before we move on, Mr Parker, to the review report produced by Mr Swift and Mr Knight itself, can I deal with an event that happened or may have happened in between the commissioning of the review and the production of the report in February 2016?
You’ve explained to us already your desire, in particular in the light of Baroness Neville-Rolfe’s letter of 10 September 2015 to find out information about Horizon from a wide range of sources.
Timothy Parker: Mm, mm.
Mr Beer: Do you recall meeting Ron Warmington and Ian Henderson of Second Sight in your office in December 2015?
Timothy Parker: I know I met them. I don’t recall the substance of that meeting, if I’m honest.
Mr Beer: Can I just read you what Mr Warmington has said about it. This is paragraph 85 of his statement, he said:
“In early December 2015 I received a telephone call from the office of the then relatively new Chairman of the Post Office, Tim Parker. He invited me to come to his office to help get him up to speed on the Horizon matter.”
Does that sound likely to be correct?
Timothy Parker: Likely.
Mr Beer: Thank you:
“I later learnt that Baroness Neville-Rolfe had, following a meeting that Ian Henderson and I had had with her, suggested to Mr Parker that he should meet with us.”
Again, can you help us whether that is likely to be correct, ie the idea of the meet came from Baroness Neville-Rolfe?
Timothy Parker: Possibly.
Mr Beer: He says:
“On 15 September 2015, Ian [Ian Henderson] and I went to Mr Parker’s office there we met with him and Jonathan Swift.”
Do you remember Mr Swift being there?
Timothy Parker: Not precisely.
Mr Beer: “The meeting went on far longer than the pre-booked one hour, Mr Parker having insisted that we stayed longer to answer more questions.”
Does that trigger any memory?
Timothy Parker: No, but I think it’s probably reflective of the fact that, you know, I wanted to listen to these guys. Yeah.
Mr Beer: We have got some emails of 15 December, circulating within Post Office, saying, “They’re still in there, they’re still in the meeting, it’s going on longer than anticipated”, and you were going to miss your next meeting?
Timothy Parker: Okay.
Mr Beer: He, Mr Warmington, says:
“We held nothing back at that meeting. Indeed, [Mr Henderson] later characterised it with the words ‘We gave him both barrels’. In practical terms that meant that we went through with Mr Parker and Mr Swift all of the thematic issues that we had covered in our final report back in April 2015.”
Does that trigger a memory in you that they were particularly forceful in what they said to you, ie “We gave him both barrels”?
Timothy Parker: I’m sorry not to be of more help but this is nine years ago: the answer is no.
Mr Beer: He continues:
“We made it perfectly clear that the rebuttal report that Post Office had immediately issued alongside our final report was utter nonsense and that were he to be deceived into placing reliance on it or, worse still, endorsing it, the consequences would likely be very dire.”
Do you remember a meeting of that type, ie you had two gentlemen who had been independent investigators coming in and saying words to the effect of “The Post Office rebuttal report” – ie the rebuttal to their final report – “ought not to be relied on”?
Timothy Parker: I don’t. I think, again, my recollection of this meeting is just not – I just don’t have a recollection of it precisely.
Mr Beer: Do you recollect a meeting in which it was said that if he – ie you – was to place reliance on what the Post Office was saying in its rebuttal report, the likely consequences would be very dire or dire?
Timothy Parker: I think all I can tell you – because, you know, the question has been asked three times, more or less – is that I think Jonathan Swift and I would have listened to what we were told and he would have taken away a lot of the remarks that were made by Ron and Ian.
Mr Beer: I don’t think you’re in a position to say that what Mr Warmington has said is incorrect. If he had said those things, what would be the consequences for you?
Timothy Parker: I think my mindset at the time was we’re in the early days of putting together this review, I’ve heard what these guys have got to say and we’ll take the thing forward. It’s not my, you know – I don’t think I would have jumped to the conclusion that everything they say is indubitably correct; I think I would have said “Well, let’s do some more work”, which is what actually happened.
Mr Beer: Ie to summarise, you would have seen this as a matter for Mr Swift to bring into account, rather than for you to take any particular action?
Timothy Parker: I think that’s slightly false contrast. I think, at that stage, bearing in mind that I was going to review the eventual output of Mr Swift, he certainly would take away the comments of Second Sight, yes.
Mr Beer: What would you therefore – if my suggestion involved a slight false contrast – going to do with what you had been told?
Timothy Parker: I think my mindset, at that point, was to allow Mr Swift to do the work and produce the report. I don’t think I took out of that meeting – because actually, as far as I’m aware, I didn’t do anything immediately – I don’t think I took out of this meeting, “I’ve heard from these people, I’m about to go out and do something”; let’s do the report and let’s see where it goes.
Mr Beer: Ie the meeting was held in the context of somebody undertaking a review and the person undertaking the review ought to pay regard to what was said, rather than you do anything independently?
Timothy Parker: I mean, honestly, I think this is a bit of a hindsight characterisation of a meeting at the time, where I was quite early still in the business and would have just been doing a lot of listening. So I’m not sure, out of it, you know, I – yeah, I just moved on with the review, yeah.
Mr Beer: I mean, it can’t be every day that you have independent investigators or consultants, management consultants or forensic accountants come in, and if they’re correct in what they say, tell you, as a chairman, that you shouldn’t be relying on the public facing document that your executives have put out?
Timothy Parker: No, and I think it’s fair to say that the Swift Review, when it came to be put together, certainly did not take, if you like, the house view as the only version of events. I think quite a lot of the comments of Second Sight were incorporated into the review itself.
Mr Beer: Let’s look at the review itself. POL00006355. I’m not going to go through every paragraph of it, not least of which because it’s 66 pages long and that wouldn’t be productive. If we could look just a little further down, we’ll see the date of 8 February 2016.
If we go forwards to page 2, and just pan out a little bit, we will see the structure, the overall structure, of the report, after some introductions and passages about the scope of the report. It’s divided into chapters concerning: Post Office, subpostmasters and the Horizon system; the complaints themselves; the criminal prosecutions; the Horizon system; support provided to subpostmasters; investigations, ie the past scheme investigations; and a summary of recommendations.
If we go forward to page 3, please, and if we just look at the end of paragraph 2, four lines up:
“These matters have been the subject of consideration and investigation by and on behalf of [Post Office] on a number of occasions. The purpose of this review is to consider whether any further action could now reasonably be taken by [Post Office] to address the matters raised by the [subpostmasters].”
Paragraph 3, five lines up from the bottom:
“The Legal Department of [Post Office] has been the source of most of the information provided to us, but we have determined what information should be provided.”
When the review was being undertaken, did you have a running commentary essentially on it, or did you set the terms of reference as we’ve seen and then wait for the review to report?
Timothy Parker: I think it – I mean, again, without wanting to deliver a definitive view, I think there was a sort of ongoing discussion. I don’t think it was a sort of, you know, “Here’s the terms of review, give me a ring in five months’ time”, or whatever. You know, I think there was some kind of ongoing discussion.
Mr Beer: You certainly received a draft report in –
Timothy Parker: I did, yeah –
Mr Beer: – January?
Timothy Parker: – in January, yeah.
Mr Beer: Did you know that the Legal Department was the source of most of the information provided to Messrs Swift and Knight?
Timothy Parker: I think I probably did. Yeah.
Mr Beer: If we go over the page, please:
“The purpose of this review was originally described in the following terms”, and then we see the quote from the briefing paper we read earlier:
“We have been guided by this. But we have concentrated on whether any further action is reasonable and necessary in respect of these issues. This has highlighted two principal questions:
“What has been done in the 2010-2015 period?
“If there are any gaps in the work done, is there further action that can reasonably now be taken?”
Over the page, please, and look at paragraph 10. Having set out, in summary, the documentation that the authors have reviewed, they set out in paragraph 10 those with whom they met: Lord Arbuthnot; Second Sight; Deloitte; Fujitsu; Angela van den Bogerd; Mr Seller, Ms Dickinson; and Ms Hailstones and Ms Alexander.
Then, if we go forwards, please, it’s getting more to the substance, to page 34. You can see on pages 34 and 35 the author’s view on one of the issues, namely the sufficiency of evidence to bring charges of theft.
Timothy Parker: Mm, mm.
Mr Beer: I’m just going to read these passages. The allegation:
“As we understand it … is that [Post Office] has too readily brought a charge of theft, which is said to be more serious than false accounting, with the aim or effect that the [subpostmaster] is pressurised into pleading guilty to false accounting in the hope that the theft charge is dropped, and because a theft charge would more readily enable [Post Office] to recover its losses. We understand there are approximately 18 scheme cases in which this, or something similar, occurred. We have also read the full trial transcript [of] Seema Misra in which a jury convict the defendant of theft (following a guilty plea to the charge of false accounting).
“Whether [Post Office] had sufficient evidence to bring a charge of theft alongside charges of false accounting is an accusation raised by number of scheme applicants, as well as by Lord Arbuthnot … it has also been a matter raised by Second Sight …
“102. We are aware that the suggestion has gained particular traction in scheme case M035 … In this case certain documents in the prosecution file indicated that the initial [Post Office] Investigators could not find evidence of theft …”
This the case of Josephine Hamilton, I should say.
Timothy Parker: Mm, mm.
Mr Beer: “… (although there was clear evidence of false accounting), but theft was nonetheless charged. We have seen those documents and have noted the absence of clear documented rationale for charging theft.”
Over the page:
“We note Brian Altman’s advice of 8 March that it is not a helpful question to ask whether a theft and false accounting are offences of equal seriousness, both being dishonesty offences with a maximum sentence of seven years’ imprisonment, because the seriousness is dependent on the nature of the specific allegation rather than the charge per se.
“We entirely accept that the decision to plead guilty is a matter for the defendant alone. Any concerns they have about the legal advice they received at the time is a matter only the defendant can pursue and is not the responsibility of [Post Office] … it is always open to the defendant to challenge the sufficiency of the evidence disclosed to him or her and seek to have that charge dismissed.
“[Post Office’s] position is that its prosecutorial decisions are always taken in accordance with the [Code], which requires that there be sufficient evidence to provide a realistic prospect of conviction, and … must be in the public interest. [Post Office] that is referred us to the Cartwright King disclosure review exercise, noting that Cartwright King also expressed views in their advice as to whether [Post Office] should oppose any appeal brought, suggesting that they must therefore have considered the evidence involved. [Post Office] has also explained to us that because of these points, and because any review would be carried out with the benefit of hindsight, it will not be an appropriate course of action to review now the prosecution files to reconsider the sufficiency of evidence issue.
“106. We do not agree. We have reached the view that this issue is one of real importance to the reputation of [Post Office], and is something which can feasibly and reasonably be addressed now. It is clear that it is not an exercise which has been carried out so far, and Cartwright King were not asked to consider the sufficiency of the evidence when undertaking their disclosure review.”
Skipping a sentence:
“The allegation that [Post Office] has effectively bullied [subpostmasters] into pleading guilty to offences by unjustifiably overloading the charge sheet is a stain on the character of the business. Moreover, it is not impossible that [a subpostmaster] would have felt pressurised into pleading guilty to false accounting believing it to be less serious when they might not otherwise have done so; the phenomenon of false confessions is well known.”
I’m going to stop reading there.
That’s quite strong language, isn’t it?
Timothy Parker: Quite strong, yeah.
Mr Beer: Is this is an example of what you mentioned, I think, in passing earlier, that the review did not universally take on board the Post Office’s position?
Timothy Parker: I think that’s right and I think, in a way, because, as we know the aftermath wasn’t necessarily satisfactory, but at the time, it was a good – for me, a confirmation that to have a qualified barrister look at these things produced a pretty good analysis of the issue, and its impact, and as – if we go further, obviously, recommendations about what to do about it.
Mr Beer: You said there that the aftermath wasn’t necessarily satisfactory, we know. Can you tell us what you are alluding to there?
Timothy Parker: Alluding to? Well, I don’t want to sort of prejudge, you know, the discussion but, you know, Swift, in my view, was quite a good report and contained quite a lot of good material and, as the litigation unfolded, as we will discover a few months down the line, effectively Swift was stopped and repurposed.
So this component of Swift, actually – you know, again the result with hindsight might not have been satisfactory, because its scope of investigation was limited but, you know, Altman did his review and produced his report. So, you know, from the perspective of “Here’s the problem” – which is, you know, charging theft potentially with the pressure to get people to own up to false accounting – I think Swift more or less got that but it didn’t – you know, again, it translated into the Altman work.
So this component, I think, again, moved the thing forward as you would want it to be moved forward.
Mr Beer: Can we turn to the recommendations of Mr Swift’s report and I’m not going to, in the way I’ve just done there, track the foundation for the recommendation into the recommendation on every occasion. That was just one example.
Timothy Parker: Yeah, yeah.
Mr Beer: Page 38, then, please. The recommendations arising from that section of the report are:
“(1) [in bold] Legal advice be sought from counsel as to whether the decision to charge [a subpostmaster] with theft and false accounting could undermine the safety of any conviction for false accounting where (a) the conviction was on the basis of a guilty plea, following which and/or in return for which the theft charge was dropped, and (b) there had not been a sufficient evidential basis to bring the theft charge.
“(2) If such a conviction could be undermined in those circumstances, that counsel review the prosecution file in such cases to establish whether, applying the facts and law applicable at the relevant time, there was a sufficient evidential basis to conclude that a conviction for theft was a realistic prospect such that the charge was properly brought.”
I think you’d agree, they are sensible recommendations, arising directly from the passages that we’ve just read?
Timothy Parker: Yeah, yeah.
Mr Beer: Can we turn then to page 43 at the foot of the page:
“125. … the Horizon system does occasionally suffer from bugs which have caused losses in some branches. Those bugs have been generic in the sense that they have the potential to affect any branch, depending on how it is structured. It is often the case that those bugs are identified when [a subpostmaster] draws the attention of [Post Office] and Fujitsu to an odd situation which she cannot explain and which appears to have had caused a discrepancy. We were told by [Post Office] that when carrying out their investigations into scheme cases, investigators were looking out for unusual or unexplained patterns of transactions which might have required further technical examination by Fujitsu to confirm whether there was a wider bug. [Post Office] told us that no instance arose and Fujitsu were not asked to look at the records in any case. Fujitsu confirmed to us that they did not carry out any analysis of scheme records.
“We consider that there is the possibility that an alternative approach to the transaction analysis would have provided greater certainty that there was no bug which had affected some of the scheme branches. We take this view because [Post Office’s] approach was necessarily ‘bottom up’, in the sense that it started from and focused on the specific circumstances of the branch, looking at the transaction logs where necessary to review a particular complaint, be it general or specific.”
Skipping over:
“A different, but complementary, approach would have been a ‘top down ‘analysis of the transaction logs of the scheme branches undertaken by Fujitsu or an independent qualified party to search for patterns of unusual behaviour in individual branches, and across branches, on a purely data-driven analytical basis which might suggest a wider problem, which could then be cross-referenced with the branch fact-specific work carry out by [Post Office] …
“In our meeting with Deloitte, it was confirmed that this type of exercise was something they would have expected could be carried out across the relevant dataset (including non-Scheme branches as a control) to look for oddities or reconciliation errors. We are mindful that external organisations are more likely to suggest possible sources of work they could carry out, but the suggestion aligns with our own view … which is at least potentially useful to rule out more comprehensively the possibility of a system bug, affecting some scheme cases.”
Again, a series of observations or a views that you would consider reasonable?
Timothy Parker: I think I probably did at the time, yeah.
Mr Beer: If we go forward to 53 – I should have stopped off on the way at 51, at paragraph 145, just in passing:
“It seems to us that the Deloitte documents in particular pose real issues for [Post Office]. First, both the existence of the balancing transaction capability and the wider ability of Fujitsu to ‘fake’ digital signatures are contrary to the … assurances provided by Fujitsu and [Post Office] about the functionality of the Horizon system. Fujitsu’s comment we quote above seems … to be simply incorrect, and [Post Office’s] Westminster Hall Response is incomplete. To the extent that [Post Office] has sought to contend that branch data cannot be remotely ‘amended’ because a balancing transaction does not amend existing transactions but adds a new one, we do not consider this is a full picture of Horizon’s functionality. The reality is that a balancing transaction is a remotely introduced addition to branch records, added without the need for acceptance by the [subpostmaster], which affects the branch’s balance; that is its express purpose. [Post Office] has always known about the balancing transaction capability, although the Deloitte report suggests the digital signature issue is something contrary to [Post Office’s] understanding.”
Just stopping there as I went past, when you received the report, did you know about the remote access issue?
Timothy Parker: No, I don’t think so. I can’t be sure but I don’t think I did.
Mr Beer: Did you know that there was a concern that either the Post Office and/or Fujitsu had a facility remotely to access branches?
Timothy Parker: I don’t think I did. You know, the remote access issue, of course, has been quite a big element of this whole set of problems, and I think my take on it was, in theory, there is a remote access problem and – you know, we’ll get to the recommendations in a moment – let’s see and let’s try and understand this theoretical ability, how practical is it, in fact, to remotely access accounts? And that was, you know, what I took away from this, I suppose.
Mr Beer: Did you take away from the fact that Fujitsu and Post Office’s public facing comments had been incorrect and incomplete?
Timothy Parker: Yes, I mean, that’s something – I’ve looked back at this and I suppose my reaction at the time was essentially to Swift – and we’ll get on to the legal privilege thing in a minute – was, you know: this is a report, let’s – there are some recommendations, let’s actually get to the recommendations and then my hope and intention was to, you know, have the outputs of the report discussed.
Now, we didn’t get there, much to my regret, and I think I was probably a little optimistic about how quickly we could get on top of some of these issues and then properly correct the issue, I suppose. But, you know, it was something I was aware of and, with hindsight, perhaps we should have jumped up immediately and said, “Look, you know, there is a theoretical possibility of remote access”. And I was assuming, as it turned out probably quite wrongly, that we could do the work on Swift and then say, yes, there is remote access and it is theoretically possible, but practically, it either is likely, less likely, or very unlikely. That was, I think, where I got to with it.
Mr Beer: Where did you get information from that remote access was only theoretically possible?
Timothy Parker: I think that’s what was said here, essentially. That was what I took away from it, anyway.
Mr Beer: In any event, let’s turn to the recommendations on this part of the report by looking at page 53:
“We recommend …
“(3) [Post Office] consider instructing a suitably qualified party to carry out an analysis of the relevant transaction logs for branches within the scheme to confirm, insofar as possible, whether any bugs in the system are revealed by the dataset which caused discrepancies in the accounting position of any of those branches.
“(4) [Post Office] instruct a suitably qualified party to carry out a full review of the use of balancing transactions throughout the lifetime of the Horizon system, insofar as possible, independently to confirm from Horizon system records the number and circumstances of their use.
“(5) [Post Office] instruct a suitably qualified expert to carry out a full review of the controls over and use of the capability of authorised Fujitsu personnel to create, amend or delete baskets within the sealed audit score throughout the lifetime of the Horizon system, insofar as is possible.”
Those two recommendations, you’ll see, are speaking about the lifetime of the Horizon system. Did you understand them at the time to mean literally since Legacy Horizon had started –
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Mr Beer: – ie about 2000?
Timothy Parker: I can’t tell you. Of course, with hindsight, the lifetime thing actually gets to be quite critical because it turns out that most of the real issues that people experienced were with Legacy Horizon, but I’m not sure that really, you know, that really came through to me as a big thing at the time. Yeah.
Mr Beer: “[Post Office] seek specialist legal advice from external counsel as to whether the Deloitte reports, or the information within them concerning balancing transactions and Fujitsu’s ability to delete and amend data in the audit store, should be disclosed to defendants of criminal prosecutions bought by [Post Office]. This advice should also address whether disclosure should be made, if it has not been [made], to the CCRC.”
Again, upon reading this, you wouldn’t have had any reason to reject the recommendations?
Timothy Parker: No.
Mr Beer: They seem reasonable and sensible –
Timothy Parker: They seemed reasonable and sensible, yes.
Mr Beer: – and they’re grounded in the body of the text –
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Mr Beer: – that preceded them?
Timothy Parker: Absolutely, yeah.
Mr Beer: If we go forwards, please, to 64, and paragraph 173:
“There is one issue which potentially relates to the scheme cases but which has not, so far as we are aware, been the subject of any specific analysis. That issue was the one raised by Second Sight in their Part Two Report … and relates to the handling by [Post Office] of unmatched credit balances in its own suspense account (or similarly named account) in respect of third party clients (such as Santander or Bank of Ireland). The point Second Sight raise is that where there are significant sums in unmatched balances, it is possible that at least some of that money would reflect uncorrected transaction discrepancies in particular branches. We consider that this illogically possible, and is at least worthy of express investigation and clarification. Accordingly, we recommend that:
“[Post Office] commission forensic accountants to review the unmatched balances on [Post Office’s] general suspense account to explain the relationship (or lack thereof) with branch discrepancies and the extent to which those balances can be attributed to and repaid to specific branches.”
Again, does that fall within the same category that we just discussed, reasonable and grounded in –
Timothy Parker: Reasonable and grounded, I agree.
Mr Beer: There’s one that I’ve missed out, (7) I think. If we go forward to page 66, number 7:
“[Post Office] should cross-reference specific complaints about misleading advice from NBSC call handlers with the possible employees who provided that advice and consider their personnel files, where availability, for evidence at to the likelihood that the complaint may be well founded.”
So if we just go back to 65 and pan out. The recommendations 1 to 5 are collected together in a summary and then, over the page, we see (6), (7) and (8) collected together.
Overall, would you agree that there was a wide range of work that required to be done arising from the Swift Review?
Timothy Parker: Yes, I think we were talking earlier about, you know, the terms of reference and whether it was correctly structured and – but, actually, I feel with hindsight, again, that Swift was not a perfect piece of work but it wasn’t a bad piece of work, and it yielded some good recommendations.
Mr Beer: Would you agree that the review raised significant reputational issues for the Post Office in the light of what it uncovered and the recommendations that it made?
Timothy Parker: I think there were some issues that definitely needed addressing pretty – yeah, pretty urgently.
Mr Beer: What about my question, Mr Parker?
Timothy Parker: Yeah, no, I think that’s a fair – these are all matters with some reputational impact, potentially.
Mr Beer: Significant reputational issues for Post Office, was how I formulated it, if this was publicly disclosed?
Timothy Parker: Yeah, I’m not going to argue about the language. These are important matters, yeah.
Mr Beer: Sometimes it’s important, though, the language.
Timothy Parker: Yes, no, I think you’re absolutely right. Let’s say reputational issues, yeah, matters.
Mr Beer: You had a decision to make as to with whom the report should be shared, correct?
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Beer: When the report landed on your desk – in your inbox, more likely – did you have a view as to with whom it should be shared, if anyone?
Timothy Parker: I – that’s a very interesting question. So to go back into the history of this thing, it was always envisaged that the Swift Review would be legally privileged and I think that was explained – I haven’t got the papers to hand but, somehow, it was envisaged that it would be a report from a QC – at the time – and it would be legally privileged.
Mr Beer: Just stopping there, the report on its face is not marked as privileged, is it?
Timothy Parker: No, no.
Mr Beer: The report does not say that it’s been provided for the purpose of any ongoing litigation?
Timothy Parker: It doesn’t, but my –
Mr Beer: It doesn’t say that it was provided for the purposes of obtaining legal advice, does it?
Timothy Parker: No, but whatever was actually on the report, and, you know, I’m not looking at whether it’s got – I understood, and was advised by General Counsel, that it should be legally privileged and I believe that was understood also by civil servants at the time as well. I may be wrong but, generally, it was understood that this would be a piece of legally privileged work with a view, once the recommendations had been carried forward, to being shared more widely. That was my understanding of it.
Mr Beer: You said that there was an assumption. Who held that assumption?
Timothy Parker: When you say –
Mr Beer: An assumption that the report would be legally privileged, was one of the things that you said. Who held that assumption?
Timothy Parker: That’s quite an interesting question and I’m not sure I’ve got a ready answer to it. All I can tell you is that my recollection, and certainly what I understood, was that the report would be legally privileged. That was the advice that I received at the time.
Mr Beer: Was that advice orally or in writing?
Timothy Parker: I can’t confirm whether it was oral or in writing but I certainly understood that to be the case.
Mr Beer: Who gave you the advice?
Timothy Parker: The General Counsel.
Mr Beer: Jane MacLeod?
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Beer: Jane MacLeod, in her witness statement – no need to turn it up, it’s WITN10010100 at page 100, paragraph 184 – says:
“I am aware from open source material that Tim Parker has said that I had advised him not to brief the Board on grounds of confidentiality and privilege. My recollection is different from Mr Parker’s. Although I agree that I discussed privilege and confidentiality when I met him, my recollection is that the Senior Independent Director, Mr McCall, asked a question at a board meeting as to whether the Board would be briefed on the findings of the Chairman’s review. I believe that, as a result of that question, I provided an oral briefing to the Board as to the scope and findings of the chairman’s review, as well as summary of the further work being undertaken following the Chairman’s review. Although I’ve not seen any documents which indicate that the full report was circulated to the Board, my recollection is that I advised the Board that the full report was available on request.”
Timothy Parker: Indeed, that’s what she put into her witness statement and I can only say that there’s – I know which particular document it’s in but she advised that the report should be four copies, I think, none saved to a hard disk, or whatever, and it was clear. I’m sure she told me, and my recollection I don’t think is wrong, that this was going to be a legally privileged report and that’s why it was restricted to four copies only that were held within the Legal Department.
Her comment – I mean, the other point to make, I suppose, is because this is of interest, is that, you know, there was no intention to hide the report as such. People knew about the report but it was a legally privileged document. And, again, you know, it’s one of my regrets is that I got that advice and I took it, and that’s essentially how the report was conceived.
Mr Beer: So it was advice from the General Counsel, Jane MacLeod, directly to you, the –
Timothy Parker: Yes, and that sort of privileged –
Mr Beer: Sorry, if I could just finish the sentence.
Timothy Parker: Yes, I beg your pardon.
Mr Beer: That the report, the Swift Report, was a legally privileged document?
Timothy Parker: That was certainly my understanding at the time and I believe, in communications with UKGI, it was also made clear –
Mr Beer: We’re going to come to that in a minute.
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Mr Beer: For you, what were the consequences of being advised that the report enjoyed legal privilege?
Timothy Parker: So –
Mr Beer: What did that mean for you?
Timothy Parker: Yeah, so look, here I am. I’ve had this report commissioned, right. I’ve got no history of – you know, I wanted to get some kind of result from it. But then I get this advice and, as I understood it at the time, the report would be legally privileged, the GC and her team, with others, would take forward the recommendations, and when the recommendations were completed, the outputs would then be shared. That was my sort of view and that’s what I expected to happen.
Mr Beer: The fact that you were advised that the report was legally privileged, what did you understand as to who that prevented you from sharing the report with?
Timothy Parker: Yeah, I think, again, this is one of the slightly unsatisfactory elements of the whole thing, is that I felt, erroneously, probably, it turns out, that legally privileged or legal privileged meant that the report, effectively, was circumscribed to only the people who were involved in the legal process.
Mr Beer: Was that something that you were advised by Ms MacLeod or was that something which you assumed on the basis of being told the report is privileged?
Timothy Parker: I can’t tell you for sure but I think the fact that I was told that the report should only be confined to four copies, I certainly took away from that that legal privilege implied that it was a report that would be held in a very tight knit – tightly knit group of people, and these were of the four people and they were all people who worked in the GC’s department.
Mr Beer: In practice, did that understanding – I’ll call it – that you reached, prevent effective discussion from taking place at the Board of the Post Office if members of the Board could not see the report?
Timothy Parker: So I think, whilst being aware of the report, I felt it certainly did, yeah. I mean, my view at the time was that – and perhaps this was somewhat naive – that the recommendations would come out pretty quickly and we would be able to talk about, you know, the report as completed. But that didn’t happen unfortunately.
Mr Beer: Did you understand, from what Jane MacLeod advised you, that you were prevented from sharing the report with other Board members?
Timothy Parker: I think that was my understanding, yes.
Mr Beer: What did you understand, if you did understand it, to be the difficulty in sharing a report with other Board members who themselves would owe a duty of confidentiality and confidence to the company?
Timothy Parker: I thought – and again, perhaps it betokens a certain lack of experience in this area – that legal privilege meant a restriction on the circulation of the report, and with, you know, what I’ve read subsequently, was the report meant for me personally and was it going to be legally privileged for me personally? Could we have shared it? I wish we had, in a way.
And I think, you know, a suitably redacted version, if that was the issue, perhaps could have been shared. And it’s just one of those things that, at the time, I was advised and I took the advice. It’s one of the unfortunate aspects to all of this, is the extent to which perhaps advice taken from specialists turned out to be something that might have been tested or reviewed in a different way.
Mr Beer: I’ll ask you the direct question: did Ms MacLeod tell you that the fact that the report enjoyed privilege prevented you from disclosing it to the Board?
Timothy Parker: That was my understanding.
Mr Beer: Did she advise you directly?
Timothy Parker: I can’t confirm one way or another. All I can do is look back and say, look, what possible motive would I have had at the time from hiding this report from my fellow Board members, other than receiving advice that I shouldn’t share it with my fellow Board members? Bear in mind, I had no axe to grind on this. I had no vested – any vested interest in trying to protect the Post Office or whatever it had done. It was simply the advice I received and I followed it.
Mr Beer: As part of the quote from Ms MacLeod’s statement that I read you, she said:
“My recollection is I advised the Board that the full report was available on request.”
Were you present at any Board meeting at which they were told, “If you want the report, you only have to ask”?
Timothy Parker: Well, I presume that, if that’s what Jane MacLeod has said, and she attended Board meetings, and I can only think of one Board meeting that I missed in the whole of my time at the Post Office, I probably would have been there, yes.
Mr Beer: Can you recall that being said? It’s not reflected in any of the minutes?
Timothy Parker: I can’t.
Mr Beer: What was your understanding as to the fact that the report was said to enjoy legal privilege, insofar as distribution of a copy of the report or sharing the contents of the report with the Minister or Government was?
Timothy Parker: I think that was a similar concern and I should say that the legal privilege thing – I’m now beginning to recollect it a little bit more – was around the Freedom of Information mechanism. So we had a UKGI Board member, and one of the concerns was that things that were distributed that got into the hands of, essentially, BEIS civil servants, in one form or another, potentially could be disclosed as part of a Freedom of Information request. And that whole sort of consideration coloured the discussion around Swift and how it was explained, and how it was kind of discussed at the time.
Mr Beer: Can we look, please, at POL00103108. An email before the final report is available, it’s dated 22 January 2016, between Jane MacLeod and you:
“Tim
“Following our call with Jonathan Swift today, and ahead of your meeting with Baroness Neville-Rolfe on Tuesday, I have summarised our progress.”
I’m going to skip over, for the moment, “How to take forward his recommendations”, and just look at “Briefing to the Minister”, if we scroll down:
“We also discussed with Jonathan whether there were any limitations from his perspective on the content of your briefing to the Minister. Jonathan confirmed that there were no limitations from his perspective, although he noted that if a physical or electronic copy were provided, this could result in a loss of legal privilege in connection with the document, recognising that in the absence of privilege, the report could be disclosable under a [Freedom of Information] request.”
Is that what you were just referring to?
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Mr Beer: “Accordingly, our recommendation is that you provide a verbal briefing to the Minister that in response to the question ‘Was there anything further that [Post Office] should do?’:
“[1] Jonathan has made a series of recommendations which have been accepted by [the Post Office].
“[2] These recommendations will be followed up as soon as possible.
“[3] In relation to 2 of the IT related recommendations, the scope of work required to discharge the recommend is uncertain, and we will therefore commission work to determine whether the work is feasible.
“[4] We will provide you with regular updates on progress of this work, and you will therefore be able to provide updates to the Minister in future briefings.
“Once the work is completed, we will need to consider whether the Minister requires anything in writing from you and whether any such document would be made publicly available.”
So this is a reflection of a meeting that I think Jane MacLeod had, or a call that Jane MacLeod had, with Jonathan Swift, and advice as to how you are to brief the Minister. Correct?
Timothy Parker: Looks like it, doesn’t it? Yeah.
Mr Beer: The sentence, “Jonathan confirmed there were no limitations from his perspective”, on the content of the briefing but, “if a physical or electronic copy were provided this could result in the loss of legal privilege”, did you understand that a choice fell to be made from that advice?
Timothy Parker: Yes. I think I probably, to a certain extent – well, no, actually, looking at it, I think what I understood was that something that was physical, if it was – if things were put down and written physically or typed physically, that could be subject to a loss of legal privilege. And I suppose, perhaps from that, I sort of conflated, you know, what could I say to the Minister? I don’t, you know, did that mean I could only say to her what was in a piece of paper? I don’t know.
Mr Beer: More specifically, did you understand that you had a choice to make: I can either brief her orally along the lines set out in those four bullet points; or I can give her a copy of the report, and that may result in a loss of privilege?
Timothy Parker: My recollection, for what it’s worth, is that I think we all, including the Minister’s civil servants, were kind of not assuming, but felt that this was going to be a document that had legal privilege. So, with hindsight, you’re right, there was potentially a decision to be made, but we fell into the “It’s legally privileged so we’ll do the verbal briefing instead”.
Mr Beer: Did you realise at the time that there was a choice –
Timothy Parker: I don’t think so, if I’m honest.
Mr Beer: – ie the fact that it was said to be legally privileged dictated the outcome or the treatment –
Timothy Parker: I’m afraid a lot flowed from that, you know, it was a legally privileged document, therefore we had to speak around it, and how it was summarised on paper needed to be thought about, yes.
Sir Wyn Williams: Can I ask you, Mr Parker, at the time, was there any discussion about who enjoyed the privilege if privilege existed?
Timothy Parker: Sir Wyn, I can’t, no.
Sir Wyn Williams: Because it strikes me at least – and I’m not pretending I’m an authority on this – that there are only two possibilities, aren’t there: either you personally enjoyed the privilege or Post Office Limited enjoyed it?
Timothy Parker: Again, I have to answer you honestly and say my knowledge of legal privilege at the time wasn’t sufficiently sophisticated – is probably the best description I can give it – to differentiate between was it privileged to me or was it privileged to Post Office? I just kind of took legal privilege to mean it was kind of privileged, you know, like, full stop.
Sir Wyn Williams: Yes, and I’m not really asking you to address your mind to the distinction, as opposed to whether there was any discussion about that distinction?
Timothy Parker: No, not that I can recall.
Sir Wyn Williams: Finally, you’d obviously know from this Inquiry that it’s possible for a party who enjoys legal privilege to waive that privilege if someone asked them to, like I asked the Post Office in this Inquiry. Did anybody, either on the POL Board or in Government or civil servants, ask you to waive legal privilege, if this document was indeed privileged?
Timothy Parker: I can’t confirm that because I can’t remember, is the honest answer to that question. But the fact that – I can only say that, you know, nothing happened in that regard, and it doesn’t stick in my mind as a topic that was raised at the time.
Sir Wyn Williams: So on the state of the evidence at the moment – and things may change, obviously, because we are going to hear from people who may have a view of this – but at the moment there’s nothing to suggest that anyone asked that there be a waiver of privilege?
Timothy Parker: For my recollection, the answer to that is no.
Sir Wyn Williams: Fine.
Mr Beer: A related question to that, Mr Parker: did you inform Baroness Neville-Rolfe, the Minister, or anyone else within the Department or ShEx, that you wouldn’t be providing Government with a copy of the report because that was on the basis of legal advice received, that doing so could result in a loss of privilege? So not only was that the reason for acting –
Timothy Parker: Yeah, I understand –
Mr Beer: – that was the explanation given?
Timothy Parker: Yeah, so all I can tell you is that I think – I’m not sure what the Minister was told exactly but I have this report and I have absolutely no reason not to show this to people. I’ve got no vested interest and so I conclude, looking back, that I must have felt that the advice I’d been given was not to share the report physically with the Minister.
Mr Beer: But you’ve got no recollection whether that was explained, in terms?
Timothy Parker: I haven’t, no.
Mr Beer: Thank you.
Sir, it’s 12.25. Can we take the second morning break until 12.35?
Sir Wyn Williams: Yes, of course.
(12.25 pm)
(A short break)
(12.36 pm)
Mr Beer: Good afternoon, sir, can you see and hear us?
Sir Wyn Williams: Yes, thank you.
Mr Beer: Thank you.
Mr Parker, can we just look at some documents that were created years later –
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Mr Beer: – in 2020 –
Timothy Parker: Mm-hm.
Mr Beer: – which speak to the issues that we’re currently discussing, starting by looking at UKGI00011785. This is an email from Tom Cooper, who I think you’ll know, to Sarah Munby, who I also think you’ll know. It’s dated Sunday, 19 April 2020. It says the:
“… information attached contains legally privileged information.
“Do not forward …
“Ahead of our meeting to discuss [the Post Office], which I hope is happening this week, I’m attaching the key documents for us to consider.”
If you scroll down:
“The following documents are attached:
“Copy of the QC’s report. Suggest you read the recommendations which are at the back.
“Copy of Tim Parker’s letter to the Minister which followed delivery of the QC’s report.”
We’re going to look at that in a moment. There was another document that is redacted.
If we scroll up, please:
“The subject of the meeting is the reporting to Ministers and Governance in the Company that took place after Tim Parker was appointed Chairman.”
So there’s a meeting in 2020 about the reporting by you and others to ministers, and governance in the company back in 2015, essentially:
“The Minister at the time was Baroness Neville-Rolfe who asked him to appoint a QC to review the handling of the Horizon IT dispute …”
That’s not entirely accurate, is it? She did not ask you to appoint a QC?
Timothy Parker: No, that’s not entirely accurate, you’re right.
Mr Beer: “… and satisfy himself that issues had been handled appropriately.”
That’s more accurate?
Timothy Parker: That’s more accurate.
Mr Beer: Then scroll down, “The following documents are attached”. It says in the penultimate paragraph:
“In addition to the above, it seems that neither the QC’s report, nor the existence or conclusions of the follow-up work commissioned to deal with the QC’s report were known to the Board of the Company or to BEIS.”
Is that accurate on your understanding?
Timothy Parker: Not entirely, I don’t think. I think in relation to the Board, although they didn’t see a copy of the swift report, I’m pretty sure that Paula Vennells summarised the recommendations.
Mr Beer: We’re going to come to that in a moment.
Timothy Parker: I think so, and I think also that, as Jane MacLeod said in her evidence, she provided a briefing. So I think it’s not quite true to say they were unaware of the existence or the conclusions of the Board and I would say BEIS – well, BEIS certainly knew about the report, I think. Obviously, they didn’t see it, but I think they were aware of it, yes.
Mr Beer: The word “existence” seems to apply to the follow-up work, rather than the report itself?
Timothy Parker: “… nor the existence or the conclusions” –
Mr Beer: Of the follow-up work.
Timothy Parker: – “of the follow-up work …”
Oh, I see, I see the point –
Mr Beer: It’s not talking about the existence –
Timothy Parker: I understand the point you’re making now.
Mr Beer: On your understanding, did –
Timothy Parker: Yeah, so I think that was part of the consequences of the report being stopped, effectively, later in May or June, and the work being taken forward under the aegis of the General Counsel in the context of the litigation.
Mr Beer: Thank you. Can we look at UKGI00012703. This is seemingly a meeting later in the year, this email refers to, again circulating within UKGI on 16 September 2020. It’s not a communication to you but it’s about you, and I want to ask you some questions:
“Ahead of our call this afternoon, this is just to update you that Ken McCall the [Senior Independent Director] …”
I think the SID, is that correct?
Timothy Parker: Yeah, the SID, yeah.
Mr Beer: “… has confirmed that, having spoken to other members of the Board as he deemed appropriate, he does not think it appropriate to take any action in relation to Tim Parker’s decision-making around the QC’s review in 2015 of POL’s handling of the Horizon complaints.
“His rationale is the same as reported previously. Ken [McCall] believes Tim [you] made a significant error of judgement in accepting legal advice that the QC’s report and, as a consequence the follow-up work, should not be shared with the Board.”
Firstly, was that put to you, that you had made a significant error of judgement in accepting advice that the report and therefore the follow-up work should not be shared with the Board?
Timothy Parker: At what point in time?
Mr Beer: At any point in time.
Timothy Parker: I’m not entirely sure anybody has put this point to me, actually. I think, certainly when Tom Cooper became aware of it, I think he probably had a discussion with Ken McCall, and this was the output of the discussion. But I can’t recall anybody coming up to me in the corridor and saying, “Hey Tim, looking back nine years, you made a bit of a decision that was wrong and we think’s a significant error of judgement, you just about scrape by and cling on to your job here”; no, nobody said that.
Mr Beer: Never mind corridors, was there anything more formal?
Timothy Parker: No.
Mr Beer: It would have been five years, not nine.
Timothy Parker: Five years.
Mr Beer: Was there anything more formal by which you were chastised essentially, for your decision?
Timothy Parker: Yes, not that I can recall but sometimes unpleasant events are put out of one’s mind, so I might have got this wrong but I don’t think so.
Mr Beer: That’s a different issue, whether you got it wrong?
Timothy Parker: Well, I might have got it wrong, in terms of do I remember it, is the point I’m making, yes.
Mr Beer: I see. The email continues:
“… he has some sympathy [that’s Ken McCall] with the fact that you would have had to take a very strong position against the legal advice at the initial stage of his tenure to achieve a different outcome. Overall, Ken [McCall’s] view is that [you have] been a strong force for positive change in the company while [you have] been Chairman and it would be unfair/disproportionate to take action over this specific issue.
“I haven’t asked him to put any of this in writing or come in to meet Ministers or officials to discuss, but this is an option if the decision is to take this further at our call …”
Was that explained to you, that an option was to take formal action against you but, on balance, a decision was taken not to do so because this was early in your tenure. You would have had to have taken a strong position to go against legal advice that you received and that, overall, you have been a positive force for change?
Timothy Parker: The answer is – and, again, I’m searching my recollection here, because I don’t want to give you an answer that isn’t true. I honestly can’t remember having a formal discussion about this.
Mr Beer: Can we –
Timothy Parker: Can I say something about this because –
Mr Beer: Yeah, sure.
Timothy Parker: – I do feel it’s quite a fine hindsight judgement to have made that this is a significant error of judgement. I think that Swift was something which produced some good consequences. The first recommendation, the second recommendation, the seventh recommendation and, ultimately, the eighth recommendation were followed through. The work, which no doubt we will discuss later, in Bramble, was also substantially followed through and informed the Post Office’s litigation.
And so I fully accept that, had Swift been discussed at the Board, it may have led to a different approach to the litigation.
But I should say that it remains my view to today that, once the litigation has started, or had started, and although I think we’ll see it wasn’t necessarily handled in the best and cooperative manner, the litigation, the GLO, ultimately proved to be a comprehensive – what’s the best word I can find? A comprehensive settlement of a lot of very complex issues. And I have replayed in my mind, Mr Swift (sic), what might have happened had we not, you know, had the GLO and everyone had read Swift and said, “Oh, there’s a problem.” the problem is that, you know, our contract with the subpostmasters is completely wrong, so we’d better tear it all up”, and somebody had said, “Oh, by the way the computer system has got a lot of bugs, and it’s unreliable”.
And I’ve replayed in my mind exactly what might have happened then, which is that we would have gone to our paymasters, the Government, and said, “We’ve got a slight problem. Our contract that we’ve had for a long time is not fair. We’ve got another problem, which is that our computer system, certainly Legacy Horizon, you know, anecdotally, it’s full of bugs”, or we got somebody to independently apparently suggest that.
My view is that the debate that would have ensued between, you know, “So what is a reliable system?” and “What are the consequences and, therefore, what compensation is due?” and “The contract isn’t fair”. And so we’ll go through all of that. I do believe, whatever the impediments placed in its way – and maybe it could have been handled a lot better – but a judge-determined settlement of all these issues has, and should have resulted already, in a comprehensive compensation settlement for all affected.
And the result of all this should have been – or in my view – that this whole thing has been completely wrong, and a very large amount of money is payable to all concerned. And, unfortunately, it’s just taken – following the ultimate settlement in the trials, it’s just taken far too long.
Sorry to give you an extensive extemporary on all of that but you can imagine someone who has sat in this seat looks back and says how could it have been better, how could it have been different, how could it have been faster?
Mr Beer: Are you saying by that answer that it needed a group of brave and determined subpostmasters to hold the Post Office to account by bringing the Post Office before a court, and that the Post Office was incapable often doing it itself?
Timothy Parker: I’m aware that the counter-argument to all of this is that there should – you know, it should have been something that was resolved inside the Post Office without the recourse to the litigation and, with hindsight, you know, the postmasters, Sir Alan Bates, should never have been required to mount a Group Litigation Order. I understand that. All I’m saying is that, once it was in train, had it been managed a bit better, then a lot of complex issues might have been determined without the delay and without the cost. But a judge review of all these issues, I still think, one way or another, was the right way to get, you know, an outcome in the end, yes.
Mr Beer: So you are saying that, irrespective of the things that we’re going through now, even if things had been done differently, it would have always have taken a judge to hold the Post Office to account?
Timothy Parker: No, I’m saying – I think what I’m saying is that a judge – of course, holding to account – you’re absolutely right, the result of any judgment would hold the Post Office to account. All I’m saying is that it would have been in my view, practically speaking, although I can perfectly accept this isn’t the right outcome, but, given where we got to, trying to see if this could have been managed internally to the same result, I’m not sure.
Mr Beer: Can we move forwards, please, to UKGI00019313. This appears to be, Mr Parker, the culmination of those meetings that we’ve just read about happening in the emails, discussion over what to do with you about your conduct in 2015/2016, concerning the Swift Review.
It’s a letter directly to you from Sarah Munby, then Permanent Secretary at BEIS:
“Dear Tim …
“As part of our preparation for the BEIS Select Committee hearing which had been scheduled for March, we received from Post Office a copy of the report prepared by Jonathan Swift QC that was commissioned by you at Baroness Neville-Rolfe’s request after your appointment as Chair in 2015. We understand from the work done recently by the company and its advisers to look at the history of Horizon that the findings and recommendations by Jonathan Swift were not shared with the rest of the Post Office Board.
“We understand that you were advised at the time by the Post Office’s General Counsel that for reasons of confidentiality and preserving legal privilege the circulation of the report should be strictly controlled.”
That sentence there accords with what you’ve told us today, doesn’t it?
Timothy Parker: I think it does, yes.
Mr Beer: “Nevertheless, given the background of Parliamentary interest, the fact that your review was commissioned by the Minister responsible for the Post Office and the potential significance of the recommendations made by Jonathan Swift, we consider it was a mistake not to have ensured that the whole Board had an opportunity to see and discuss the detail of its findings and agree what any next steps should be. With hindsight, this information should have been seen by the Board and we are disappointed that it wasn’t.”
You mentioned earlier being taken aside in a corridor and being essentially chastised or told off. This is the written equivalent to that, isn’t it?
Timothy Parker: Yes, I think it definitely is, yes.
Mr Beer: “As a rule, we think it is quite difficult to envisage any circumstances where issues of legal privilege or confidentiality should prevent relevant information being shared with a company’s Board. You won’t need us to remind you of the importance of effective corporate governance and that the role of the Board is to ensure the company’s prosperity by collectively directing the company’s affairs, while meeting the appropriate interests of its shareholders and relevant stakeholders.”
Then there’s a counterbalancing point or paragraph:
“Finally, we also recognise that while you have been chair and under Nick Read’s new leadership, the Board has instigated a frontally different approach to handling the grievances bought by postmasters affected by Horizon as well as initiating significant changes to the organisation, processes and culture of the organisation. These are to be welcomed and we continue to encourage the company to act quickly and decisively to do what it can to remedy the remaining issues arising from the Horizon cases as well as implementing the changes needed to ensure that such issues never arise again”, and then a thank you.
So, as far as you’re aware, was this the endpoint or the culmination of the consideration by Government as to its approach to your decision not to disclose the report to the Post Office Board back in 2015?
Timothy Parker: Well, I received this letter – when is it dated – at some point in –
Mr Beer: October 2020.
Timothy Parker: – in 2020 and I haven’t heard anything subsequently so I think you can conclude from that that the answer is yes.
Mr Beer: That was the end of it?
Timothy Parker: (The witness nodded)
Mr Beer: Okay. Can I just go back to what you and the Chief Executive, Paula Vennells, did say about the report and its recommendations at the time, to see, irrespective of the approach that BEIS and Government took subsequently, what information was disclosed, first by looking at POL00158304.
Timothy Parker: And, by the way, may I say something on this letter before we move on?
Mr Beer: Absolutely.
Timothy Parker: Can we just –
Mr Beer: Go back to the first page?
Timothy Parker: – scroll back to the first page if that’s all right.
Mr Beer: Then scroll down.
Timothy Parker: Okay. Let me – I think again, at the risk of sounding a little boring on the subject, I think it’s important to place what I would accept with hindsight was a misjudgement in context.
Mr Beer: Thank you.
Timothy Parker: So the first point to note is that I’m not a lawyer and I received very strong legal advice, which I took.
The second point is that I did that in good faith. I had no reason to deliberately hide this thing or chuck it into the long grass.
And the third point to make is that it’s easy, in the context of this Inquiry, to imagine that all the chairman is doing is looking after issues to do with Swift and looking after issues to do with Horizon, and I have to keep reminding you that that is not the case. There is an awful lot going on in this business and an awful lot of stuff that needs addressing. So having had, you know, a slap over the wrists from this, I can perfectly see the response but I think I’d just like you to bear in mind that there is context to these things, and that sometimes it’s easy to overlook that.
Mr Beer: I think that context should include that, when you started working as Chairman, you were working for a minimum of one and a half days a week?
Timothy Parker: We can get into a discussion about what makes an effective time allocation –
Mr Beer: I was just asking a simple question, Mr Parker. When you started, you were on a minimum of one and a half days a week?
Timothy Parker: Are you asking me that as a question of fact, are you?
Mr Beer: Yes.
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Beer: Then also a question of fact, in November 2017, you asked for that to be reduced to two days a month, didn’t you?
Timothy Parker: I did. Can I also, as you’ve asked the question about time, just explain to you a little bit about the perspective of being a chair and time, and what makes an effective chair, based on the experience that I’ve had. So being a chair is about a number of different things and it certainly is about time spent in a business. But it’s also about the capacity to understand business problems and the capacity to strike up effective relationships with the key people in a business, especially the CEO.
So you asked the question, immediately after this, about time with a slight implication, I suspect – maybe wrongly – that somehow what happened here was the result of me not spending enough time at the Post Office, and I would certainly rebut that suggestion.
I would say that I was a very active, energetic chair who took a lot of time and spent time with people to understand the business, and I certainly don’t think the time, one and a half days, or whatever it is, was the reason why I made this error of judgement, with hindsight.
Mr Beer: Can we go back to the note, please, at POL00158304. This was the note I was going to move to, to look at what was said by you and the Chief Executive about the Swift Review at the time. These are speaking notes for a Board meeting of 22 January 2016, seemingly a speaking note of Ms Vennells. Can we go forwards, please, to page 6, please, and scroll down, please.
Thank you. Just there “Sparrow”, “Chairman’s Review”.
Remember, this is 22 January 2016, before the final report was received on 8 February:
“Jonathan Swift and Christopher Knight, the barristers advising Tim Parker on the adequacy of scheme processes, shared their draft report with the chairman last week. The report sets out a limited number of recommendations and [Post Office] will, where possible, take these forward to demonstrate the highest possible standards of rigour and fairness in the handling of the Horizon related complaints.”
Is this the kind of information, to your recollection, that was provided to the Board, ie the extent of the information provided to the Board about the contents and recommendations of the Swift Review?
Timothy Parker: Mm, I think she also had a table of the recommendations. But that’s it. Yeah.
Mr Beer: Was it your view that the report did set out only a limited number of recommendations?
Timothy Parker: The way it’s put there, it’s sort of fairly kind of benign. I think it’s set out eight/nine – eight recommendations. I mean, it depends on your language, doesn’t it?
Mr Beer: It might be said that underplays the overall outcome –
Timothy Parker: I think that’s a – you know, it you could say it’s a limited number because there aren’t many or you could say it kind of gives the impression there’s not much going on. Yeah.
Mr Beer: Let’s just look at what the Minister was told, UKGI00006482. This is a couple of days later, 26 January 2016. Meeting between you, Baroness Neville-Rolfe, Laura Thompson and Andrew Smith. Then “Main points”. The first few bullet points concern other things, which is reflective of the point you made a moment ago, Mr Parker, that this wasn’t the only issue. If we look at the penultimate bullet point:
“TP [that’s you] updated on the Horizon investigation. He said that the QC was about to report. He had found no systemic problem. [Tim Parker] thought that the issue might have passed its peak interest.”
Firstly, did you say that to Baroness Neville-Rolfe?
Timothy Parker: I have no idea. I think I certainly would have commented that, as far as the computer system is concerned, coming back to our previous discussion, and I think it was reflective, broadly speaking, of what was in Swift, there wasn’t a systemic problem, whatever “systemic” was understood to mean.
In terms of the second thing, I think I must have just commented that, in terms of the press, it had at that point passed peak interest and that might have been in response to a question, or whatever. But that would have just been me commenting on that.
Mr Beer: Were they truly the takeaways from the Swift report, as reflected there: no systemic problem, issues passed its peak interest; rather than he’s made eight recommendations of substance that need taking forwards, they pose significant reputational issues, to Post Office?
Timothy Parker: Do you know, I don’t know. I mean, I’m not sure what the substance of the conversation is, or why, you know, why those are the two sentences. I just can’t tell you. I just come back to what I said, which is that it was a report which I think it was – it wasn’t the final report at that point, was it? It was –
Mr Beer: No, not by this time.
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Mr Beer: I think the eight recommendations at this time were as they were to appear.
Timothy Parker: They were, yeah, you’re right.
Mr Beer: Lastly on this, then, before we break for lunch, can we look at POL00024913. Thank you. This is a formal letter that you sent to Baroness Neville-Rolfe on 4 March 2016. We were looking previously at a Board meeting in January and a meeting with Baroness Neville-Rolfe in January. This is therefore after the 8 February 2016 final report had been provided. You say:
“At our meeting on 26 January 2016, [that’s the one we just referred to] I provided you with an update on the work I have undertaken with the assistance of Jonathan Swift and Christopher Knight, both of 11 [KBW] Chambers to review the Post Office’s handling of complaints made by subpostmasters about the operation of the Horizon software system. I now write to set out further information about the approach to the review, the scope of work undertaken so far, and my initial findings. I also outline my plans to bring the work to a conclusion.
“Before doing so, I wish to stress that this update, and the work which underpins it, reports on the legal advice I am currently receiving and is, accordingly, subject to legal professional privilege and provided in confidence.”
What does that mean, that sentence?
Timothy Parker: I, again, followed the suggested text around legal advice, and there was this concern which I’ve – I think I’ve highlighted around, you know, anything that goes into the hands of ministers and civil servants is potentially disclosable under Freedom of Information, and that seemed to be a concern that generally coloured discussions of this thing.
Mr Beer: In fairness to you, this was a letter drafted for you by Ms MacLeod and the draft of the letter was itself reviewed by Mr Swift before it was signed, and I think you were told by General Counsel that the letter had been amended to reflect amendments that he had suggested. You cover that off in your witness statement at paragraph 65.
Timothy Parker: That’s exactly the case. Yeah.
Mr Beer: The letter continues:
“I am, of course, aware that once the additional strands of work I am pursuing are complete, we will need to find an appropriate method of communicating the results of my review to a wider audience.”
In the first paragraph, you refer to “my initial findings” and in the second paragraph you refer to “my review”. Had you made any findings and had you conducted a review?
Timothy Parker: I think that’s a little semantic. I mean, it was conducted on my behalf and whether I sort of finessed the thing to suggest it was only me or my review, I certainly took responsibility for it, which is the main point, I suspect.
Mr Beer: The purpose of asking the question was not to delve into semantics but was to understand whether you understood this to be your findings and your review, and whether you had the opportunity to disagree with anything that Mr Swift had recommended?
Timothy Parker: I think it’s fair to say that, as I discussed earlier this morning, I thought the Swift Report was a good piece of work and it came out with some good, sensible recommendations which I supported, and I did discuss the report with Jonathan Swift so, at that point, I’m sure I felt happy and willing to take ownership of it.
Mr Beer: You say under “Scope of the Review”, “My objectives were as follows”, and then you set out essentially the term of reference?
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: Then if we go over the page, please, there is then, over the course of four pages, a summary of the headline findings of the review and the recommendations made against each of them. So, to that extent, the Government was informed of headline findings – I’m not going to go through each of them now – and the recommendations made.
If we go to the last page, please, page 4. If we just scroll through so you and others can see the detail that was included in the letter going to Government. Thank you. Stop there. Under “Next steps”:
“I have commissioned independent persons to undertake the necessary work. I am satisfied that they meet the standards of expertise and independence appropriate to the tasks.
“I … share your aim that matters should be drawn to a conclusion as soon as possible consistent with the need for the work that remains to be done to a high standard. I hope that you understand that, particularly in relation to the further testing of the Horizon system, this work may take some time”, there may be a report in May.
Then skipping a paragraph, two matters:
“… as I have noted above, a number of subpostmasters have made applications to the [CCRC] for the circumstances of their convictions to be looked into with a view to those cases being brought back to the Court of Appeal. That work is ongoing. Second, [JFSA] is reported to have received funding to instigate civil proceedings against the Post Office … at the time of writing, no claim has been issued nor any Letter of Claim been received.”
Timothy Parker: Mm-hm.
Mr Beer: So, overall, you were, I think, advised to write a letter of this length and detail – is that right –
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Beer: – and therefore, happy that this information was not itself information which would lose privilege?
Timothy Parker: That’s quite an interesting point and I think the – my sense is that this letter was written, yeah, and it’s quite a good summary, I agree. And – but I think that it’s probably trying to go as far as possible to outline Swift without necessarily handing the report over.
Mr Beer: Thank you.
Sir, it’s 1.10. Can we break now, please, until 2.00?
Sir Wyn Williams: Yes, of course.
Mr Beer: Thank you very much, sir.
The Witness: Thank you.
(1.12 pm)
(The Short Adjournment)
(2.00 pm)
Mr Beer: Good afternoon, sir. Can you see and hear us?
Sir Wyn Williams: Yes.
Mr Beer: Thank you very much.
Mr Parker can we turn to the recommendations, the eight of them that Jonathan Swift made in his review. Who in your view was responsible for determining whether and to what extent the recommendations should be taken forwards?
Timothy Parker: So this responsibility I delegated to the General Counsel.
Mr Beer: Why did you delegate responsibility for deciding which recommendations were to be taken forward to the General Counsel?
Timothy Parker: I rather assumed that all of the recommendations were going to be taken forward.
Mr Beer: So I asked whose responsibility was it for determining which recommendations were taken forward and you said you delegated that to the General Counsel?
Timothy Parker: Ah, I’m sure we discussed it and, obviously, we ended up with a selection of different people looking after different recommendations, as I recall.
Mr Beer: Before coming to the issue of who carried some of the recommendations into effect, was there a person who had a responsibility for determining whether the recommendations were taken forward or not?
Timothy Parker: As I understood it, the General Counsel.
Mr Beer: You also said that you thought that all of them were going to be taken forwards; is that right?
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Beer: So she didn’t have anything to determine?
Timothy Parker: I didn’t think so, no.
Mr Beer: Right.
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Mr Beer: So your understanding was that all eight recommendations were going to be taken forwards. What role did the General Counsel, Jane MacLeod, therefore play?
Timothy Parker: Her role was to work with the relevant parties and report back to me.
Mr Beer: Is that the role that you delegated to her, then –
Timothy Parker: Exactly.
Mr Beer: – rather than deciding which recommendations were or were not taken forwards?
Timothy Parker: I see your point. As I recall, there wasn’t a debate about which recommendations but just to take all of them forward with appropriate parties.
Mr Beer: Did it occur to you that the Board ought to play a role in deciding the extent to which recommendations were taken forwards and, if so, how they were to be taken forwards?
Timothy Parker: We had a situation after the report was completed where, as I think I explained, the report wasn’t shared with the Board and the understanding was the recommendations would be taken forward, and my plan was to share the outputs at that stage. So this was something that went straight from the General Counsel to the relevant parties, and so the Board was not involved, no.
Mr Beer: Was that a product of the legal privilege issue that we discussed this morning?
Timothy Parker: It was the product of the perception that I had with the legal privilege issue, yes.
Mr Beer: Thank you. Can we look, please, at POL00103190, and the bottom email, please, 13 May 2016, Jane MacLeod to you:
“Here is my regular fortnightly update on the progress of your review and the litigation.”
Is it right that she provided an update regularly to you?
Timothy Parker: Yes. I mean, I’m sort of drawing that conclusion from the first sentence, here.
Mr Beer: Was the relationship between you and Jane MacLeod essentially one-to-one, ie you saw her as driving the recommendations forward as appropriate on your behalf?
Timothy Parker: Yes, I think that’s a fair characterisation.
Mr Beer: She says – we can look at these quickly:
“Helpline – In relation to the allegation that our Helpline may have provided incorrect advice to the subpostmasters which resulted in a loss to the accounts, Bond Dickinson (the external firm conducting the work) has now completed its investigations. Although some investigations were limited because certain records are no longer available and there were inaccuracies in the information provided by complainants, their draft report reveals that there is no evidence to support the allegations that have been made. We are currently reviewing the report ahead of sharing it with Jonathan Swift to seek his view as to whether it sufficiently discharges his recommend in this areas, but we are confident that it should.”
Then:
“Horizon System – We have had further meetings with Deloitte in relation to the extent of the work necessary to discharge Jonathan’s 3 recommendations on the testing of Horizon, and they have begun work on the substantive phase of that work. It is, by its nature, an iterative process in that, dependent on early results, further decisions then need to be made on whether or not to explore further … I have asked the new [CIO], Rob Houghton, to review the process undertaken by Deloitte, to sense check these further decisions.
“Suspense accounts – … Deloitte are also conducting the work, into the existence and nature of the relationship between [Post Office’s] suspense accounts and specific branch accounts over the relevant period. This is a materially different exercise to the IT testing, and I understand that most of the relevant accounting processes were/are paper-based records and manual reconciliations …
“Prosecution practice – Jonathan Swift has confirmed that Brian Altman can limit his initial review to those 19 cases presenting the specific features of double charges in question, and decide on the basis of those findings whether to extend the exercise. That work is ongoing.”
If we go back to the top of the page, page 1, you say:
“I think there will be frustration at the time this is taking (indeed I am also beginning to get somewhat frustrated). So what is now the projected timetable for completion on the components of the action list?”
Does that reflect the fact that the report had been provided to you in draft in January, in final version on the 8 February, and it was now mid-May, and the work was inchoate?
Timothy Parker: I think that’s true. That’s what I was expressing at the time.
Mr Beer: Did you pick up from the chain that the recommendations made by Mr Swift were being trimmed?
Timothy Parker: No. Not especially. Why – what is behind the –
Mr Beer: Altered?
Timothy Parker: I don’t think so.
Mr Beer: I mean, to take an example, over the page, “Prosecution Practice”:
“… Swift has confirmed that [Altman] can limit his review to 19 cases presenting specific features and then decide on the basis of those features whether to extend the exercise.”
That wasn’t of the initial recommendation. The recommendation was to review all of the cases, if you remember the recommendation number 1 and 2.
Timothy Parker: I see your point. I think I would have taken that at face value to mean that she had talked to Jonathan Swift and, between them, they’d taken a view that that was going to respond to the recommendation adequately. I hadn’t picked up, to be honest, that things were being, to use your phrase, trimmed, as such.
Mr Beer: Can we go forwards, please, to POL00241554. We can see at the foot of the page your email, “there will … be frustration”, yes?
Timothy Parker: Yeah, yeah.
Mr Beer: Then top of the page, please. You’ll see that Jane MacLeod forwards the email to – circulates the email to a small team of people: Patrick Bourke, Mark Underwood and Rodric Williams.
Timothy Parker: The very same people who received the copy of the original Swift Report.
Mr Beer: So it’s the same select few?
Timothy Parker: Exactly.
Mr Beer: “Please see email from Tim below.
“I think it would be helpful to be able to respond with the status of each of the 8(?) actions that were being carried forward, a description of the remaining work and the expected completion time.
“… we should consider the work being done by Deloitte and how far we want to address the questions posed by Jonathan.”
Just stopping there, was it for this small team to decide how far “we” – presumably the four of them – want to go to address the questions posed by Jonathan Swift?
Timothy Parker: So I think I come back to where I started on this, which is that I assumed – perhaps wrongly in retrospect – but I assumed that the General Counsel’s team were (a) competent, (b) would do things in good faith, and (c) would respond effectively to the recommendations of the report.
Now, you know, when you get to see these emails that are shown to me, or form part of the evidence base which are what’s going on, as it were, behind the scenes, it kind of puts a different complexion on things, a little bit. So the reason I mention all of that is that, you know, I’m expressing to you what seemed to me to be the case. Behind the scenes, of course, you find that, you know, the motives for doing things perhaps are not quite as straightforward as one might have imagined.
Mr Beer: There’s no suggestion from me, at least, that this email was provided to you. Was it right for this team to be seemingly determining whether the recommendations were taken forwards and, if so, in what way?
Timothy Parker: So in the world that I normally exist in, I have people working for me, and they have a job to do, and if I ask them to do a job they understand and it’s correctly specified. Until I got to the Post Office, I think I’m right in saying that, throughout my career, I have found that people went and did what was asked of them with suitable determination and suitable application of their abilities.
And so you – in retrospect, you might say, well, these are not the right people because here we are at the Post Office. But I can only tell you that, under normal conditions, they should and would have been the right people and could well have carried out these recommendations effectively.
Mr Beer: Can I ask you two questions arising from that. Do I take it from that answer that, if you had known that this small team had taken upon itself the function of deciding how far to go to discharge a recommendation, you would have had something to say about it?
Timothy Parker: I would have been concerned. I mean, it was straightforward, “Here are the recommendations”, you know, “Let’s go and do something about them”.
Mr Beer: The second thing is that you didn’t, therefore, know at the time that this subsurface internal debate within a select team within Post Office was going on?
Timothy Parker: No.
Mr Beer: The email continues:
“Given the litigation, I suspect there is even less we are going to be able to say about the results of the further work, so we need to consider the value to be obtained from each step.”
Again, that’s a similar point, ie the team determining value to be obtained from further work, in part based on the extent to which something can be said about the results of it. Does the same answer that you gave a moment ago apply?
Timothy Parker: I can see your point. If I may make one general observation about this sort of backward-looking, what were people doing eight years ago, type of thing, you can only look at the evidence that you have on a piece of paper and people write sentences which can or cannot reflect truly what was going on. So I’m not here to, you know, doubt what is actually written here. But sometimes things that are recorded don’t exactly reflect what people were doing at the time. I don’t know in this case but I just think it’s worth bearing in mind that you cannot take every sentence that is written and that you read as gospel in this context.
Mr Beer: That’s certainly the case: a number of people have sat in your chair and said that what they wrote does not reflect what they meant at all.
Timothy Parker: Um, very good!
Mr Beer: Can we move on to POL00103214. Look at page 2, please, and just scroll down. Thank you.
It’s an email later that month, we were just looking at 14 May, we’re now looking at 27 May, to you, and Ms MacLeod says:
“As flagged at the Board letter this week, I hosted a call with Jonathan Swift today ask what, in his view, would be a reasonable course of action for you to take in relation to his recommendations as to the further lines of inquiry which could be undertaken, now that the [Post Office] faces litigation covering essentially the same ground.”
So just stopping there, can you recall who told you and how about litigation being threatened against the Post Office on behalf of subpostmasters?
Timothy Parker: I believe I must have been told, at some point after the receipt of the letter of claim – now the letter of claim I think came in the middle of April or end of April, something like that.
Mr Beer: Can you recall whether you were told that this may have an impact on the extent to which the eight Swift recommendations could be carried into effect?
Timothy Parker: I can’t, to be honest. I can’t tell you whether this was the first, you know, glimmer of this happening.
Mr Beer: That’s essentially what I’m driving at.
Timothy Parker: Honestly, I can’t tell you for sure.
Mr Beer: In any event, Ms MacLeod reports:
“In summary, Jonathan felt that Tony (that should be de Garr Robinson QC] (the barrister retained to advise [Post Office] on its defence to the proceedings) should first be requested to advise [Post Office] whether in light of the litigation, the various works teams should be continued, paused or redefined.”
That’s essentially telling you that she went off to Mr Swift, who said, “Don’t ask me in the first instance, go to the person that’s conducting the civil litigation, de Garr Robinson QC, and ask him”, yes?
Timothy Parker: That is exactly as I understood with hindsight is what happened, yes.
Mr Beer: “We will send instructions to [Mr de Garr Robinson] early next week and expect to have this advice relatively quickly. Once this advice has been received, Jonathan has said that he would be happy to discuss with you how best to take this forward in the context of your review, as well as considering how to position this with [Baroness Neville-Rolfe] and others with knowledge of and interest in the review.”
Was this your main means of communication with Jane MacLeod, ie email, rather than attending the office and having meetings?
Timothy Parker: I’m sure we spoke about it. I’m sure she just sent me an email about it.
Mr Beer: You think there was discussion outside of the email as well?
Timothy Parker: I honestly can’t confirm that.
Mr Beer: Can we go forward to page 1, please, and scroll down. On 10 June, Jane MacLeod writes further to the email we’ve just looked at, and says:
“… we met with Tony [de Garr] Robinson last night to discuss the Postmaster Litigation. In the course of that discussion we asked him for his advice as to whether the work being undertaken for the purposes of your review should be continued.
“His strong advice was that the work being undertaken under the aegis of your review should not continue in the light of the litigation. However, he also recommended that the subject matter of that work should continue, provided it is rescoped and re-instructed for the purposes of the litigation.
“Clearly you will need to inform the Minister and we will prepare a form of words …”
Over the page, sign-off from Jane MacLeod.
Then top of the page 1:
“Let us meet to discuss on Thursday.”
Yes?
Timothy Parker: Looks that way, yes.
Mr Beer: Now, the Swift Review was a significant piece of work, wasn’t it?
Timothy Parker: It was.
Mr Beer: It contained recommendations that went to the issue of uncovering potential miscarriages of justice?
Timothy Parker: It did.
Mr Beer: It plainly took a long time to research and complete and it was a comprehensive report, wasn’t it?
Timothy Parker: Mm-hm, indeed.
Mr Beer: Given that one of the reasons for undertaking the review and some of the recommendations from it related to matters touching on the safety of criminal convictions, did it occur to you that undertaking the recommendations through the aegis of civil litigation against the Post Office was not the right way forwards?
Timothy Parker: So I think we’re back to this question of, in this kind of situation, which I had very little experience of hitherto, receiving advice from senior counsel on a legal matter, very strong advice, apparently, I took that advice and I assumed – perhaps erroneously – that the General Counsel, who also herself was a lawyer, would have considered and appreciated any implications, ramifications of doing this, in terms of how the Swift Report was carried forward.
So it’s a very difficult question because, you know, when you look at these things in hindsight, you say, well, you could have spent some more time discussing it, or you could have had your own view, or you could have done this. The problem with experts or specialists is, how do you judge the view of the specialist? Do you get another specialist to advise you on the specialist or do you draw the conclusion that your judgement of the specialist was wrong and the specialist you got is no good, or that the General Counsel who was advising you is somehow incompetent, or the whole bunch of them have somehow, some rather nefarious underhand objective of potentially holding things up?
I’m not sure. But, at the time, I took at face value what I thought was good advice and the right advice from people who apparently were qualified to give it.
Mr Beer: So is a summary of that answer that you thought it reasonable to rely on the advice of your General Counsel who had asked the silk the very question that you needed to be answered, and he had provided an advice which was said to be very strong?
Timothy Parker: I am – all I’m saying – and you’re right, it’s not a bad summary of my 10 or 12 sentences – that whether it came from Mr Swift or and with Jane MacLeod, they’re both lawyers, they both understand what’s in the report, they are and were both qualified or – and certainly he was – to give a view. Yes.
Mr Beer: Do I take it that it didn’t occur at the time that what might be in Post Office’s narrow interests in the conduct of the civil litigation might not be in the wider interests of wrongly convicted subpostmasters?
Timothy Parker: So I think we’re touching on this question of – with hindsight, of course, it would appear that there were motives perhaps underpinning some of the advice or the direction of this that were not wholly fair or right or in the interests of people who had been wronged. At the time, however, it seemed to me that the people giving me advice should be and were doing this in good faith, and it was the right thing to do.
Mr Beer: Thank you, can we move forwards. POL00242402. If we can go to page 4, please, this is a chain that you’re not copied in on but it attributes to you and to the Post Office some beliefs or intentions. So I want to ask you about them. It’s 8 June now, an email from Andrew Parsons, the partner at the firm of solicitors that the Post Office was using to defend the threatened litigation, to Anthony de Garr Robinson, and he says:
“Tony
“I met with the Post Office litigation steering group yesterday.”
Just stop there: were you a member of the litigation steering group?
Timothy Parker: I wasn’t.
Mr Beer: Do you know who it consisted of?
Timothy Parker: I do. I’d have to have a piece of paper in front of me but, in summary, it was a collection of Post Office Executives and specialists and legal people.
Mr Beer: “Their approach to [Jonathan Swift’s] recommendations has shifted slightly.
“Tim Parker … feels that he has made a commitment to Baroness Neville-Rolfe … to follow through on the [Swift] recommendations unless he is presented with a persuasive case not to do so.”
Is that accurate, that you felt at this time that you’d made a commitment to the Minister to follow through on the recommendations, unless you were presented with a persuasive case not to?
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Mr Beer: So that’s accurate. Then:
“[Post Office] are … looking to us (and quite frankly you with your magic QC seal!) to give them some reasons for why Tim completing the [Swift] recommendations would be ill-advised.”
First, Post Office are looking to us, ie to the lawyers and to Mr de Garr Robinson, to sprinkle some magic dust on the answer –
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: – for reasons why completion of the recommendations would be ill-advised. Was that a message that came from you?
Timothy Parker: You mean this, about magic QC seals and –
Mr Beer: No, put aside the magic QC seal. The description of Post Office are looking to us for reasons not to complete the recommendations.
Timothy Parker: Yeah, well, you know, again, as you said at the outset, this is something that’s going on without my knowledge.
Mr Beer: That was the question –
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Beer: – was this going on without your knowledge?
Timothy Parker: No, and, just to be clear, it was without my knowledge.
Mr Beer: So you weren’t looking for lawyers to come up with reasons not to do or undertake the Swift recommendations?
Timothy Parker: No.
Mr Beer: Do you know who was? It’s described here as “POL are looking to us”.
Timothy Parker: Yes, I see that. I certainly wasn’t part of the “Hey, you know, can you get Tony to give us some reasons why we should let up on this”.
Mr Beer: Yes, some top cover –
Timothy Parker: No.
Mr Beer: – some legal insurance, or some other such phrases I’ve heard in my career. That wasn’t coming from you?
Timothy Parker: That wasn’t coming from me.
Mr Beer: Did you know, in any way, that there was a group of people within the Post Office looking to stifle or end the carrying into effect of the Swift recommendations?
Timothy Parker: The answer to that question is no.
Mr Beer: If we scroll down:
“… the recommendations we are talking about are”, and then they’re set out, 1, 2 and 3:
“My view [that’s Mr Parson’s view] is that these three recommendations plainly overlap with the issues in the litigation. I can see three reasons why Tim should not ‘conduct’ the above investigations:
“1. We, the litigation team, will need to investigate these points … We will probably need to do this on a different timetable to Tim (we having a degree of time pressure; Tim under less time pressure). We will also probably require a more robust investigation given that these points could be tested in court. Two parallel reviews would be wasteful and could cause unknown complications should they reach contradictory results.”
Was any of this reasoning explained to you for not simply carrying into effect the Swift recommendations?
Timothy Parker: No. I had certainly not this kind of rationale, no.
Mr Beer: “2. If these investigations are conducted by Tim there is a greater risk that this work is not privileged … It would be much safer for these investigations to be conducted as part of the litigation.”
Was that explained to you?
Timothy Parker: No. I think the one – you know, the one sort of view I had was that this review should be stopped and repurposed as part of the litigation and, because of the litigation, the work would continue to be privileged.
Mr Beer: “3. Even if the risk in 2 above could be guarded against (say by classing it as part of the [Jonathan Swift’s] ongoing advice to [Tim Parker] – questionable???), I cannot see how [Tim Parker] could disclose the results of these investigations to [the Department] without a risk of waiving privilege (particularly where there is a possibility that [Baroness Neville-Rolfe] may then speak to James Arbuthnot or [Post Office/BIS] could be the subject of a [FOIA] request.”
Was that explained to you as a reason for not carrying into effect the Swift recommendations or any of them?
Timothy Parker: No, essentially what I got out of all that was what you saw in, you know, a couple of papers ago, which is the strong – the – I can’t remember the exact description, but it was something like the “strong advice” – on the strong advice of senior counsel, the work should be discontinued and repurposed. I can’t remember the exact form of words but that is the advice that I received.
Mr Beer: “If we can give [Post Office] a piece of advice that says [you] should stop any further work, [you] would then feel empowered to say to [the Department] that, on the basis of legal advice, he is ceasing his review. I’m conscious that this feels somewhat unpleasant in that we are being asked to provide political cover for [Tim Parker]. However … shutting down [Tim Parker’s] review is, in my view, still the right thing to do.”
The way that last paragraph reads, would you agree, is it implicates you somewhat in the making of the request?
Timothy Parker: Well, I mean, I certainly was not aware of all of this stuff going on, as it were, and it certainly looks a little bit like, you know, these guys are marionettes and I’m doing my little thing in response to bits and pieces that they’re putting forward. And that’s, you know, very disappointing with hindsight because you – as I was explaining earlier, you expect to get advice from lawyers in good faith, you know, good motives and a good rationale, and I assumed that was what I was getting.
Mr Beer: So, directly to answer my point, to the extent that this last paragraph implicates you, in the sense that it says that you would feel empowered to say, on the basis of legal advice, you are ceasing your review, and that they, the lawyers, are being asked to provide political cover for you, neither of those things are things that you asked for?
Timothy Parker: No. I got the advice and then used it, you know, used the advice to essentially communicate with BEIS.
Mr Beer: So you weren’t –
Timothy Parker: It wasn’t – I didn’t feel empowered myself. I wasn’t aware of being empowered, because, you know, I wanted a reason to go and tell BEIS the thing was being discontinued. I received that advice and, as a result of getting that advice, I went and then communicated it to the civil servants and onwards to the Minister.
Mr Beer: Can we move forward, please, to POL00242552.
If we just go to page 3, please. Just to remind you, the foot of page 3:
“we met with Tony Robinson [sic] to discuss the Postmaster Litigation.”
Second paragraph:
“His strong advice was that work being undertaken under the aegis of your review should not continue …”
Yes –
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Beer: – 10 June? Then page 2 at the bottom, please, 14 June, “See below”, that’s that chain, and your reply saying, “Let’s discuss on Thursday”. Jane MacLeod and Rodric Williams and Patrick Bourke in email discussion:
“… Any approved messaging we want to get across?”
Did you know that the small select team were formulating messaging for you?
Timothy Parker: No.
Mr Beer: Up the page, please:
“In terms of messages to Tim and from Tim to [Baroness Neville-Rolfe], I think we’re going to have to address the issue head on: the litigation makes the Review irrelevant since the issues to be considered will be put to a higher standard of testing in the courts …”
Was that ever explained to you, that the review was now irrelevant?
Timothy Parker: I can’t remember that it was explained in those terms, no.
Mr Beer: Because of, it is said, a higher standard of testing in the courts; that wasn’t ever explained to you?
Timothy Parker: I can’t be sure. I mean, I think the main reason this ended up where it did was the advice I referred to earlier, which is the strong advice from external counsel.
Whether or not this was added, you know, as a sort of rationale, I can’t be sure.
Mr Beer: The email continues:
“… to continue would be fruitless since we couldn’t use its output, senseless in terms of expenditure, and present unnecessary risk to the organisation’s legal position.”
Were those reasons for the review being irrelevant put to you?
Timothy Parker: No.
Mr Beer: “It is, to my mind, in any event, now clearer than ever that Review (or indeed any other exercise not involving a third party adjudicator (not mediator)) just isn’t capable of putting these issues to bed in the minds of some. That does not need to be pitched as a bad thing: yes, it frustrates the Review and is ‘uncomfortable’, but it has the clear merit of being independently determined and final. Indeed, before you joined I was racking my brain, with others, about how we might find a way of getting these cases or one of them to the court. None of this [is] new, but I do think the trick will be in the ‘sell’. Anyway that’s my view …”
Was it explained to you that the view was irrelevant because it wasn’t capable of putting issues to bed in the minds of some?
Timothy Parker: All of these ruminations which is from – is it Patrick Bourke?
Mr Beer: Yes, this is –
Timothy Parker: Patrick Bourke – you know, I had, as I’ve explained twice – the way it was represented to me was that de Garr Robinson, who was the senior counsel, advised, on strong advice, that the report should be discontinued and repurposed. I can’t ever remember receiving all of the – you know, the product of this kind of thought piece or whatever, you know, justificatory type logic, no.
Mr Beer: It might not just be a thought piece of justificatory logic, it might be revelatory of the true reasons operating on some people’s minds for not continuing with the Swift recommendations and they were instead badged up to you as needing to be stopped because a silk had said so in strong terms?
Timothy Parker: You know, it looks that way, doesn’t it?
Mr Beer: Thank you very much. They’re the only questions I’m going to ask you about the Swift Review.
Can we turn to a separate topic, please the conduct of the Group Litigation. You’ve addressed this in very considerable detail in your witness statement and, therefore, I’m not going to ask you about a lot of it because you have exhibited to your witness statement a very large volume of contemporaneous material that explains your conduct and the conduct of those around, you.
Timothy Parker: Mm, mm.
Mr Beer: Just a few topics, if I may. Firstly, can we look, please, at the one of the first excursions into court and the outcome of it, namely the strikeout application, by looking at POL00103351, and look at the foot of the page, please. We’re now in October 2018. It’s an email to you, copied to others, from Jane MacLeod and she says:
“I understand Tom Cooper has recommended you read the judgment from the hearing last week.”
It’s attached:
“We received the decision on Monday evening and the decision rejects our application for strikeout of the significant parts of the evidence [‘contained’, I think that should say] in the claimants’ witness statements.
“The application was decided on case management grounds for which the managing judge has considerable discretion; applying that discretion, the managing judge set a very high threshold for strikeout, and concluded that we had not established to the necessary standard that the claimants’ evidence could never be relevant to the case, given the number of Common Issues; the ‘considerable legal analysis’ each will require; and what our case on those issues is … he confirmed that he will apply properly the law on admissibility when it comes to trial, and the November 2018 Common Issues Trial will not rule on matters which concern Horizon or whether Post Office actually ‘breached’ its obligations to the claimants (matters to which most of the disputed evidence goes and which will be dealt with in later trials).
“As previously advised, this is consistent with the managing judge’s approach of wanting to give the claimants their ‘day in court’ while applying the orthodox legal position. That said, we lost the application and can expect the claimants to be awarded their costs when that question is dealt with on the first day of the trial (estimated to be £120,000).
“In deciding the application, the managing judge was critical about conduct of the case (see particularly paragraphs 55-57), including intimating that we were not acting go relatively and constructively in trying to resolve this litigation (which criticism was levelled equally between the parties); and that we had impugned the court and its processes by making the application for improper purposes. This response is extremely disappointing given the approach that we have been adopting, and his challenge as to the purpose which we had applied for strike out is at odds with comments he made during the various procedural hearings over the past year. Nevertheless, we are refining our preparation for trial – including our reactive communications plan – in the context of the judge’s remarks.”
Then back to page 1. You say:
“Thanks … I’ve read the judgment, and the judge does seem to be somewhat negative about our efforts to take out elements of the evidence, even if he does acknowledge that both sides have been uncooperative with each other in the management of the case. My worry is that some of his points at the end betray what looks like an inherent dislike of our ‘aggressive’ approach to the individual claimants as well as an ‘aggressive’ approach to litigation, as well as a rap over the knuckles regarding what the judge sees as using negative PR as part of our argument. Interesting to know whether this initial response from him suggests any change of tack on our part.”
So I think would it be fair to say you were concerned about the judge’s criticism of the Post Office?
Timothy Parker: Yes. Was this – just to be clear, was this the case management conference number 2? I’m just trying to, you know, get the chronology. So we had case management conference number 1, at which point he was quite critical of both parties, who he said were being uncooperative.
Mr Beer: I think that was in March ‘17?
Timothy Parker: And this is number 2, is it?
Mr Beer: I don’t think it’s CMC number 2. I think’s a separate strikeout application.
Timothy Parker: Okay, so progressively the judge, as I read things, became more critical and what began as a sort of fairly even-handed criticism of both parties, I think, by this time he, you know, had started to become somewhat critical of the Post Office, and that’s why I suspect I asked, you know, “So what do people think of this, actually?”
Mr Beer: The words that were reported to you and which appear in the judgment – namely that the Post Office had made the application for “improper purposes” – are quite strong, aren’t they?
Timothy Parker: They are, and also, one of our people apparently – this is the PR reference – I think said something like they felt some of the additional evidence could potentially damage the reputation. I can’t remember what the – so I knew what the issues were and that was really why I was asking the question.
Mr Beer: So you say at the end:
“Interesting to know if this initial response from him suggests any change of tack on our part.”
Is that a question back to Jane MacLeod?
Timothy Parker: Yes. I think – you know, and obviously – without wanting to sort of immediately prod and say, “Look it looks like you’re wrong”, I’m inviting a comment.
Mr Beer: That leads me to the question: what role did you play, therefore, in setting or amending the Post Office’s strategy in the Group Litigation?
Timothy Parker: So I think you’ll see, I don’t know if there’s another email chain subsequently, where the point is made to Jane, and there are various responses around a change of tack, et cetera, et cetera. Somewhere, I think.
Mr Beer: I think that’s much later.
Timothy Parker: Is it? I’m sorry, there’s so many documents it’s hard to –
Mr Beer: Yes.
Timothy Parker: So I’m not – I mean, I can’t tell you, if we don’t have any documents, exactly what the output of this was. At this stage, you know, there’s obviously some concern, but – and the point has been made. I’m not quite sure what happened as a consequence of me inviting some kind of response here.
Mr Beer: So back to the question of what role did you perform: you weren’t a member of the litigation steering committee?
Timothy Parker: Well, by this time, I may be wrong, this is 2018 –
Mr Beer: October ‘18.
Timothy Parker: – we had formed the Board subcommittee and so I’m not quite sure whether this is in the context of the executives or whether this is something that was going through the Board committee. I would presume that this was an exchange between myself and the executives.
Mr Beer: Is that because of those that are copied in on it?
Timothy Parker: I’m assuming that, yeah.
Mr Beer: Again, approaching the question from a different perspective, who determined the Post Office’s litigation strategy?
Timothy Parker: So, at that point, we had a board subcommittee and the arrangement was that the executives managed the day-to-day elements of the litigation and were required to escalate any significant decisions to the Board’s subcommittee.
Mr Beer: Did Government have any role in the strategy that the Post Office took to the litigation?
Timothy Parker: Well, Tom Cooper was a member of the Board subcommittee, and one of the key reasons he was a member of the Board subcommittee was because he was the BEIS representative on the Board.
Mr Beer: Can we turn forwards, then, to POL00103352, foot of the page. Same day, 18 October, 10.30:
“Tim
“Have you seen the judgment from the other day? It’s worth a read.”
Then further up the page, your reply, same day, at 2.00:
“I’ve now read it. Judge is critical of both parties, but already sense he is not well disposed to us – the word ‘aggressive’ is used a couple of times in connection with us, in relation to the inadmissible evidence claim, and the treatment of [a subpostmaster]. The tone of his comments on the comments at the end, on the Common Issues trial, and the purported objection on our part for PR reasons, is definitely not helpful. I’ve asked for an update on whether this ruling and its tone, suggests any change of tack.”
Timothy Parker: Yes, so that was the chain that I was referring to earlier, where I think we picked up, you know, the critical comments of the judge, and at that point was asking, “So, guys, what are you going to do about this?”
Mr Beer: So what happened as a result? You’ve asked directly Jane MacLeod, copied to Paula Vennells, does what has happened on this occasion, resulting in the publication of this judgment, suggest a change of tack? UKGI have sent the same judgment to you, saying it’s an interesting read. You’ve replied saying exactly what you’ve done. What happened?
Timothy Parker: Yeah, so Tom and I were colleagues on this committee and I don’t know if someone can bring it up, but there is a subsequent email chain and someone has spoken to Jane, and I think it was Paula Vennells summarised a list of outputs from that discussion, which – I can’t remember which document is relevant to this. But there is one.
Mr Beer: I will endeavour to search for that whilst other people ask you some questions because I don’t have it at my fingertips at the moment.
So is the answer, then, that the primary vehicle for setting the strategy was the subcommittee?
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Beer: But there were back channels of communication, such as this one, in which members of the subcommittee communicate?
Timothy Parker: Yes, I think the broad – I can’t remember the – there is a document somewhere with the terms of reference of the subcommittee and, from memory, it makes fairly clear that the management of the litigation is by the subcommittee and executives, who manage the thing on a day-to-day basis, need to escalate matters to the committee as appropriate.
Mr Beer: We shouldn’t see this kind of communication as the – a means at which strategy was decided or carried into effect?
Timothy Parker: Well, I suppose in a way you’ve got myself, Tom Cooper and I’m not sure if, at some juncture, Ken McCall, who was the – another member of the committee – would have been involved in this, but, I mean, it at least is being dealt with and two significant members of the committee are aware of it.
Mr Beer: Thank you. Can we move forwards, please, to March 2019, to look at the recusal application. Can we start by looking at POL00023898, and look at page 2, please. An email of 15 March 2019 from Jane MacLeod to you, Tom Cooper and Alisdair Cameron. She says:
“As flagged on the Board call on Tuesday, we have sought further advice on appeals and as to whether we have grounds to request the judge to recuse himself on the grounds of bias.”
So I think the Board call previously was the Tuesday of that week:
“We sought advice from Lord Neuberger who stepped down last year as President of the Supreme Court (and … was the highest judge in the [United Kingdon]). We sought his views as to whether the draft judgment demonstrated the following grounds for appeal:
“Whether the injured has correctly interpreted and applied the law as to construction of a document or application of a principle of law;
“Whether there are grounds to argue that findings have been made as a result of serious procedural irregularity (which goes to the admission of, and reliance on, among other issues, inadmissible evidence); and
“(most urgently) Whether Mr Justice Fraser demonstrated grounds on which we could apply for him to recuse himself.
“The test for recusal is ‘whether the fair-minded and informed observer, having considered the facts, would conclude that there is a real possibility that the [judge] was biased’.
“Attached is Lord Neuberger’s preliminary [note] ([the note he refers to is] put together by David Cavender summarising the key extracts of the judgment and trial transcript). As you will see in paragraph 5 [he] states that although he has only looked at the issues very cursorily ‘at least some of them raise quite significant points on which the [Post Office] has a reasonable case, and at least on the face of it, some points on which the [Post Office] has a pretty strong case’.
“… he suggests that if we wish to rely on the ground of procedural unfairness at an appeal, then ‘Post Office has little option but to seek to get the judge to recuse himself at this stage’ and in paragraph 20 that if we fail to act promptly … we ‘risk being held to have waived [our] rights, or at least weakened our position on the recusal issue’.”
There is a timetable.
The risks are:
“[If] The application is successful and the … trial is adjourned … we proceed with an appeal on the Common Issues Trial … and a new judge is put in place …
“The application is unsuccessful … then it is likely that the judge is further antagonised, however he will be aware that the Common Issues trial is progressing which includes ‘procedural unfairness’ assertion. Possible impact in that scenario is that the judge is more cautious to as behaviours to (possibly) [Post Office’s] benefit.”
Over the page:
“The theoretical downside to a recusal application is that it fails and that Fraser remains the judge at Trial 3 which will require multiple findings of fact which are more tricky to appeal.
“We should also not proceed with this course of action unless we are prepared to appeal a decision by him not to recuse himself.
“… I propose today to brief a further senior silk (probably Lord Grabiner) to act on the recusal application …
“Next steps
“… this is clearly a Board decision and we would need to give the Board time to consider the options …”
Then some practical arrangements given that Lord Neuberger was in Argentina.
Do you recall the issue of the recusal of Mr Justice Fraser being raised in this way?
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Beer: What was your initial reaction, if you had one, to the suggestion that the Post Office should apply to a judge to recuse himself on the grounds that he was apparently biased?
Timothy Parker: If I’m honest, an element of unease. In a way, this is – it’s a bit analogous to what I mentioned at the outset of today, which is one of the things that would have held to frame this kind of decision and, indeed, the decision that were made at the beginning of this thing, would have been to know, for example, exactly how many postmasters had been convicted and, in the same way, in a funny kind of way, this – if I had had some meaningful statistics, I think if all of us had had some meaningful statistics about how often judges are recused, we might have looked at this in a slightly different way because I have a suspicion it isn’t very often.
And I think one of the problems was that, you know, if you take advice out of the context of the frequency of the events you’re trying to evaluate, you sometimes end up with a slightly distorted view of things. And so, you know, my gut feel – and I’d had something to do with judges – was this, you know – I was a little bit uneasy. I have to say.
Mr Beer: What was the cause of your unease?
Timothy Parker: Simply the fact that, you know, it’s quite a big deal to get a judge to accept that they had made a judgment that was wrong on technical grounds.
Mr Beer: Can we go forwards, please, to POL00103446, and scroll down to the foot of that page, please. Thank you. Slightly difficult to decode exactly what’s going on but it’s an email to you of 16 March, and Jane MacLeod says:
“Below is my high level summary of the call today.”
If we go to the foot of that page there, where the summary begins:
“Participants: Kelly Tolhurst MP, Tom Cooper (UKGI), Gavin Lambert (BEIS), [you], Al Cameron, Jane MacLeod …”
Then the text of Jane MacLeod’s high level summary commences, and it goes over the page, and if we go to page 3, please, and if we look at the second bullet point down.
“TP [that’s you] replied that we have a Board call on Monday evening at which we will discuss issues around the judge’s bias and how that could impact subsequent trials. Although his [your] initial reaction is that this is not something the Board is likely to want to do, the Board must act in the best interests of the company so we need to consider that option seriously. If we are to make the application, we understand that it must be made urgently and should not be delayed”, et cetera.
Firstly, why were you having a meeting or a call with Kelly Tolhurst MP about, amongst other things, the judge’s recusal?
Timothy Parker: Well, by that time – so just to give the background, so Tom Cooper was a member of the Post Office litigation subcommittee and, by that time, because not least the judgment in the Common Issues trial had been received, and it was so damning, by that time, I think the department was becoming worried, concerned and wanted a higher level of involvement. And Kelly Tolhurst was a relatively new – because it was a fairly actively fast resolving door over there – she was the relatively new Parliamentary Undersecretary of State at what was called BEIS at that time, I think.
So the reason she was involved was that, you know, Tom, I think, felt it was necessary to get the Minister directly aware and involved in potential decisions that were being made around the judge’s recusal.
Mr Beer: What part did Government therefore play in deciding whether to apply for the judge’s recusal?
Timothy Parker: My assumption is – and I’ve no means of telling from this or indeed where I sit now – is that Tom Cooper’s role was as the Department’s representative on the Board and this Board subcommittee. As it happens, he recused himself from the decision because – I can’t remember, there was, you know, some reason about the executive and the judiciary, and stuff like that but, essentially, you know, he would have been the conduit through which I would have assumed we were getting a departmental view.
Mr Beer: Why did Post Office need a departmental view on whether to apply for a judge to recuse himself?
Timothy Parker: Well, I think this was simply an example of where matters had got very serious. So you have to see things in the context of the litigation producing an output from the first trial that was a loss on virtually every count, and our sole shareholder beginning to get concerned, from all sorts of points of view, not least, I imagine, they could see that there would be a significant reputation, significant cost, all sorts of things.
Mr Beer: Was it right that your initial reaction, as is recorded here, is that this, ie applying to recuse the judge, was not something that the Board was likely to want to do?
Timothy Parker: For the reasons I was trying to express earlier, I think most of us – I’m trying not to be overly complimentary, Sir Wyn, most of us think that judges usually get it right and, you know, have an inherent respect for the judiciary. So it would have excited a certain amount of unease in most people, I think, to suggest that, you know, the judge had got it wrong.
Mr Beer: And was biased?
Timothy Parker: Or was – and/or biased.
Mr Beer: What changed, to your understanding, from your unease at making the application and your reporting that this was something that the Board was not likely to want to do, to the making of the application?
Timothy Parker: So the first point I should make, you know, is that I also recused myself from the decision –
Mr Beer: But just to stop there, that was because of your role as Chair of HMCTS?
Timothy Parker: At HMCTS. But, put that to one side, I was there and I would have been involved in that discussion and, you know, I’m not trying to back out of this thing. So we had advice from two sources. We had advice from Neuberger and we had advice from Grabiner. Grabiner’s advice was pretty strong, actually. I think he said something along the lines of we had a duty, almost, to ask for the judge’s recusal, and –
Mr Beer: Stopping there, what did you understand – you’re right, he did say that – what did you understand him to mean by that the Post Office was under a duty?
Timothy Parker: I can’t recall the detail exactly but the way the advice was framed was that, you know, we kind of almost – to ensure the – you know, the business of the administration of the law required us, where we thought something had been incorrectly managed, for whatever reason, we needed to act upon that.
Mr Beer: Just stopping there, and can I put two potential hypotheses to you in terms of the Post Office was under a duty to apply: one could mean that the Post Office was, as a matter of company law, its directors, it owed a duty to make the application in discharge of its duties to its shareholder?
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: Alternatively, it could mean that, if you wished to win this litigation in the final result, procedurally, you are under an obligation to take this point now and not wait until you appeal the substance. Can you recall whether you formed a view as to in what sense you were under a duty to make the application?
Timothy Parker: Honestly, I can’t, at this distance. But I think – I don’t want to make too much of this duty thing. I think we just got advice from two very, very senior lawyers and felt, on balance, that advice should be taken.
Mr Beer: So, in answer to my question, the thing that changed was legal advice from two very senior lawyers, one of whom said that the Post Office was under a duty to make the application?
Timothy Parker: That’s a fair description of what happened.
Mr Beer: Thank you very much.
The last topic, please. You told us earlier that you were not aware of concerns being raised about the Fujitsu employee, Gareth Jenkins, giving evidence in court in Post Office prosecutions that may have been false or incomplete –
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: – until much later on?
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: You couldn’t remember when.
Timothy Parker: Mm, mm.
Mr Beer: Can I ask directly, then, that we look at POL00006357. Thank you.
If we just go to the last page, which is page 14, and the foot of the page, we can see this is an advice of 15 July, written by Simon Clarke, in a firm of solicitors that the Post Office used, Cartwright King, to advise it on matters relating to the prosecution of subpostmasters.
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: If we go back to page 1, it’s advice on the use of expert evidence relating to the integrity of the Fujitsu Services Limited Horizon system.
If we just look at page 13, please, and the author says:
“What does all this mean? It means that [Mr Jenkins] has not complied with his duty to the court, the prosecution or the defence …
“38. The reasons as to why [Mr] Jenkins failed to comply with his duty are beyond the scope of this review. The effects of that failure, however, must be considered …
“[1] [Mr] Jenkins failed to disclose material known to him but which undermines his expert opinion … in plain breach of his duty as an expert evidence.
“Accordingly [his] credibility as an expert witness is fatally undermined …
“[3] … in those current and ongoing cases where [he] has provided an expert witness statement, he should not be called upon to give that evidence …
“[4] Notwithstanding that the failure is that of [Mr Jenkins] and, arguably, of Fujitsu … this failure has a profound effect upon [Post Office] and [Post Office] prosecutions, not least because by reason of [Mr] Jenkins’ failure, material which should have been disclosed to defendants was not disclosed, thereby placing [Post Office Limited] in breach of their duty as a prosecutor.
“[5] By reason of that failure to disclose, there are a number of now convicted defendants to whom the existence of bugs should have been disclosed but was not. Those defendants remain entitled to have disclosure of that material notwithstanding their now convicted status.”
Penultimately:
“Further, there are also a number of current cases where there has been no disclosure where there ought to have been.”
Lastly:
“Where a convicted defendant or his lawyers consider that the failure to disclose the material reveals an arguable ground of appeal, he may seek leave of the Court of Appeal …”
When were you first made aware of the existence of this advice by Simon Clarke concerning Gareth Jenkins?
Timothy Parker: Oh, well, I mean, probably in reading this in detail, when I actually got all of the – I can’t remember, I think it must have been in my bundle, but I mean certainly years after the event. I mean, one of the things that struck me was I don’t think Swift was shown this.
Mr Beer: Correct.
Timothy Parker: Yeah, so, you know – yeah. I mean, I can’t tell you exactly when but, suffice to say, I would imagine, post-the trials, probably.
Mr Beer: By the trial, do you mean the Horizon Issues trial?
Timothy Parker: Or both – I mean, you know, the point I am making, I think, is it – I would have known about this at the point at which we were reviewing stuff after the litigation, yeah.
Mr Beer: So, too late for it to matter then?
Timothy Parker: Too late for it to matter then, yeah.
Mr Beer: What was your reaction on being provided with a copy of the advice, or having it summarised to you?
Timothy Parker: Well, this is one of the things where, again, I think, when you’ve looked at a lot of the documents that we have reviewed today, it’s hard not to draw the conclusion that decisions might have been different, had a lot of these things been known at the time and, you know, this whole terrible raft of events, I think, in part, is because, as problems build up over time, the wall against breaking them down gets higher and higher, and this was just part of the wall, and it didn’t break down, really, until we got to the litigation, I suppose.
Mr Beer: Can we look, please, at POL00167395. These are minutes of a Board meeting held on 19 November 2020 by conference call, and you’ll see that you are present.
It’s a special meeting concerning the CCRC and you’ll see that there’s quite the cast list.
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Beer: If we scroll down, and scroll still further, and then over the page. Second paragraph on that page:
“Brian Altman informed the Board that a layer of complication had been added to the court proceedings yesterday.”
Then scrolling down, please. That paragraph refers to essentially the disclosure within the proceedings and outside the proceedings of the Clarke Advice, okay?
Timothy Parker: Mm-hm, mm-hm.
Mr Beer: That’s the earliest that we can see that a reference was made to the Clarke Advice in any Board meeting.
Timothy Parker: Mm-hm.
Mr Beer: You wouldn’t presumably be in a position to say, “No, we were told about it much earlier”?
Timothy Parker: No.
Mr Beer: I mean, lastly on this point, if we look at UKGI00017966, thank you, this is a reply of the Post Office to Tim McCormack, one of his searching Freedom of Information requests. He says:
“Good to see the new spirit of openness in action yet again this morning with the publication of redacted copies of Board Minutes.
“Could you therefore provide me with copies of all board minutes in which is mentioned the Clarke Advice or Clarke Review.”
So he’s after that information.
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Mr Beer: Then looking at the bottom paragraph there:
“Post Office Limited has conducted reasonable and proportionate searches and has identified two sets of minutes in which the … Clarke Advice was mentioned: the minutes of a meeting on 19 November”, which is the one that I just took you to.
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Mr Beer: “… and the minutes of a meeting on 4 February”, which was obviously later in 2021.
So it seems that the Post Office rather agree that the earliest mention of the Clarke Advice of July ‘13 to the Board was 19 November 2020.
Timothy Parker: Mm-hm.
Mr Beer: When it was revealed to the Board, the Clarke Advice, did anything happen as a result?
Timothy Parker: That’s – I can’t answer that question, I think, because –
Mr Beer: I’m thinking –
Timothy Parker: It’s a very – it’s –
Mr Beer: – Mr Parker, something like “Well, hold on, I’ve been in position now” – speaking from your perspective – “for five years or so” –
Timothy Parker: And how come I didn’t know about –
Mr Beer: – “I commissioned this guy called Jonathan Swift to look at things” –
Timothy Parker: All right, I get the gist of your question. All right. So, look, this is 2020 or ‘21 or something like that.
Mr Beer: Yes, November 2020, earliest mention.
Timothy Parker: Again, I have to put in context some of my answers here. Previous context I have given you is the Post Office wasn’t just about Horizon. There were a lot of other very serious problems which I and the Board were contending with. The context I give you on this is that I believe, in 2021, we had 60 Board meetings, something like that, to do with the fallout from this whole thing.
So whether anything happened as a consequence of this, I can’t tell you for sure. What I can tell you is that the amount of time and work and effort that I and other Board members put into trying to essentially reconstitute this whole business from top to bottom might have allowed one of these things to sort of, you know, just evaporate without anything happening as a consequence.
So I can’t tell you for sure what happened but I can tell you this was an incredibly, incredibly busy time. You have to remember, if you take an organisation and within the space of six months you find out that the whole basis on which your business has been conducted was wrong, you find out that your – the whole basis of how you are somehow operating has to be changed. The amount of work to try and put things right, correctly so – I mean, all of these things needed putting right – but the workload was just immense and all time consuming.
And, whatever, you know, I can tell you the new CEO and the new team were making strenuous efforts to try to put things right. So that’s the context I would give, I suppose.
Mr Beer: Tim Parker, thank you very much for answering my questions.
There are some questions from Core Participants. Could we take those, please, at 3.30, sir.
Sir Wyn Williams: Yes.
Mr Beer: Thank you very much, sir.
(3.18 pm)
(A short break)
(3.30 pm)
Mr Beer: Good afternoon, sir, can you see and hear us?
Sir Wyn Williams: Yes, I can. Thank you.
Mr Beer: I’ll just wait for the room to settle down a little.
Sir Wyn Williams: Mm-hm.
Mr Beer: Sir, the questions are, to start with, from Mr Henry up to 30 minutes; Mr Stein up to 10 minutes, and then Ms Patrick, up to 10 minutes.
Sir Wyn Williams: All right, thank you.
Questioned by Mr Henry
Mr Henry: Mr Parker, together with Ms Page, I represent a cohort of Core Participants, including Seema Misra, and Mrs Oyeteju Adedayo. I want to start off with some general questions, if I way.
The first is the Sir Anthony Hooper argument. Did it ever occur to you that the SPMs who ended up being prosecuted or milked for shortfalls were hardworking people trying their best to put food on the table for their families in their own self-reliant way and therefore why would they resort to stealing from their own businesses?
Timothy Parker: I think the way you put the question, there is – with hindsight, it would appear that – and this was the scale point I was trying to make earlier, which is that, if I had seen, I think, at the outset, how many people had been convicted and how many people had been terminated or had an employment issue because of apparent shortfalls, I think the scale of the problem would have been apparent. And I think part of the lack of response, or immediate response, partly came from the apparent scale, if you like, of how many people there were relative to the population of subpostmasters. But you’re absolutely right, I mean, you know, when do you start to question whether people are honest or not?
How many people do you need in a population before you think, well, can’t be the case they were all crooks, or whatever?
Mr Henry: Well, I’m going to come to that and, fortuitously, that was my second point because, when notifying the Government of the liability regarding convicted subpostmasters – so not dealing with civil, but purely criminal – in your letter to the Secretary of State, you mention that 959 cases had been identified in which Horizon evidence had been used to secure a conviction. Do you remember that letter?
Timothy Parker: Well, when was that written, please?
Mr Henry: Well, we’ll put it up on the screen. It’s POL00031104, and you can see it’s 29 April 2020.
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Mr Henry: If we scroll down – I can never get it right either, whether it’s down or up – but you’ll see that there is a reference to 959 cases, it’s the penultimate line on the screen.
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Mr Henry: So I am going to describe it as the epidemic of theft and false accounting. Do I take it from your answer, your previous answer, that you never questioned the conventional wisdom that this huge portion of subpostmasters was dishonest, and that this statistically significant number of allegedly dishonesty subpostmasters did not make sense?
Timothy Parker: Mm, the point I was trying to make earlier, and maybe I didn’t make it clearly enough, was that when we – when I turned up and I asked for the Swift Report to be done and we did all of that, the way the problem appeared to me was that there were 130 people, I think, going through mediation or 136, and there were 23 cases that were going through the CCRC.
What I was trying to say earlier was that I actually didn’t become aware of just how many of these people had been convicted until quite late in the day and you might say, well, why didn’t you ask? And that is the point I was trying to make. With hindsight, we could, and perhaps this question should have been asked: that I know 23 people are going through the CCRC but can you tell me, please, how many people have been convicted over the last 15 years?
And that, you know, might have precipitated a totally different response to this thing because, as I was trying to explain earlier as well, you can look at it through the lens of was the computer system reliable, or you could look it through the lens of how come so many people have been convicted, and how does that compare with the average for people being convicted in a retail business, for example, which is one of the questions I ended up asking.
So I know it’s an unsatisfactory response to you and your clients but, if this thing ever happened again and, you know, the issue was some people have been convicted, one of the first questions to ask is, well, out of a population of how many, and how many other people have been convicted who aren’t complaining, or aren’t going through mediation?
Mr Henry: So do I take it, again, that that work, that statistical analysis, came far too late?
Timothy Parker: I’d have to agree with you on that.
Mr Henry: I want to move on to a different subject and I appreciate that you were very much, as it appears, reliant on experts but the recusal decision to unseat Mr Justice Fraser, did you, notwithstanding the advice you received, take into account or recognise the impact that would have had on the subpostmasters’ ability to secure an outcome in their favour? In other words, did you reflect that, if you had been successful, that would have killed the claim stone dead?
Timothy Parker: So I think one of the paradox – well, it’s not a paradox, exactly, but, as I said at some point today, it always seemed to me that, had this been managed in a more cooperative manner, the civil proceedings, it could have, and perhaps should have, ended up with a judge-determined set of decisions around the contract and the reliability of Horizon. Of course, what happened was it was an adversarial combat and each side was trying to win, and the recusal was one decision that could have stopped your client’s case dead, I’m sure there were other things that, had they lost, would have ended up with a termination to the claim, for example, you know, if the judge had decided in the Common Issues trial substantially not to change the agency arrangement, that might have changed things as well. So my take on it is you’re right, you know, had that – had the recusal thing been successful, it could have stopped the case dead. I mean, I – again, it must seem, perhaps, somewhat naive in retrospect but I – my intention, and I had hoped, with these proceedings, that we would fight, you know, a sort of fair battle, and I think the – one of the issues was the legal teams got into a sort of “we want to win” litigation, without – at virtually any cost.
And we got into a situation where people were doubling down and the recusal thing, to me, was a doubling down thing in retrospect. So, you know, for me, this is one of the most unsatisfactory aspects of the whole GLO.
Mr Henry: Do I take it that you felt that you had, as Chair, lost control of the litigation because, obviously, these things were being done ostensibly, shorthand, in your name but you appear to, by your answers, suggest that the lawyers had got out of control and that they doubled down and it had been adversarial and that you had, together with your colleagues, nothing to do with it?
Timothy Parker: So, look, Mr Henry, it’s not my intention to release myself from responsibility for these events. When you’re the Chair, you, you know, the buck stops with me. So for me to try to characterise this as “Oh, it’s all down to the lawyers and its nothing to do with us”, that’s certainly not my intention.
I think what I’m trying to highlight is, in the balance between the client and the lawyers, sometimes the shift goes too much in one direction and, instead of being, you know, the dog, it’s the tail that starts to wag the dog, a bit. And I think the tail was wagging the dog a bit when we got to this. The recusal thing, as I said, I think I had misgivings about it at the time and it’s – again, I tried to make the point. I don’t know how many just are recused but I imagine it isn’t very many.
Mr Henry: Now, Mr Parker, moving on again to a separate topic, and I assure you that there is some purpose to it, when you sent out letters of apology subsequent to the Horizon Issues judgment, reflecting on this now, Mr Parker, was that performative or was that a genuine expression of contrition?
Timothy Parker: So, the subject of apologies. It is quite interesting because, today, I was toying with making an opening statement: stand up and say I’m deeply, deeply sorry, as many people have done. And there ensued a discussion with people, should I do this, because, you know, I would like to say sorry. And the response I got was that, well, you could do this, but actually, you know, people have got tired of that and it all rings a bit hollow and you probably are just going to annoy people more than really give them any sense of your real desire to say sorry.
And I’m afraid, in these circumstances, it’s very hard to either prove that your sorrow and apology is genuine, it’s hard to find language which, if you attempt to express it in the extreme, just sounds as if you’re being hyperbolic and simply trying to get effect. So there is no satisfactory answer to this. There is no real way to say sorry in a convincing way because the people who have been affected just feel the damage has been done, and you’re scrambling to sort of fill a small gap in that sort of failure to accommodate. So I don’t think a good letter could have been written. I don’t think any letter would prove to be satisfactory. And it’s not easy, when you’ve got a lot of people who are involved.
So I know that’s an unsatisfactory answer, but I’m trying to express the reality of the situation.
Mr Henry: When you signed those letters, though, did you remain of the view, even after the Horizon Issues judgment, that the subpostmasters who had been prosecuted or pursued in the civil forum were guilty/liable? I mean, I’m trying to ask you to reflect on how hard it was to let go of the idea that the subpostmasters who had challenged and who had taken on the Post Office weren’t at it?
Timothy Parker: I see the point to your question and my view is that, once we had reached the end of the trials, the game was up, as it were, and it was time to just, you know – I’ve tried, you know, when you get a business that is so upside down in terms of its structure and its relationships, I can see why you’re asking the question but, from my standpoint, you know, I felt the game – you know, we just needed to change completely and, with the new Chief Executive and the team, we have tried, or we did until I left in 2022.
Mr Henry: So you don’t believe that a mindset of blame still persists? I know you left in 2022 but you don’t believe that a mindset of blame will persists within the organisation?
Timothy Parker: I can’t speak for an organisation. I can only speak for myself and I would say that Nick Read and his team have, at all levels, made a huge effort. Now, that isn’t to say that some of the people who were working at the time of these events are still at the Post Office, because it’s impossible to run an organisation, just clear everybody out, as I hope, you know, is obvious. But the mindset has been completely changed and I would say, when you have such a huge shift in culture to make, it’s never made overnight. I mean, this is – you have to appreciate it’s one of those slightly irritating aspects of these sorts of events, is that trying to put them right is no easy matter. And it requires determination at the top.
And believe me, after the trials, I and the rest of my Board, and Nick and his team have done, I feel, as much as they can. The one area that I simply cannot speak for is money, because money unfortunately – once the fact that there was a huge liability at stake, the money is no longer a matter for the Post Office, it’s a matter for the shareholder.
Mr Henry: I see. Well, I’m going to now go to a specific example where I suggest, you see, the mindset hasn’t changed. Taking Mrs Adedayo’s case, what is your view on the Post Office’s recent written submission to the Inquiry, effectively branding her a criminal, despite her conviction having been quashed? I mean, you may not be aware of it but I can put it up on the screen, if you like. But I quote:
“The Inquiry will be aware that this [that is Mrs Adedayo’s case] is the sole case study where the Post Office does not accept that the conviction was unsafe.”
Do you unreservedly reject that victimisation?
Timothy Parker: First of all, we haven’t got the letter yet and, secondly, unless I have got all the facts at my disposal, Mr Henry, I don’t think you can expect me to, you know, deliver a black and white response on this. I’m no longer, obviously, at the Post Office, which precludes me a little bit from knowing what all the background is.
Mr Henry: Well, Mr Parker, her conviction was quashed and the Post Office still brand her a criminal. I mean, surely can you not reflect upon that and distance yourself from it and repudiate it?
Timothy Parker: I think I’d love to be able to just say, yes, Mr Henry it’s absolutely right, your client – you know, I’m absolutely with you. Honestly, I haven’t had the background and I simply, much as I would love to sit here right now and say yes, I would prefer to see the background first before delivering an opinion. And I hope anybody in my situation would see that’s not unreasonable.
Sir Wyn Williams: Well, if it helps, Mr Henry, I think it’s fair enough.
Mr Henry: So be it, sir.
Can I go to time, please, now, and I’ve got, having dealt with some general questions, some specific issues. Throughout your tenure, you had many competing obligations devouring your time and you wouldn’t be human if, from time to time, forgive the expression, they were distracting you. You would agree?
Timothy Parker: Actually, I’ve got a slightly different view to that. I would say one of the strengths of having multiple appointments is that you have got exposure constantly to what is going on in a range of different activities. And that actually means that you are well acquainted with the business world and other worlds, actually, in what’s going on. And so I would say – and I’ve tried to explain earlier that, you know, being an effective chair is partly to do with time but it’s also to do with judgement, and I think one’s judgements and one’s involvement are actually improved by having a range of different things to do.
Mr Henry: That, curiously – and I’m sure that you weren’t plagiarising it – was Mr Leighton’s similar explanation for the competing demands. But you have said yourself it wasn’t just about Horizon. There was an awful lot of stuff going on, awful lot of stuff going on in the business, and what I’m trying to suggest to you is that, to reduce your time at this critical stage before the GLO, must ultimately be viewed as a serious error of judgement. What do you say to that?
Timothy Parker: I say, actually, I gave – and as far as I’m concerned, Mr Henry, I gave all the time and attention that I could and needed to at the Post Office and I think if you talk to colleagues, look at the Board effectiveness reports, just do a general trawl, go and talk to people at the Post Office, you will find that I was well acquainted with what was going on. I was always well briefed. When I was in a meeting, I paid very close attention to the facts that were under consideration. I chaired meetings well. So, no, I don’t accept that assertion, actually.
Mr Henry: I’m going to deal with this very quickly, Mr Parker, but you are familiar with – and you have seen, of course, in the pack that was sent to you – a number of emails from Mr Tim McCormack?
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Henry: What I’m suggesting to you is that, because of the enormous burden on your shoulder, not just simply from the Post Office but other competing demands, this affected your ability to grip it personally and get involved in what he was saying in a meaningful way, and so, therefore, you were channelling his requests onto other people who were not serving your interests. In fact, they were delaying, denying and stonewalling Mr McCormack. Now, would you like me to deal with the emails in detail or –
Timothy Parker: Yeah. I understand because I’ve read the emails –
Mr Henry: You’ve read the emails?
Timothy Parker: – and I understand the point you’re making. And I’ve tried to explain earlier that, when I joined the Post Office, and bearing in mind most of these emails were probably around April 2016 and July, or whatever, I think that’s right, I assumed – perhaps, with hindsight, incorrectly – that the people who were advising me were honest, you know, were competent, et cetera. And in virtually every other company I have been in, when I get a sort of email or letter that which comes in, which is essentially about a legal matter and says, you know, in capital letters “I will say, you know, what’s going on, and take it away and give me some background”.
And I understand the point you’re making but I can honestly tell you, Mr Henry, that whilst, you know, it might appear that we should have grappled with Tim’s points and really concentrated on them, and it’s very unsatisfactory, looking back, to see that it was handed over to a bunch of people, that we – you know, arguably weren’t going to handle it well – those were the circumstances at the time.
I’m not trying to get out of responsibility here. Some mistakes in that respect were made but I honestly wouldn’t say that was a function of me not having enough time, as such.
Mr Henry: If it wasn’t a function of you not having enough time then why would you not wish to go to the ends of the earth to establish whether or not an innocent woman had been imprisoned?
Timothy Parker: Because this was an individual case, which I think was going through the CCRC. I can’t quite remember the context and, actually, I have tried to grapple with this thing, largely through the collection of issues that were brought together, and you’re right; I mean, perhaps had one rushed after the Misra case, there might have been some progress. I can’t honestly tell you. But if what you’re implying is that somehow, you know, because I didn’t deal with this thing, we didn’t really do anything, didn’t really care about this, didn’t try to resolve it, I don’t think that’s really fair.
Mr Henry: What I’m trying to suggest, you’ve talked about the wall being built, we’ve seen how your reception into the Post Office was being prepared – I’m going to call it a grooming pack, prepared by Mark Davies – that they were trying to get you on side and that, notwithstanding your genuine desire to be independent, notwithstanding the fact that you had no axe to grind, that gradually you were compromised and, to use the analogy of the wall, you became immured in prejudice; what do you say: the institutional prejudice of those people that you relied upon and trusted who surrounded you?
Timothy Parker: What I will say is this: behind a set of events that we have been discussing today are a complex mixture of interactions between people. Some self-consciously driven in a particular direction, others not. Others just being part of it, and so, whilst your characterisation, I think, probably has some truth to it, matters are far more complicated than that, and I would say, in some respects, yes, the wool might have been pulled over the eyes and, in other respects not, sometimes happened, and sometimes didn’t. But there isn’t – you know, it is very unsatisfactory but it’s like, you know, here’s a set of wrongs, and we put them right, and how did the wrongs happen and, exactly, you know, where are the root causes?
And the root causes of this thing of course, at the end of the day, probably reside in the software. The root causes of the problems we talked about today reside in the process of investigation.
The individuals – and this is the point I was trying to make, you know – a lot of the problems that we have looked at happened between 2000 and 2010, quite historic, and trying to overcome history in a business, when history is so damaging, is a tough thing to do. So –
Mr Henry: All the more reason, therefore, for people who feared what impact that could have on the GLO to keep it battened down, to keep it hermetically sealed so that none of that would escape; do you see?
Timothy Parker: I do, I understand the point you’re making and I tried to express this earlier, which is it’s got a slightly unsatisfactory tinge to it because, of course, it implied that Sir Alan and the JFSA team had to spend money and had to get support to mount the GLO. But the GLO, although one might have a lot of aspects of dissatisfaction about the way it was run, actually did end up with a judge making determinations which will change the Post Office forever and, actually, set up a situation in which your clients, in time, should be properly compensated because the – there’s been an absolute clarity in terms of what – which – you know, what was responsible for what.
Mr Henry: Now, Mr Parker, I have to be brief, and I don’t want to be unfair to you but I’ve only got couple of minutes left, so I just want to ask you if you feel that the answer you gave to Mr Beer about this really had to be resolved, as it were, adversarially was somewhat fatalistic and that more could have been done to strive to see the other side and to strive for settlement, without having to enter into the quagmire of litigation.
Timothy Parker: Yeah. I mean, look, there’s no satisfactory answer to this. I played out – so if there had been an early settlement, I could easily imagine a situation in which your clients will be worse off because, instead of waiting until the end when it was absolutely determined by the judge that Legacy Horizon was not robust and, you know, Horizon Online wasn’t robust, you could have ended up in a situation where, mm, computer system quite robust. This is the point I was trying to make earlier, where I played out – so the post – I know – I’m not trying to escape, you know, responsibility but if we’d sort of said, “Well, you know, we think we’ve got a problem with the computer system, it’s not reliable”, the moment you start to get to a “there could be miscarriages of justice”, “there could be a huge liability here”, then the question starts being asked: well, what’s involved?
Mr Henry: Final question, please, and I have to compress two documents, but there are two documents noted by Peters & Peters, it would seem, but involving number of lawyers, and one reference is POL00337435, it’s dated 24 January 2020, and so that’s long after the Horizon Issues judgment. You are not present, Mr Parker, but you and Mr Cooper, it is said, wanted to take pot shots at Seema Misra. Do you have anything to say about that? Do you recall any research that have been done on what claimants, convicted claimants, have said in open source material to try and trawl to see if they had made previous inconsistent statements so that their credibility, even after the Horizon Issues judgment but before the criminal appeal, could be impugned? Do you remember anything of that nature?
Timothy Parker: I don’t and, funnily enough, this document appeared fairly late in my bundle. I did have a look at it, and it is apparently a sort of abbreviated description, isn’t it, of a barristers’ meeting, I think, yes.
Mr Henry: Yes.
Timothy Parker: Well, look, somebody writes “taking pot shots”, I don’t know what that means to you but it’s a fairly colloquial sort of – I don’t know what they were trying to express but I’d love to have Tom Cooper in the room here but I can assure you, neither of us and – you know, would have been attempting to deliberately somehow undermine a situation that had been, you know, effectively determined as a result of the trials. I just don’t know where that comes from, honestly.
Mr Henry: Finally, do you recognise the suggestion that the Board looks at lawyers purely from this perspective: they see lawyers – this is Rodric Williams, speaking on behalf of the Board – as interchangeable tools for optics, legal advices, polluted product for the Post Office because of the High Court litigation; is there any suggestion that you and your colleagues did see lawyers as marionettes?
Timothy Parker: Sorry, what’s the point you’re trying to make?
Mr Henry: Well, the Board is reported to have told the lawyers not to advise on safety and Rodric Williams goes on to say “the Board sees lawyers as interchangeable and tools for optics”. You said that you didn’t see lawyers as marionettes but, I mean, this suggests that perhaps if this note is a fair reflection of your point of few, that you did?
Timothy Parker: Is this a Rodric Williams note, is it? I don’t think Rodric really reflects an awful lot of certainly what I think or what the Board thinks.
Mr Henry: Okay. I think I’ve run out of time so I’m going to stop there.
Thank you, sir.
The Witness: Thank you.
Sir Wyn Williams: Thank you, Mr Henry.
Questioned by Mr Stein
Mr Stein: Mr Parker, my name is Sam Stein. I ask questions on behalf of a large group of subpostmasters and mistresses and people that worked in Post Office branches.
You will recall, having dealings in at least 2019, with a Mr Swannell. At the time, he was the Chair of the Shareholder Executive and that was later renamed into UKGI, which is the UK Government Investments. Okay.
Now, when you get to the end of 2019, there were discussions that touched on the question of settlement; do you recall that?
Timothy Parker: Mm, mm.
Mr Stein: Okay. Now, help us please a little bit with this. Mr Swannell will be giving evidence next week, I think on Tuesday, and his recollection is of having had a word with you, sometime in June 2019, whereby you thought the estimate of the amount involved in the settlement might well be something in the order of 100 million.
Timothy Parker: Mm-hm.
Mr Stein: Now, contextually, we know that the settlement was in the order of, essentially, 50 million, a bit over.
Timothy Parker: Yeah, yeah.
Mr Stein: Okay?
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Mr Stein: Now that’s quite a big difference?
Timothy Parker: Yeah, mm.
Mr Stein: But the 100 million, was that what you thought it was worth or was that what you were told this may well come to?
Timothy Parker: Honestly, I’d like to see the papers because it’s quite hard for me, 2019/20, 100 million, I’d love to be able to give you a definitive answer but I can’t on that.
Mr Stein: But do you have a recollection because it’s only his statement where he refers to this. I’m not sure we have papers that refer to this. Do you have a recollection as to whether there was any particular barrier, as an example, to 100 million or –
Timothy Parker: Well, okay –
Mr Stein: – that was being discussed?
Timothy Parker: – all I will say to you and, again, I’m not trying to escape responsibility, liability, or whatever, is that whatever discussions happened post-the litigation, the whole – the money only comes from one source and, therefore, you know, whether the Post Office quotes the number or there’s another number, ultimately, the decision isn’t going to be made really in the Post Office.
Mr Stein: Right. So, essentially, you’re saying, by that point –
Timothy Parker: By that point.
Mr Stein: – it’s for the Government, as the shareholder –
Timothy Parker: The Post Office could not probably run, and I may be – maybe it can now but, certainly in my time there, I don’t think it could have run as a standalone business. It needed constant support from the Government.
Mr Stein: All right.
Timothy Parker: And, therefore, any additional cash requirements was always going to be an incremental Government decision, one way or another.
Mr Stein: So before I move on to another topic, your recollection of the figures in relation to the settlement was (1) the money was always going to have to come from Government. Yes; is that right?
Timothy Parker: Ultimately, yes.
Mr Stein: And, secondly, Mr Swannell’s recollection of discussions around 100 million and, in fact, it being considerably less than that, clearly demonstrates that there had been discussions at potentially quite a bit of a larger figure at some point?
Timothy Parker: Look, I don’t want you to put words into my mouth that are subsequently contradicted by someone else, so I can’t give you a definitive answer to this, honestly.
Mr Stein: But you’re not saying no. What you’re saying is you can’t really remember; is that fair?
Timothy Parker: That’s exactly what I’m telling you, yeah.
Mr Stein: Okay. I’m going to go, therefore, to a document you’ve looked at with Mr Beer a little earlier. Can we go to POL00174397, please. I’d like to go to page 2, once we get to the document. So do you recall, quite early on in the questions being asked by Mr Beer, that he was discussing with you this note, which is a note that was meant to have emanated, as you understood it, from Paula Vennells, okay?
Timothy Parker: Mm, mm.
Mr Stein: It’s a briefing document of some type, setting out some of the concerns at that time. Now, you’ve said repeatedly a word you use is context, so let’s understand the context of things. So the context of this note is you come into a business that’s overall in crisis, you agree?
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Stein: Yes. Fundamentally, this is a problem business, in terms of needing to be turned around, yes?
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Stein: Okay. You’ve been chosen over another possible candidate as being the right individual to have a go at doing that, yes –
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Stein: – and you wanted to find out more about what’s going on?
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Stein: Again, you’re saying yes, you’re agreeing; is that right?
Timothy Parker: Yes. I’m just wondering where this is going.
Mr Stein: Well, let’s see where it’s going in a moment.
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Mr Stein: We know also from your evidence that you said that the whole basis of the business and the way it was being conducted, you’ve referred to that being questioned in the litigation, because it’s about the Horizon system.
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Stein: Okay? So when you came in to the Post Office, in the role that you took over, you must have realised quite rapidly that questions regarding the Horizon system integrity were also questions that were threatening the whole business; is that fair?
Timothy Parker: Looking at this, as I’ve tried to explain, in scale terms, it didn’t look that big, in relation to the population of subpostmasters, the number of people who were complaining, the number of people who were convicted. And so – and most of these issues were to do, obviously, with what you would call historic Horizon. So, from my perspective, you know, we had a set of issues that were people who’d had historic problems with Horizon, and then there was Horizon as an EPOS system, which operated post offices, effectively.
And the two things were slightly, you know, one is sort of business as usual, the other is a whole set of issues that people had had with the system historically.
So this – as I tried to explain earlier, this was one of a number of problems.
Mr Stein: Right. Now, you’ve said that a number of times. That’s your context point: number of other problems dealing with the business. But this is about the Horizon system. It’s questioning the integrity of the system; you agree with that?
Timothy Parker: A component of it is, yes.
Mr Stein: Let’s have a look at how serious this was, then. We can go perhaps to the bottom of page 2, if we may, please, I think we’re there already, and fourth paragraph from the bottom. Just go up a little bit. Yeah. We see the bottom. That’s it.
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Stein: Right. We can see that the references here are obviously to the JFSA complaint –
Timothy Parker: Yeah, yeah.
Mr Stein: – we see the BBC Panorama programme –
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Mr Stein: – and we see references to MPs that are also engaged.
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Mr Stein: If we scroll a bit further down, please – my fault, let’s go up again.
Fourth paragraph from the bottom. Okay, the one that starts:
“We have been robust in rejecting the serious allegations made in Parliament …”
Is that right?
Timothy Parker: Yeah, yeah.
Mr Stein: “… made in Parliament and media, particularly in recent months.”
Then it goes on to talk about the issues that concern:
“… the campaign’s allegations have grown to include suggestions of wrongdoing by senior management …”
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Mr Stein: “… bullying, deliberate cover-up and abuse of prosecutor powers.”
Now, these are serious allegations.
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Stein: Now, accepting your point, which is that, in your mind, you’ve got the problem which is you think may well be largely historical, may be an older part of the system.
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Mr Stein: Okay, but this is in fact actually questioning the integrity, not only of the Horizon system but also of management –
Timothy Parker: Yeah, yeah.
Mr Stein: – at the very time you’re coming into it?
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Mr Stein: So it’s raising the very question that Mr Beer was talking about with you, which is, well, hang on are the people around you people that you can trust, right?
Timothy Parker: Um –
Mr Stein: Serious allegations.
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Mr Stein: In fact, allegations that, if true, would be the death knell of the business that’s already in crisis.
Timothy Parker: Well, I’m not sure I would go that far but you’re right to highlight that. Yes.
Mr Stein: Okay, well, let me highlight then and see if I can be right about something else. Page 1, third paragraph down, please. Now, I use the term paragraph, the three main paragraphs from the top under “Note for Tim Parker”, okay? So it says this:
“The Horizon system deals with six million transactions every day and has been used by almost 500,000 people since it was introduced. It is currently used by 78,000 people working in Post Office branches, is independently audited and meets or [excels] standard industry accreditations.”
Let’s take that apart. Did you receive the independent audit of the Horizon system at this time?
Timothy Parker: No.
Mr Stein: Did you ask for the independent audit of the Horizon system at this time?
Timothy Parker: Which independent audit system are you referring to?
Mr Stein: Well, go back to the third paragraph from the top, the one I read out:
“The Horizon system deals with six million transactions every day and has been used by almost 500,000 people since it was introduced. It is currently used by 78,000 people working in post office branches, is independently audited …”
So stopping there for the moment. Did you see the independent audit at this time?
Timothy Parker: So, essentially, I –
Mr Stein: It’s a bit of a “yes” or a “no” question.
Timothy Parker: No, can I just finish, please? I think I’m entitled to that. I understand the question that you’re asking. Essentially, I didn’t ask for the independent audit. This was something, obviously, that’s been put into the brief. Now, I’m not quite sure, can you just explain to me where you’re going? Where –
Mr Stein: I’m asking the simple question, I suspect answer is either yes or no. It looks like it’s no. Did you see the independent audit? The answer appears to be no, you didn’t; is that fair?
Timothy Parker: Well, you know, if somebody says something is independently audited, that can mean a number of different things. It can mean somebody has gone in and looked at it or it can mean that there’s a – I don’t know, but if you’re asking had I got the independent audit? No.
Mr Stein: Did you ask for it?
Timothy Parker: I don’t think I could have done.
Mr Stein: All right, why couldn’t you have done, Mr Parker?
Timothy Parker: Do you know –
Mr Stein: Is that you saying you didn’t have the power to –
Timothy Parker: No.
Mr Stein: – or are you saying you just didn’t?
Timothy Parker: No, this was a brief that I received, and we’ve looked at this Sparrow brief and it’s – you know, earlier. And this is all about – so what actions could have been taken that might have landed us in a different direction? And maybe you’re right. Maybe there was an audit. We could have asked for it, I could have asked for it and it would have said this is okay, and – or, you know, it would have been something that was inadequate. I’m not entirely sure. And, with hindsight, there are many things that we could have done.
Swift, which we discussed extensively, whilst not being perhaps brilliant and perhaps a bull’s-eye and perhaps spot on, covered off a lot of the bases and, if the question you’re asking is, you know, is there something that definitively could have been done that would have pushed us in another direction? I’m not entirely sure.
Mr Stein: Mr Parker, I’m asking about your decision making. I’m asking about your responsibilities.
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Stein: I’m asking questions that go to whether and to what degree that you have made mistakes; do you understand that?
Timothy Parker: I entirely understand that.
Mr Stein: So your answer to my question to the independent audit was this, “I don’t think I could have done”. Now, I’m trying to find out now, from my follow-on questions, whether that means you didn’t have the power to do it or whether you just didn’t do it, which?
Timothy Parker: I think I could have had the power, in theory, I suppose, to do many things.
Mr Stein: Right.
Timothy Parker: And we, you know – as I said, I didn’t ask for the audit and it – you know, I don’t know what this was referring to. We moved on to Swift.
Mr Stein: Okay. Now, it then goes on to say in this paragraph:
“… and meets or exceeds standard industry accreditations.”
Did you ask for those?
Timothy Parker: I can’t tell you right now because, you know, this is a long time ago.
Mr Stein: Do you recall seeing the standard industry accreditations for the Horizon system?
Timothy Parker: I don’t think anybody plonked them on my desk, no. But I’m not entirely sure. I don’t think so.
Mr Stein: Two paragraphs down, “We commissioned”, it starts; do you see that one there? Further down, “We commissioned” – thank you very much – it’s got a little yellow dash to the left of it:
“We commissioned [past tense] a review by independent forensic accountants …”
Okay? Then it goes on:
“… to set up a scheme which, where appropriate, offered mediation”, et cetera.
All right? Now, reminding us of the timing of this, this is at 2.15, at the time that you’re engaged in dealing with matters, all right? We know that what this must appear to be is Second Sight, which is back to 2013, so it says:
“We commissioned a review by independent forensic accountants …”
Did you ask to see that?
Timothy Parker: The Second Sight report, we saw as part of the whole setting up of the Swift Review.
Mr Stein: Did you see it as part of this? Did you get this and say, “I need to see the independent forensic accountant review”?
Timothy Parker: I can’t tell you exactly when I saw it.
Mr Stein: Right. So what we have established, in your evidence with Mr Beer, first of all, and obviously with me as well, what we have established is that you came in, you were given this briefing and then you decided that you needed to have somebody else look at these issues, and that was then Mr Swift –
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Stein: – QC, now KC?
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Mr Stein: Okay, got it. Do you accept that what you should have done, have been more hands on, saying, “Let’s have a look at this stuff myself, I want to see it on my desk, I want to talk to the IT people, maybe talk to Fujitsu”; do you accept that you could have gone more into this yourself?
Timothy Parker: I have tried to explain earlier, I think, that, whilst you might say the Swift Review was inadequate and we should have gone straight to the IT system and done an audit, that is one of a number of possibilities. And what I tried to do was to get somebody who could look at the range of issues and the Horizon system was one of them. So, you know, as – if I had seen, I suppose – and I mentioned this earlier – the scale of the thing, that might have been different but I responded to this, honestly, in the best way that I thought I could and I felt Swift was a pretty good response, initially. Now, we know, with hindsight, we go down a sort of Sparrow briefing, I can see your point.
Mr Stein: You see, one way to look at the difficulty with the amount of time that you were spending on this, is that you were part-time and your decisions were part baked.
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Mr Stein: Do you understand that, Mr Parker? You’ve said repeatedly that the time issues, this is the same amount of sort of time that you might spend with other businesses, that the role of the CEO is like that, that you have a direction, rather than necessarily getting down to the grips with the nitty-gritty all the time type role.
Timothy Parker: Mm, mm.
Mr Stein: But this isn’t the National Trust, is it, Mr Parker? This is the Post Office, responsible for prosecuting its own staff members. Don’t you think that more time should have been spent by you getting to grips with these very issues?
Timothy Parker: I don’t accept that. I gave sufficient time and attention to the Post Office, I’m sorry.
Mr Stein: Our time is limited now myself, in relation to questions and I’m –
Sir Wyn Williams: You’ve already taken double the allocation, Mr Stein, so one more question.
Mr Stein: Only one more minute. You say this in your statement, paragraph 59, this is in relation to the Swift Report or Review and you quote in your statement part of the Swift Review, where it says this, in relation to bugs – so paragraph 59, page 27 of your own statement – all right? Swift Review:
“It seems to us entirely unremarkable that the Horizon system, which is enormous in terms of the range of matters it deals with and the number of users it has, will occasionally discover bugs, errors or glitches in the way that it works.”
Then you continue the quote:
“Some of those bugs may impact on the financial position of a branch, either positively or negatively. We do not understand POL or Fujitsu to suggest anything otherwise.”
Now, Mr Parker, we’re learning from the Swift Review that this system, the Horizon system, may in fact cause negative impacts on the financial position of a branch. Did you not think to yourself, “Hang on, that sounds remarkably like the people that had been making all that noise from the JFSA”, and decide there and then to do something about it?
Timothy Parker: So Swift, I felt, covered off a range of issues and covered them off quite comprehensively, and I took away, perhaps wrongly, that Swift, whilst it wasn’t a green light, was not a red light either, and what you’ve done today, I think, has sort of picked up on a number of points which, with hindsight, we might have gone after. And this is one of the frustrations and difficulties of looking at something like this, over a long period of time, with a great deal of complexity and, you know, I could reel off a bunch of other things I could have done that would have ended up with probably a quicker situation.
But I come back to the point I made earlier, which is that the extent of the issues that we had arrived at meant that, no matter how unsatisfactory, the ultimate determination of the reliability of the computer system and the contractual position with subpostmasters has facilitated a long-term solution to this problem.
Sir Wyn Williams: All right. Thank you.
Mr Stein: Thank you for your indulgence. No further questions.
Sir Wyn Williams: That’s fine.
Ms Patrick?
Questioned by Ms Patrick
Ms Patrick: Thank you, sir.
Mr Parker, my name is Angela Patrick. I represent a number of subpostmasters who were convicted, and have since had their convictions quashed, including Mrs Hamilton, who I’m sure you can see sitting beside me.
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Ms Patrick: You might be glad to hear that I only want to look at one issue. I want to turn back to the follow-up to the Swift Review and I actually only want to look at one example, and that’s the advice of Mr Altman, then QC now KC, produced on 26 July 2016 for the Post Office in response to the Swift Review.
I want to start, just to look a little bit at what you say in your witness statement about that advice, just to refresh your memory. I’m not proposing to turn your witness statement up, in case you need me to refresh your memory. If you do, say so.
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Ms Patrick: In your witness statement, you say – at paragraph 113, for those following along – that it’s likely you would have briefed in on that advice from Mr Altman –
Timothy Parker: Mm.
Ms Patrick: – but you can’t recall now what you would have thought about it.
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Ms Patrick: Now, just to clarify, do you think you did see a copy of the advice or is it likely that you didn’t?
Timothy Parker: I mean, I’d like to be able to confirm to you one way or another, but I honestly can’t.
Ms Patrick: No. But you recall that it’s likely you would have been briefed?
Timothy Parker: Yes, let’s say – let’s work on that principle, if you want to take your point further.
Ms Patrick: It’s not a principle. I’m going on your evidence from your witness statement, Mr Parker –
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Ms Patrick: – and, in your witness statement, you say you’d probably have been briefed by General Counsel?
Timothy Parker: Probably.
Ms Patrick: Now, elsewhere in the witness statement, you reflect on the advice, reading it now, having been provided with it – and you can’t remember if you had it at the time – and you reflect on the broad conclusions, and you note that there are some criticisms that Mr Altman made that went beyond the scope of his instructions. I just want to ask you about a couple of things, two things, from the advice.
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Ms Patrick: First, in your witness statement, you note that he reviewed eight files –
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Ms Patrick: – and he considered three cases.
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Ms Patrick: Yeah. Now, Mr Beer took you this morning to some correspondence, which you didn’t see, narrowing the scope of Mr Altman’s instructions to cover 19 cases, if you remember. You hadn’t seen that. Did you know at the time, if you can remember, that the scope of his advice had been narrowed still, to eight cases?
Timothy Parker: Honestly, I don’t know and I can’t tell you.
Ms Patrick: You can’t, I assume, recall whether the briefing would have covered whether the review, the advice, had been narrowed to report only in eight cases?
Timothy Parker: I can’t.
Ms Patrick: If you had known and you’d been told at that time, having read the Swift Review and what he’d recommended, that you go back and look at all the cases, if you’d read at the time that he was only going to look at eight cases, in fact he could only analyse three, would that have caused you any concern?
Timothy Parker: Well, it’s funny you should mention that because I read through the documents again and I was struck a little bit that, you know, the case population wasn’t enormous. I did note that.
Ms Patrick: If you’d seen it at the time, maybe it would have caused you to ask, “Hang on a minute, can we really rely on these headline conclusions”?
Timothy Parker: Well, I’ve tried to explain that I think one of the core issues with this thing was putting – was percentages of the populations of people that were actually looked at. So, you know, as we’ve discovered, a huge number of people –
Ms Patrick: If I can stop you there, Mr Parker. Whether it was 136 or it was 900-odd, if you were getting, I’d like to say, probably expensive legal advice –
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Ms Patrick: – from a criminal silk, on the advice of Mr Swift, on whom you were relying, that all the cases should be reviewed –
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Ms Patrick: – and you were being told that only eight cases were being looked at and, in fact, he was only going to analyse three, would that not have set up a red flag for you?
Timothy Parker: Well, I said I looked back at the advice and it – you know, you’re right to point it out. At the time, it seemed relatively reassuring, yes.
Ms Patrick: But, if you had seen it, would you have not said, “Hang on a minute, we’re only looking at eight cases”?
Timothy Parker: I might have done, yeah.
Ms Patrick: Okay. Does that help with your memory as to whether you read it or didn’t read it at the time?
Timothy Parker: Honestly not, no.
Ms Patrick: Okay. Turning to the second thing I wanted to ask you about. Now, Mrs Hamilton was one of the three cases.
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Ms Patrick: I only want to look at one part of the advice which deals with the circumstance of Mrs Hamilton’s plea only being accepted on the condition related to repayment of money.
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Ms Patrick: It’s at POL00022854, and I want to look at page 27. If it’s okay with you, Mr Parker, for time, I’m just going to take you to the two paragraphs that I want you to look at. You can trust me that it’s the advice. If somebody can bring that up, I’d be grateful.
I want to look at page 27, and it’s paragraphs 106 and 107. Thank you. I’ll just take it briefly. I’ll read it so everybody knows what I’m talking about. He says:
“The proposal here, however, ultimately to invite the court to order the count be left [that’s the count of theft to be left on the record] on the file as a condition of repayment was highly unusual if not exceptional, and was, it seems to me, fraught with difficulty, despite the judge approving this course.
“First, the effect of the arrangement was that the prosecution was in effect allowing Mrs Hamilton to buy her way out of a charge upon which the in-house lawyer and counsel had advised there was [sufficient] evidence. Second, the question might be asked why if the prosecution felt the evidence was sufficient to support the count of theft it was content to drop it for repayment of the losses. Third, if Mrs Hamilton did have a tenable defence to the count of theft (although I have seen no defence statement providing any defence, and doubt a defence statement was ever served) then it might be argued that the suggestion she should repay the losses in return for the dropping of the theft count, which was an idea originating with the prosecution, placed undue pressure on her, despite the fact that she was represented, and despite having pleaded guilty to false accounting.”
Now that’s an important, serious criticism, isn’t it, Mr Parker?
Timothy Parker: Yes. I mean, he goes on. I mean, it’s quite hard for me to comment on this. There’s a lot going on on this paragraph. There’s a lot going on on the whole page, and I haven’t got the whole document at my disposal. So to ask me to comment, you know, on a specific case, I think is – unless we have proper time, and I’m not – yeah, go on.
Ms Patrick: I simply wanted to ask: did you see this at the time or were you briefed on it; and would you, if you had been, have considered it a serious matter?
Timothy Parker: So I can’t tell you if I saw it and, before opining on how serious a matter I would have considered it, I’d have to look at the whole document again.
Ms Patrick: Okay. Did your briefing at that time – I know that you can’t remember it, but just to try to prompt your memory – can you recall if it recorded any discussion of any specific matters or criticisms that ought to be considered for referral to the CCRC?
Timothy Parker: No, I can’t.
Ms Patrick: You’ve spoken today about the advice you were given on privilege in this civil litigation.
Timothy Parker: Yeah.
Ms Patrick: Did that briefing, or any advice you can recall being given around the time of this advice, cover the Post Office’s continuing obligations on disclosure as a prosecutor?
Timothy Parker: I can’t. I’m sorry.
Ms Patrick: At this time, when you were being briefed, or when you read this advice, you would have been aware, I think, that the rest of the Board wouldn’t have read the Swift Review or its recommendations; is that right?
Timothy Parker: Possibly. Why?
Ms Patrick: Well, you knew that they hadn’t. Only the four internal staff had been given it. You had a copy. It was being controlled. You knew the rest of the Board hadn’t seen the Swift Review; is that right?
Timothy Parker: I’m sorry, what’s the point you’re making, though?
Ms Patrick: I’m asking you a question –
Sir Wyn Williams: Never mind about that, Mr Parker. Just say “yes” or “no”.
Timothy Parker: Okay, yes.
Ms Patrick: Yes, so you knew?
Timothy Parker: Yes.
Ms Patrick: So, at that point, nobody else on the Board could have judged if Mr Altman had or had not done what Mr Swift had recommended, could they?
Timothy Parker: Well, I’m not sure who the Altman advice was shared with, actually. This was one of the outputs of the Swift Review.
Ms Patrick: That’s why I put the question the way that I did. You had seen both the Swift Review and were being briefed, or had been shown, a copy of the Altman advice. You were uniquely placed. Nobody else could compare the two and say, “Well, Mr Altman has kind of not done what the Swift Review expected him to do”. You were the only person that was in the position to do that, apart from staff; is that fair?
Timothy Parker: Yeah, I think at the time I just took this advice, which seemed to me to be an adequate response on the first and second recommendation. I think, you know, I wasn’t busy comparing things, it just looked to me – and I was – I think I was told – I think I was told at the time, this met the brief.
Ms Patrick: Well, Mr Parker, I’m not trying to be flippant here but you said comparing one thing or the other. This is a very serious question of whether the Post Office had met its prosecutorial duties to people who it had convicted of criminal offences.
Timothy Parker: Mm, mm.
Ms Patrick: So being the only person on the Board who could assess whether or not the advice that the Post Office had commissioned was actually what it sought to obtain, put you in a particular position. Did that, at the time, cause you to think that you really ought to be looking really critically at the advice the Post Office was being given?
Timothy Parker: I can’t honestly tell you.
Ms Patrick: Okay. Today you’ve relied a number of times on a belief that legal advice given to you was competently given in good faith. Did you owe any responsibility to the Board and to the business and the Government Shareholder to actively question or challenge that advice you were being given?
Timothy Parker: I think, as I explained earlier, to challenge advice of specialists invites the question, you know, how do you challenge a legal opinion, and I don’t have an easy answer to that.
Ms Patrick: But, at a minimum, you would have had the responsibility to at least properly consider the advice you were being given in good faith; is that fair?
Timothy Parker: I believe I did, at the time.
Ms Patrick: You can’t recall now if you ever saw a copy of the Altman advice?
Timothy Parker: I can’t for sure.
Ms Patrick: Can you recall if you asked to read it for yourself?
Timothy Parker: I cannot. I’m sorry.
Ms Patrick: Thank you, Mr Parker.
Thank you, sir. I have no more questions.
Sir Wyn Williams: Thank you, Ms Patrick. Is that it, Mr Beer?
Mr Beer: Yes, it is, sir.
Sir Wyn Williams: Well, thank you, Mr Parker, for making a full and detailed witness statement and for answering questions during the course of today. I’m very grateful to you.
The Witness: Thank you.
Sir Wyn Williams: We will resume I believe, next Tuesday; is that correct, Mr Beer?
Mr Beer: Yes, 9.45, please, sir.
Sir Wyn Williams: Very well, 9.45 next Tuesday. Thank you.
Mr Beer: Thank you, sir.
(4.36 pm)
(The hearing adjourned until 9.45 am on Tuesday, 16 July 2024)