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Post office scandal

“Yes, compensation. Yes, justice. But without the truth we can’t do either of those. Going to law will force the Post Office to open their files. So finally, we’ll get to know everything the Post Office knows. The truth. The whole truth.”
Mr Bates v The Post Office.

Between 1999 and 2015, the Post Office prosecuted 700 sub-postmasters for false accounting and theft, with almost 300 more cases brought by other bodies. And yet, in May 2024, legislation was passed to automatically quash the majority of guilty verdicts.

Five people stand outside Aldwych House. They look stern and serious. They're holding a turquoise banner that reads “Justice for Sub-Postmasters Alliance”. Underneath the heading there are three demands. Firstly, a full statutory inquiry, secondly a demand to identify and hold the individuals responsible to account and finally to fully recompensate the victims.

Described as the UK's worst miscarriage of justice, at the heart of the scandal lay the Horizon computer system introduced by the Post Office in 1999. Personally pursued to pay back unexplained accounting errors, the effect on all the accused and their families was the most painful part of the scandal. Over 30 people died without ever seeing the accusations against them overturned. 

It took years before the flaws in the Horizon accounting system were exposed, along with the Post Office’s attempted cover-up. Information from the many subject access requests sent by the sub-postmasters in 2015 was vital evidence.

Subject access requests allow people to see all the information held about them by an organisation. They can allow people to understand how organisations are using their data – and can even help expose wrongdoing.