The former head of Britain’s state-owned Post Office said she will hand back a royal honour in response to growing fury over a miscarriage of justice that saw hundreds of postmasters wrongfully accused of theft between 1999 and 2015. 

The British government is considering whether to offer a mass amnesty to more than 700 branch managers convicted of theft or fraud between 1999 and 2015, because Post Office computers wrongly showed that money was missing from their shops.

The real culprit was a defective accounting system called Horizon, supplied by the Japanese technology firm Fujitsu.

Here’s a look at the latest on the case. 

So what happened?

The British Post Office Scandal is the collective name for a series of widespread and long-lasting miscarriages of justice between 1999 and 2015 that involved the persecution of more than 700 poster masters. 

The victims were accused of false accounting, theft and fraud. 

Some spent time in jail while others went bankrupt, saw their marriages destroyed and some died before their names were cleared. 

Several committed suicide. 

The Post Office maintained for years that data from the defective Horizon computer accounting system, developed by Japan’s Fujitsu and rolled out in 1999, was reliable, while accusing branch managers of theft.

After years of campaigning by victims and their lawyers, the Court of Appeal quashed 39 of the convictions in 2021. A judge said the Post Office “knew there were serious issues about the reliability” of Horizon and had committed “egregious” failures of investigation and disclosure.

A total of 93 of the postal workers have now had their convictions overturned, according to the Post Office, but many others have yet to be exonerated.

How did it unfold?

Reports of issues with the accounting technology Horizon was first reported back in 2000. 

During the next decade, a number of postmasters either found their post office contracts terminated, were made bankrupt or were jailed. 

In 2009, a trade publication in the UK reported claims of the flaws in the Horizon system. 

Amid mounting pressure from the media and lawmakers, the Post Office began to investigate the issue. 

However, the boss of the service at the time, Paula Vennells, told a parliamentary committee that there had been no evidence of a miscarriage of justice. 

Ex boss hands back honour

An online petition calling for Ms Vennells to hand back her CBE gained more than 1.2 million signatures this week. 

“I have listened and I confirm that I return my CBE with immediate effect,” said Ms Vennells, who led the Post Office between 2012 and 2019.

“I am truly sorry for the devastation caused to the sub-postmasters and their families, whose lives were torn apart by being wrongly accused and wrongly prosecuted as a result of the Horizon system.”

Ms Vennells added that she continues “to support and focus on co-operating with” a public inquiry into the scandal that has been underway since 2022.

Technically, Ms Vennells retains the CBE title until it is revoked by the Honours Forfeiture Committee, a move Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has said he would support.

Why are we talking about it now?

British channel ITV broadcast a four-part series Mr Bates v The Post Office, which recorded personal accounts of the events by former postmasters and their families. 

A Statutory Inquiry examining the scandal is also underway. 

The inquiry is expected to conclude later this year.

London’s Metropolitan Police has also confirmed it is conducting its own investigation into the Post Office over potential fraud offences arising from the wrongful prosecutions.

Post Office Minister Kevin Hollinrake has said the government is looking at options to speed up appeals and Justice Secretary Alex Chalk is consulting senior judges about the next steps.

Has anyone been held accountable?

To date, no senior Post Office staff have been punished. 

Fujitsu, which has continued to win multiple British government contracts, said it is “fully committed” to supporting an ongoing independent public inquiry.

It said it has apologised for its role in a scandal that has had a “devastating” impact on people’s lives.

ABC/Wires