Post Office Caused 'Harm and Injustice' - Alan Bates — Transcript

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1. 0:00so we've now got a very fitting opening
2. 0:01to phases five and six of the post
3. 0:03office Arizon it inquiry with Alan Bates
4. 0:06the leader of the justice for sub
5. 0:07postmasters Alliance and one of the
6. 0:10first sub postmasters affected by the
7. 0:13events that have transpired in the post
8. 0:15office Scandal and he explains that the
9. 0:18harm and Injustice caused by the post
10. 0:20office are what led him to H lead the
11. 0:24campaign for as long that he has in
12. 0:26conjunction with other affected sub
13. 0:28postmasters let's jump into the inquiry
14. 0:31can I call Alan Bates please yes of
15. 0:33course ah he's
16. 0:40appeared
17. 0:41right sorry feet after me I swear by
18. 0:45Mighty God I swear by almighty God that
19. 0:48the evidence I shall give that the
20. 0:50evidence I shall give shall be the truth
21. 0:52shall be the truth the whole truth the
22. 0:54whole truth and nothing but the TRU and
23. 0:55nothing but the truth thank you very
24. 0:58much
25. 1:00good morning Mr Bat good morning uh my
26. 1:02name is Jason beer as you know and I ask
27. 1:04questions on behalf of the inquiry can
28. 1:06you tell us your full name please uh
29. 1:08Alan bat thank you very much for
30. 1:11previously providing a comprehensive and
31. 1:14detailed witness statement to the
32. 1:15inquiry and for coming to London today
33. 1:17to give evidence to assist the inquiry
34. 1:20um in its work can we start by looking
35. 1:22at your witness statement please so he
36. 1:25had no problems uh with that oath did he
37. 1:28you know because he's been telling the
38. 1:29truth consistently since the first
39. 1:31letters and reports that we've seen in
40. 1:34given 2000 some 24 years ago no
41. 1:36self-incrimination warning is required
42. 1:39here it's the only hard copy document
43. 1:41I'm going to be asking you to refer to
44. 1:43it's got for the purposes of the
45. 1:44transcript the UR win
46. 1:483051 100 and it's up on the screen it's
47. 1:5259 pages long um excluding the exhibits
48. 1:56page and is dated the 29th of February
49. 1:59so longer than some of the witness
50. 2:02statements that have been produced by
51. 2:03people working for or with the post
52. 2:06office um I picked up a couple of typos
53. 2:09I wonder whether we could just correct
54. 2:11those first if we look at page 23 and
55. 2:14the foot of page 23 at uh paragraph 75
56. 2:19uh it says the CW were not involved in
57. 2:21this period as I recall the nfsp in the
58. 2:25letter should that say from Colin Baker
59. 2:29yes it should to the 13th of January so
60. 2:31cross out the words January 200 and put
61. 2:33in the words Baker the word Baker yes
62. 2:36yes please and page 32 uh paragraph
63. 2:41102 it says in my letter to Mr O'Neal
64. 2:44dated the 9th of September 2009 I think
65. 2:47that should be 2004 the original letter
66. 2:50yes it would be yes yes so can that be
67. 2:53corrected to 2004 thank you if you can
68. 2:56turn to page 59 please in the hard copy
69. 2:59um do we see your signature
70. 3:04there yes you do and with those two
71. 3:06typos corrected are the contents of the
72. 3:08statement true to the best of your
73. 3:10knowledge and belief they are thank you
74. 3:12very much Mr Bates I'm not going to ask
75. 3:14you questions about every aspect of your
76. 3:16witness statement because it's long and
77. 3:18detailed and a copy of it will be
78. 3:20uploaded to the inquiry's website today
79. 3:23so the public can um read it can I start
80. 3:26the statement can come down please um
81. 3:28can I start with um a little bit about
82. 3:30your background uh you tell us in your
83. 3:32witness statement it's paragraph five no
84. 3:34need to turn it up that before you
85. 3:37became a sub postmaster you worked for
86. 3:3912 years in the Heritage and Leisure
87. 3:42project management sector is that right
88. 3:44that's correct and is it right that in
89. 3:47the course of um that work you developed
90. 3:50experience in electronic point of sale
91. 3:53epos systems yes I do you developed
92. 3:57experience in the development of s
93. 3:59specific business software and the
94. 4:02provision of Staff IT training that's
95. 4:04correct so that is very relevant in
96. 4:06terms of his later work at the post
97. 4:08office and the introduction of the
98. 4:10Horizon system to what extent if any did
99. 4:13that background assist you when you
100. 4:16became a sub postmaster and were later
101. 4:20required to work with the Horizon it
102. 4:22system I think when Horizon came in I
103. 4:25think I was quite positive about it um
104. 4:28because I I knew what technology and
105. 4:30these sorts of systems could do so um I
106. 4:33I was quite positive but I I found it a
107. 4:36bit frustrating once the system was
108. 4:38installed and we were operating I found
109. 4:41there were many shortcomings in the
110. 4:44system and um knowing what these systems
111. 4:48could do it just seemed a bit of a lost
112. 4:51opportunity you were a sub postmaster I
113. 4:53think between the 31st of March 1998 and
114. 4:58the 5th of November
115. 5:012003 yes uh by my Reckoning so a period
116. 5:04of five and a half years or so that's
117. 5:07correct and by comparison if you don't
118. 5:09mind me saying to other sub postmasters
119. 5:11that's a relatively short period isn't
120. 5:12it it
121. 5:16is sorry it is but it's due to post
122. 5:19office not to myself
123. 5:23quite and also I suppose ironically you
124. 5:26spent more than four times that period
125. 5:30campaigning oh
126. 5:32yes and that just outlines the scale of
127. 5:35the post office Scandal doesn't it 5
128. 5:38years working with the post office 20
129. 5:42odd plus years trying to sort out the
130. 5:45issues that the post office caused him
131. 5:48and why has that been
132. 5:50necessary um because uh well initially
133. 5:54it was because post office terminated my
134. 5:57contract giv me three months notice and
135. 6:00not giving me a reason for doing so um
136. 6:03purely because in my belief is that it
137. 6:06was I kept raising problems and concerns
138. 6:09over its Horizon system due to a number
139. 6:12of faults I'd found over the years and
140. 6:15surely with a system that's so integral
141. 6:17to the future of your organization
142. 6:19rather than punishing someone for
143. 6:20raising issues you should be thanking
144. 6:22them for trying to make you work he says
145. 6:24he was quite positive about the
146. 6:26introduction of horizon clearly trying
147. 6:28to help the post office understand
148. 6:30that there might be issues with it and
149. 6:31you would think that then they'd want to
150. 6:34address those issues because none of the
151. 6:36terrible post office Scandal had to
152. 6:39happen the first person that was really
153. 6:43majorly affected by this and to notice
154. 6:46these issues could have been the last
155. 6:48person and he could have had a long and
156. 6:50successful career presumably with the
157. 6:52post office had that happened and none
158. 6:54of these
159. 6:55prosecutions or issues that have
160. 6:58happened in the 20 years since
161. 7:00had to happen at
162. 7:01all you tell us in your statement that
163. 7:03you spent that period of time Seeking
164. 7:07Justice
165. 7:08accountability and redress for not just
166. 7:11yourself and your uh wife but also on
167. 7:16behalf um of a much wider group of
168. 7:18people is that right yes I did um we um
169. 7:23once I'd started my individual little
170. 7:26campaign in
171. 7:28there we we found others along the way
172. 7:31and eventually we all joined up and so
173. 7:34the jfsa was born and onwards me the
174. 7:39campaign you say in your witness
175. 7:41statement that you have dedicated this
176. 7:43part of my life to this cause is that
177. 7:47how it has seemed or felt first firstly
178. 7:51that it's required dedication but
179. 7:53secondly it's a
180. 7:55cause yeah I think it's also
181. 7:57stubbornness as well but um it
182. 7:59it's I mean as you got to meet people
183. 8:04and realize it wasn't just yourself and
184. 8:07you saw the harm and Injustice that had
185. 8:10been um descended upon them uh it was
186. 8:15something that you felt you had to deal
187. 8:17with sorry um it's something you felt
188. 8:20you had to deal with it's something you
189. 8:22couldn't put down and um you had the
190. 8:25support of the rest of the group in
191. 8:27there as well sorry that's right you
192. 8:29take a moment to uh clear the frog in
193. 8:31your throat yeah I have and hopefully
194. 8:33not a Welsh one there we sorry