10.05am: Discussions about the key role of lawyers features early. The Post Office had the choice of whether to include criminal rather than just civil cases in the review of Horizon.
The inquiry has previously seen a note of a lawyers’ meeting with Richard Morgan KC, asked to advise on this issue, where it was said by someone that ‘if the findings are negative that will open the floodgates to damages claims by SPM’s’.
Vennells says she was not told about this advice.The inquiry then looks again at this internal Post Office email where general counsel Susan Crichton is reported to have said that re-opening the Seema Misra case would be a ‘red rag to a bull’. Misra, who was pregnant at the time, was wrongly convicted in 2010 and jailed for more than a year.
Vennells suggests Crichton was influenced by the Morgan meeting and says she was not involved in these discussions at all. Her view would have been that all cases flagged up by MPs should be reviewed.
‘Did you share Susan Crichton’s concerns about the red rag to a bull? asks Beer. No, she replies.
9.55am: Jason Beer KC starts by looking at the decision to bring on board forensic accountants Second Sight to review a small number of Horizon-related cases. Vennells says her concern and priority was to choose an organisation that would be welcomed by sub-postmasters, rather than one of the Big Four who would not have expertise in how small businesses or Post Offices ran.
Second Sight’s approach was to select a representative sample of cases and selectively test the Horizon system. Vennells accepts this didn’t happen.
9.45am: The sub-postmasters, the media and the lawyers are back in their seats. Public gallery not quite as full as yesterday but still a huge buzz in the room. Sir Wyn Williams and his team take their seats and Paula Vennells is ready to go again.
