tonight, the uk appears to be on the brink of taking military action with the us against houthi rebels who ve been attacking ships in the red sea. could parliament be recalled to discuss any uk military response? tonight we ll guide you step by step through this latest international crisis with our defence editor mark urban and our political editor nick watt. also tonight. breathtaking testimony from a fraud investigator employed by the post office to examine shortfalls at branches across the country his evidence helped wrongly convict multiple subpostmasters he investigated this ex branch manager who was suspended by the post office after shortfalls and fraud accusations. you have been told there was a growing body of cases and that in itself was not sufficient for you the question the reliability of the horizon system. because i am not technically minded. i would expect that to come from people above. shazia saddiq was with us last night and is back tonight. she was at th
prosecutions into thousand 15. if we are to make sure that escande like this can never happen again, we need to look at the way in which private prosecutions like these have been undertaken. any company can bring private prosecutions in this way. this is not a special power of the post office, i know my right honourable friend the lord chancellor wants to give this issue proper and thoughtful consideration and i am sure he will report to the house about this issue in due course. getting justice for the victims of this candle and ensuring that such a tragedy can never happen again is my highest priority as a minister and has been throughout my 15 months in office. when we talk about compensation, we have to remember that the lives of postmasters and their families caught up in this scandal have been changed forever. they face financial ruin, untold personal distress and a loss of reputation that no amount of financial compensation can fully restore. the government recognises h
to prove that a computer system is operating reliably. the post office says while progress has been made, with £138 million paid in compensation, it continues to work with the government to support its efforts to speed up the exoneration of people with wrongful convictions. each and every individual who was a part of the post office scandal, they need to go behind the bars, and their properties need to be confiscated like they confiscated my property, and the money should go to the victims. shazia s still here, and also with us is professor richard moorhead, who sits on the independent horizon compensation advisory board and is an expert in legal regulations and ethics. welcome to newsnight. what was it about the culture, in the post office? it about the culture, in the post office? . . about the culture, in the post office? ., , ., ., , office? it was, it had a siege mentality. office? it was, it had a siege mentality. it office? it was, it had a siege mentality, it was office?
words, hejust signed it was a robust but it wasn t his words, he just signed it off, was a robust but it wasn t his words, hejust signed it off, no questions asked and the chair had said to him, are you saying a statement of this form was probably made on other occasions? yes, he replied. also, the whole aspect of documents being disclosed to defence teams has been a big theme throughout. how the disclosure failed on the evidence and bugs and errors that were running right through all these prosecutions. stephen bradshaw said he had signed off on disclosure documents for another case but actually he didn t liaise with his criminal team that these documents had been passed on. and this sort of evidence all feeds into this growing picture emerging of concerns about the competence and the conduct of the investigations and the prosecutions that have been going on for so long. it s clearly troubling because the horizon
the minister responsible for the post office, kevin hollinrake, says the government is very, very close to announcing its plans to clear hundreds of sub postmasters who were wrongly convicted. he s due to attend a meeting of the horizon compensation advisory board this lunchtime. they have been sharing their stories on bbc breakfast this morning. here s janet skinner she was jailed over false claims she stole thousands of pounds. she wants the post office to be removed from both the appeals process, and the compensation schemes. you are the post office minister. will the government take back control over the post office? currently, the post office, they are orchestrating convictions, who has a conviction upturned, they are in control of compensation. they are now classified as the criminals. why are they having the power to control everything? i was talking about your case yesterday with sir david davies,