- 18/01/2024
Former South Warnborough sub-postmaster Jo Hamilton answered MPs questions about the Post Office Horizon scandal on Tuesday, January 16.
Speaking at the Business and Trade Select Committee in Westminster, Jo said she found it “sickening” to think her money may have been paid out as bonuses to Post Office executives.
She answered questions from MPs about the personal impact of the scandal, alongside former North East Hampshire MP Lord James Arbuthnot.
Speaking at the Business and Trade Select Committee in Westminster, Jo said she found it “sickening” to think her money may have been paid out as bonuses to Post Office executives.
She answered questions from MPs about the personal impact of the scandal, alongside former North East Hampshire MP Lord James Arbuthnot.
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NewsTranscript
00:00 5, 4,
00:02 Order, order. Welcome to the second session of the Business and Trade Committee this morning,
00:08 looking at the way we accelerate redress for the victims of the largest marriage of justice in British legal history.
00:15 I'm delighted to welcome Alan Bates and Joe Hamilton to give us evidence this morning.
00:20 Do you want to just say a word, as if it's needed, of introduction for the record? Mr. Bates.
00:25 My name's Alan Bates and I'm the founder and St. Hovers really the main mover with the Justice for Postmasters Alliance.
00:35 Thank you. Joe Hamilton.
00:36 I'm Joe Hamilton, ex-sub-postmistress from South Wombra.
00:40 Thank you very much indeed for joining us today. If I can start with you, Mr. Bates.
00:47 Are you now slightly furious that after a high-profile drama, after everything that you've been through,
00:55 there are still so few people who have actually seen full redress for the scandal that was done to them?
01:02 How are you feeling?
01:04 I'm frustrated, to put it mildly.
01:09 I mean, there is no reason at all why full financial redress shouldn't have been delivered by now.
01:16 It's gone on for far too long. People are suffering, they're dying, we're losing numbers along the way.
01:23 And it just seems to be tied up in bureaucracy. And that seems to be the big problem.
01:30 I mean, this scheme, the current scheme, started in March 2022.
01:39 And I mean, that's what, 22 months ago now. And we still, there are very few cases that have actually gone through or come out the other end.
01:49 So it is frustrating, to put it mildly.
01:52 I'm in a different scheme. I've been in the overturn conviction scheme.
01:58 And I know that is painfully slow.
02:01 And they have to literally drill into the minute details of everything they think you might be claiming.
02:08 It's almost like you're a criminal all over again. You've got to justify everything.
02:13 And they get forensic reports for this and forensic reports for that.
02:16 And you put it back into the machine and then months later it comes back with a query.
02:21 You send it back and months later again it comes back.
02:24 And you know, there has to be a way. I mean, I don't have access to all the data.
02:30 But there must be a way where you can see people in different bands and sort out a simplified version.
02:36 That won't be so costly for the government either.
02:38 It sounds like after all the hell that you've been through, you're still going through hell to finally get justice done.
02:45 Yeah, it's almost like you're being retried.
02:47 Because everything you say you'd like, they say, "Oh, justify that and justify that."
02:53 And it just goes on and on and on.
02:56 And you must be in touch with others who are having similar experiences.
02:59 Yeah, I mean, everything has to be backed up with paperwork.
03:03 It's just nonsense, you know.
03:05 What's the impact on you of having to go through all of that over and over and over again?
03:12 Well, I'm pretty much out the other side.
03:15 So, you know, I'm fighting for the group that still haven't had, well, they haven't had virtually nothing.
03:22 I mean, I'm not privy to what they actually have had.
03:25 But I've heard, you know, they've had tiny interims.
03:28 And literally, they're in this factory of bureaucracy that just swallows up paperwork.
03:35 Mr Bates?
03:37 Yes?
03:39 Have you had evidence and experience shared with you of what people are going through to try and finally get what they're owed in terms of redress?
03:48 Well, I mean, I'm only involved with the GLO group, the Group Litigation Order group.
03:55 The ones who brought the court case against post office initially and who got left behind afterwards, realistically.
04:04 But eventually they're caught up.
04:06 But I mean, people, I mean, people have spent a lot of time, again, with their lawyers.
04:15 Their lawyers have got their cases already sorted.
04:19 In many instances, their cases have been submitted to the department, but they're sat there.
04:26 They're not moving through.
04:28 I mean, recently, well, we were given assurances that after 40 working days that cases would receive a first offer.
04:38 Well, generally, I know that most people haven't had a first offer.
04:42 I can speak firsthand about my personal case.
04:46 I mean, that was submitted towards the beginning of October.
04:50 I mean, today it will be the 66th day, working day, allowing for Christmas and New Year, that I'm still waiting for my first offer.
05:01 And I'm being told that I won't receive anything or a first offer until the end of this month, which will be 77 working days, or almost double the expected time.
05:15 So after everything you've been through, after all of this time, the delays are still dragging on.
05:22 Yeah, I mean, I hear a lot of stories about that lawyers, sorry, government lawyers or the firms that governments are using for lawyers,
05:34 are not happy about working extra hours or working at weekends or working evenings.
05:41 There obviously isn't enough of a resource being put in at that end to actually deal with these cases.
05:49 And that's what's really frustrating.
05:52 I know the lawyers that I'm using, which are dealing with a lot of cases, have a huge team working on them.
05:58 And they're piling the cases through, but they're just not moving.
06:03 They hit a dead end once they go into the department.
06:07 So are you saying that the people who are processing the claim are not busting a gut to actually get the job done?
06:15 Oh, gosh, yes. I mean, after my claim had gone in, and mine's just in the queue like everyone else's, not being dealt with specially at all.
06:27 After mine had gone in, it took them, I think it was 53 days before they asked three very simple questions.
06:37 I mean, it's madness. The whole thing is madness. It's not being done.
06:41 And there's no transparency behind it, which is even more frustrating.
06:46 We do not know what's happening to these cases once they disappear in there.
06:52 I mean, I know we like red tape in this country, but I mean, this is insane.
06:56 Now, it's bogged down. Absolutely bogged down, red tape.
07:00 Julie Masterman.
07:02 Thank you very much, Chair, and welcome to you both.
07:06 The ITV drama has undoubtedly provoked a huge response from the public all across the country.
07:13 Empathy for the incredible, dreadful situation you've been in for such a long time, and outrage on the same thing.
07:21 One of the things that strikes me, and I think strikes a lot of people, is that postmaster after postmaster were telling the same story.
07:29 They were in the same position, telling their truth, telling the truth, and were not believed.
07:35 And in fact, were told that you're the only one.
07:39 If people have watched that drama and are thinking to themselves, with incredulity, how on earth could this happen?
07:47 What's your assessment? And what would you tell people who watch that?
07:51 From your experience, how on earth could that have happened?
07:56 Alan, can I start with you?
07:58 How would it happen?
08:01 I really think it was because of post office.
08:05 I mean, when you take on a sub-post office, you actually invest a large amount of money in that business.
08:13 And as happened in my case, when they fell out with me, they walked off with that amount of money.
08:20 And I think a lot of people feel there's a financial gun held to their head if they start kicking off or start raising too many problems with post office.
08:31 And cases like mine, cases like Lee's, I mean, these become reasonably high profile in the area.
08:38 And post office like to push them through, or they used to like to push them through, I don't know if they still do,
08:43 as examples, as warnings to others to keep your head down and do as you're told.
08:50 What about you, Jen?
08:52 I was the opposite. They convinced me that it was all my fault.
08:55 I wasn't tech savvy at all back 20 years ago.
08:59 And yeah, they convinced me it was my fault.
09:01 And that kind of, it was before the days of social media.
09:04 So you felt like you were, I really was alone.
09:07 And I thought I must have pressed something and reversed something that then doubled the next day.
09:12 And yeah, I just thought I'd made a hash of it.
09:15 But when ultimately I went to court and it made the national papers and people rang me up after seeing the piece in the paper,
09:25 and I realised it wasn't me, it wasn't just me, then it just makes you so angry that, you know,
09:34 they'd literally gaslit me for about three years and turned me, well not into a basket case, but pretty much.
09:42 And then I just, that lit a fire.
09:45 And yeah, thank goodness we had the publicity because we joined up.
09:49 But you know, that is wrong, but it's taken this long and this much money to get to where we are today.
09:56 And you know, I know a lot of the group and they are literally falling apart,
10:01 waiting for the end of this to be able to put it behind them.
10:04 So, yes, so the turning point is not feeling alone.
10:09 But actually, I mean, these are, we use terms like the post office and Fujitsu,
10:16 but actually you're dealing, when you were going through this, still are going through this,
10:20 you're dealing with individual people.
10:23 Can you explain how that felt, that you were up against, you were talking to individual people,
10:31 but you couldn't get through to the big institutions that you're actually dealing with?
10:36 It's very hard to imagine how that must have been.
10:39 Yeah, and a lot of people then went to their MPs because that was Alan's brainchild to go to your MP.
10:45 I mean, fortunately I had James, but not all MPs listened, you know,
10:49 because you kind of think the post office is trusted and what are they, they've pleaded guilty in court.
10:54 So who, I mean, who believes you, you know?
10:57 I mean, I was lucky James was curious and had had some dealings with the Chinook failing.
11:04 So he got curious because he had four people in his constituency.
11:08 But I think it's the feeling that nobody's listening, you know.
11:12 When you say you've got a problem, you just need people to listen.
11:16 And do you think, Alan, that your experiences and this process that's still going, being here today and the inquiry,
11:25 do you think that that will help stop miscarriages of justice and repetitions of this kind of scandal?
11:34 Are you talking about broadly on other instances or whatever?
11:40 In which case, I hope it sends a warning shot across the bowels of these big corporations that what they actually do and decide and the way they work really affects people right down at the front line of their organisations.
11:57 And I think it's one of the failings that has been with a lot of the other things like the banking scandals or blood scandals.
12:06 People in high in jobs of high responsibility, that they're not being held to account at the end of the day.
12:16 And this I'm hoping in this particular instance that people are held to account and that will demonstrate to others.
12:27 Keep your eye on the ball with what you're doing.
12:29 So do you think this experience will help in the future?
12:34 Yeah, definitely. I mean, it's almost like the other way around to what happened to Lee.
12:38 Hopefully, if people get held to account, it might warn them not to do this to ordinary people again.
12:44 Thank you, Jan.
12:46 Can we just check, Alan, when it comes to Fujitsu, what is their culpability in this and what is the compensation that you think they owe, frankly, to the British taxpayer and indeed to you?
13:02 Well, I think this is very much a question for Sir Wynne and the inquiry to answer.
13:10 My gut feel on this, having looked at lots of paperwork over the years, is, you know, how much did the post office really know in the early days and how much did government really know in the early days about what was happening at Fujitsu?
13:30 I think everyone's going to be surprised about how much was known.
13:36 But I mean, that's for Sir Wynne to establish with the inquiry.
13:40 Are you comfortable with taxpayers' money being spent on Fujitsu right now?
13:47 I don't know what the other options are.
13:49 Do we have other IT suppliers, big enough IT suppliers in this country?
13:54 And I believe there's quite an awful loss of defence systems and a whole host of other systems as well.
14:04 Any perspective on that?
14:06 Well, I pretty much concur with that.
14:08 But he, you know, yeah, I guess Sir Wynne is where it's at.
14:14 He'll find out who was culpable on the journey because it goes back so long.
14:20 He needs to get to the bottom of who knew what, when.
14:23 And then if anything criminal has taken place, that they should face prosecution and they should share.
14:30 If it's proved they're culpable, they should have their share of the compensation.
14:35 They should pay their share.
14:37 If I may, just add something to that, Chairman.
14:43 I mean, you're going back 20 odd years when this happened.
14:47 I should imagine a number of staff would have changed place.
14:51 There have been big changes in the company.
14:54 So holding those currently to account for what people did 20 years ago, this might seem a little stiff.
15:06 If they can actually show that the organisation has changed and that it is willing to own up and look after, i.e. compensate or repay government for what's happened in the past.
15:23 Thank you.
15:25 Thank you.
15:26 Jo, you took your case to the Court of Appeal in the end.
15:31 Did you do that via the Criminal Cases Review Commission?
15:34 Yes, eventually. It took a long time.
15:37 It took a long time?
15:38 Yeah, they waited for Justice Fraser.
15:40 What was your experience of the Criminal Cases Review Commission process?
15:44 Well, if I'm honest, I applied and I didn't hear anything for years, literally years.
15:50 And every now and again you get a three-month letter saying, "We're still looking at it. We're still looking at it."
15:56 And then it became apparent that they were waiting for the High Court litigation before they'd make up their minds over anything.
16:04 It became apparent. Did they tell you that or did you work that out yourself?
16:07 We worked that out.
16:08 Yeah, we did hear on the grapevine that they wouldn't do anything as it was so close to the litigation sort of, you know, the judgment coming out.
16:17 They wouldn't do anything until it came out.
16:19 When it got to the Court of Appeal, the Post Office in your case conceded that they behaved improperly.
16:26 And the judgment of the Court of Appeal set out in details what was wrong with the process and why your conviction was unsafe.
16:34 Mainly because they did it when they knew I hadn't done it.
16:38 You went through that process.
16:40 Yeah.
16:41 What's your reaction to a piece of legislation that exonerates everybody, including those people who haven't gone through the process that you did?
16:50 I mean, where does that leave you feeling? Does that diminish your acquittal by the Court of Appeal or not?
16:56 I don't think it diminishes mine, but, you know, a bit of you thinks, "Hmm," but then something's got to happen because there's 900 cases, you know.
17:05 It's, yeah.
17:07 Not perfect, do I get the sense, but you're not--
17:09 Not perfect, but I think it's the only way.
17:12 Yeah.
17:14 Ian Lavery.
17:16 Thanks, Chair.
17:18 Good morning, Mr. Bates and Ms. Hummel.
17:22 I wonder the threat of a prison sentence, what sort of impact that actually had on you.
17:31 Yeah, obviously, it must have been horrific.
17:34 It really must have been horrific.
17:36 I wonder if you could explain to the committee, you know, when you were actually on the helpline trying to seek advice from the post office, and you actually had your computer in front of you.
17:49 And they were explaining how to remedy the issue, and then your deficit--
17:55 Worse.
17:56 Well, it doubled, I believe, in front of your eyes.
17:59 Yeah, yeah, it did.
18:00 Can you explain to the committee how you actually felt at that precise moment in time?
18:05 I mean, at the time, I felt helpless.
18:07 When they told me I was the only one that was having problems, I just presumed it was me because, you know, I didn't know any better.
18:16 And I always thought they said reverse this and reverse that, and I thought, oh, it'll sort itself out.
18:22 But it didn't.
18:24 And it's, you know, they kept my wages, and then I remortgaged and put money in.
18:29 And because I had such a long lease on the shop, I knew if they sacked--because they said they'll sack me.
18:36 And then I thought, well, the whole thing will collapse.
18:38 And I felt I had no choice but to run with it and keep putting money in.
18:43 Absolutely desperate situation.
18:46 And, I mean, the reports of many of them might be exaggerated.
18:49 I'm not sure I'd say that.
18:51 You remortgaged.
18:53 Yeah, twice.
18:54 You borrowed money off your parents, et cetera.
18:56 What a horrendous situation to find yourself in.
19:00 And you eventually repaid the money back to the post office.
19:04 Have you any idea where that money went?
19:07 No, I've heard it goes into the suspense account and then eventually gets hoovered into profit and loss.
19:15 But--
19:16 How would you feel, Ms. Hutton, if you thought that your money was put in the post office accounts,
19:26 and the profits from that account went to dividend holders,
19:33 whilst you were suffering the way you were,
19:37 and potentially some top executives in the post office received some of your money in terms of bonuses?
19:44 I don't think so.
19:45 Ironic, isn't it?
19:47 How would that actually make you feel, honestly?
19:51 Yeah, well, it's sickening, really, to be honest.
19:55 The fact that we were shouting so loud at one point, and everything was known,
20:01 and yet our money was just being played with.
20:04 They looked profitable at one point, and it was our money.
20:09 Thanks very much for that.
20:12 Mr. Pierce, last week the government announced a promised up-front payment offer of £75,000.
20:21 I wonder what your initial reaction is to that,
20:25 what the reaction is from the people who you've been in contact with.
20:30 Will many of them people be taking up the £75,000,
20:34 or do you believe that there will be a large proportion,
20:38 or what proportion, in fact, do you believe will accept that,
20:42 or will march towards full compensation?
20:46 I think there probably will be some, it will suit in there,
20:51 but at the moment I don't think there's any detail that's been published about it.
20:57 That's my understanding.
20:59 And the other question about it is,
21:02 the few cases that have gone through in the GLO scheme,
21:06 which I always refer to as the low-hanging fruit, which are the low-value ones,
21:12 I mean, will they be able to claim a top-up to the £75,000 as well?
21:19 I mean, I think there's a lot of questions to be answered about the scheme at present,
21:25 but I don't think, until they publish the details, it's a bit hard to comment.
21:31 And basically the huge question is,
21:36 can a figure ever be calculated which will fully redress the situation
21:43 that individual post-mortems found themselves in?
21:47 It's been really interesting already this morning, Olin,
21:51 to see that potentially spouses of victims, children, family members,
21:58 in no way will be compensated as a result of that.
22:01 How do we actually calculate the correct type of compensation for each individual involved?
22:07 You'll never get it exactly right, but I mean, this is something I've been after for a while,
22:13 that where there has been health or mental issues in the family along the way,
22:18 they need to be assessed as part of this scheme, and it needs to be transparent,
22:24 and it needs to be consistent across the whole board as well,
22:28 because at present it's not included in a sub-postmaster's claim.
22:35 I mean, and I think when I've raised this in the past, government have said,
22:39 oh, well, we do consider it when we're working it out, but it's not structured,
22:44 it's not transparent, and it needs to be introduced.
22:47 And as far as the GLO scheme goes, I think it probably affects maybe a fifth or a sixth of all the claimants,
22:56 maybe more, but it's around that sort of figure.
23:01 But I mean, you're right, this financial redress will never, will never put things back for people.
23:09 But this is money, this is something which I get annoyed about when people call it compensation.
23:15 This is money that they are due.
23:18 This is money to put them back into a position that they would have been in had post office not done what it did to them.
23:27 So it's not really compensation, which is why I keep calling it financial redress.
23:33 I think what you're saying basically, just sorry, just to conclude,
23:37 a lot of the money in the first place was yours anyway, and you're just getting it back.
23:42 Is that fair to say?
23:45 That's certainly a part of it, but it's also the loss, as we've been discussed before,
23:49 it's the loss of the earnings that they've got. It's the loss of their investment in there.
23:53 You know, it's all this that they would have had in the future.
23:57 Thanks Chris.
23:59 Thank you, Chet. One of the recurring themes throughout this has been all of the people that thought that it was only happening to them
24:05 and the gaslighting that you referred to happening, Joe.
24:10 The Justice for Subpostmasters Alliance has obviously done some absolutely extraordinary work in convening those affected,
24:17 supporting them and seeking justice.
24:20 But I'm interested to know your view of the role of the National Federation of Subpostmasters within this,
24:27 as surely there's alarm bells that should have been going on there,
24:32 and an expectation from their members that they would get support that didn't materialise.
24:36 Do you think an independent trade union could have made a difference here? If I could start with you, Alan.
24:42 Oh, yeah. I mean, the Federation were in bed with Post Office from day one.
24:49 As far as I know, they probably still are because they're paid for lock, stock and barrel by Post Office.
24:55 And it should be entirely independent. It really has to be.
25:01 I mean, it's utter madness. They've refused. They've refused to support any subpostmaster in any legal action against Post Office.
25:10 In fact, I believe it was involved in, sorry, it's incorporated into their charter that they were not allowed to act against Post Office.
25:19 Otherwise they'd lose their funding. Joe?
25:24 Yeah, well, the only advice I got from them when I rang them up, when I knew they were, well, I rang them up to arrange an audit.
25:31 They said, well, we'll arrange the audit. You just go find yourself a good criminal lawyer.
25:36 And that was the only help I got from them. There was no question of where's the money gone?
25:41 You know, could it be this? Could it be that? They just said, you go find yourself a lawyer.
25:45 I mean, they knew it was inevitable. You know, why didn't they stick up for me?
25:49 So, yeah, they are in bed with the Post Office, unfortunately. And Justice Fraser's judgment bears that out.
25:55 And so do you believe that they share some of the culpability for what's happened?
26:00 Yeah, I mean, they had our membership fee.
26:02 For you to work out that this was a widespread issue?
26:05 They must have known. They must have known. But it will come out of the inquiry.
26:09 Thank you.
26:11 Mr Lavery has already covered the questions that I wanted to ask, and rightly so.
26:17 But I just wonder if I could ask you both very briefly.
26:20 On 17 December, Lord Arbuthnot held an adjournment Westminster Hall debate.
26:25 And then on 29 June 2015, Andrew Bridgen held a Westminster Hall debate.
26:29 Both of them identified that the Horizon scheme could be remotely accessed.
26:34 Both of them identified the fact there were bugs in the system.
26:38 And then, according to my timeline, both in 2014, the second site report response from the Post Office
26:47 maintains remote access to Horizon Branch Council is impossible.
26:50 Then again in 2017, the Post Office admits in court the previous assertion that remote access to Horizon Branch Council was impossible.
26:57 How do you respond to that, when you were three, four, five, six, seven years right, calling out the fact that remote access was possible?
27:08 I'd like to hear how you respond to that, when both the people you were talking to in Parliament, when you were raising it within your groups.
27:17 I just wonder if you could add some comments to it.
27:19 Jo, shall we start again?
27:20 Here we are nine years after that, and it's still not sorted out.
27:24 I mean, how long have you got?
27:27 It's shocking that it's taken this long and cost this much money just for something that we've been banging on about for years.
27:37 Mr Bateson?
27:39 Yeah, I mean, we've always known that we were right.
27:44 It was just that the Post Office decided to try and control the whole narrative over the years because of their power and money and all the rest of it.
27:53 And they had the ear of politicians.
27:55 They used to breathe them.
27:57 And it was very, very hard to battle against them.
28:02 But we always knew we were right.
28:04 But and there was a major, as we know now, there's a major cover up's been going on.
28:09 The cover up's almost as worse as bad.
28:12 Sorry, it's far worse than the actual initial crime and the prosecutions of individuals in all of this.
28:18 Thank you.
28:20 Thank you, Chair.
28:21 I just want to follow up on Anthony's point.
28:24 Do you think the Post Office was naive and they just believed fidgetsy?
28:31 Or do you think they were deliberately concealing something?
28:35 Or was there something else?
28:37 We can start with you, Alan.
28:39 Yeah, I think Post Office didn't have the technical expertise at the outset when they brought this system in.
28:45 And they very much relied upon their supplier to also be their IT experts and advisors along the way.
28:53 And I think that was a major, major decision, a major problem that they did.
29:00 Realistically, even if they didn't have the in-house expertise, they should have brought in a third party to assist them along the way and not rely on Fujitsu.
29:10 And was that your experience whenever you would call the help desk, for example?
29:14 Was it your experience that the help desk didn't have the capability and the knowledge to assist?
29:22 I didn't even know there was a Horizon help desk.
29:25 That's how helpful the National Desk were.
29:28 And they didn't even tell me.
29:29 They just said, "Oh, well, you do this and this and this," which made the whole thing worse.
29:33 But no one ever told me about the Horizon help desk because I took the Post Office over pre-Horizon.
29:40 I never had a -- not pre-Horizon but pre-electronic, and I never had a problem until it went electronic.
29:47 And I'd only ever dealt with the National Help Desk.
29:50 But, yeah, they didn't tell me about the Horizon help desk.
29:54 I just follow on from Anthony's question.
29:59 Are you aware to date with the Horizon system still being used of any continuing faults?
30:04 Has anyone approached either of you at any point to ask whether or not the system that is still being used is resulting in faults?
30:11 I mean, I've heard some things that, you know, I have no proof of it, but I've heard it's not brilliant.
30:16 It's still not brilliant.
30:18 Thank you, Jo. Alan?
30:20 I mean, I have spoken to some postmasters in the past who will give me examples of failings within the system still.
30:31 So, yes, it's still ongoing.
30:34 Thank you.
30:35 Anything else?
30:36 Thank you, Chair.
30:37 Mr. Bates, Ms. Hamilton, may I first of all apologize?
30:40 I might be one of the only people in the country who's yet to actually watch the ITV drama, not through any deliberate choice,
30:47 but with having two young children, I'm stuck between Port Patrol and many other shows and evenings and normally fall asleep whilst trying to get them to bed.
30:54 Thank you for that insight.
30:56 I know, well, just to throw that out there, but my father is a good judge of character, someone who is a very godly man.
31:05 Only once in my life has he ever sent me a raging text message, which shocked me to my core,
31:10 and it was following this ITV drama and seeing the injustice that you and many others have had to suffer.
31:17 And that's why I wonder, so far as you're concerned, do you think, despite what Minister Hollenraker has said on the floor of the House
31:24 and obviously in subsequent interviews about emergency legislation, about the processing scheme,
31:29 obviously the drama actually bringing to the public's attention what you've both had to go through as men and all the other victims,
31:35 do you actually truly believe justice will ever be achieved?
31:38 If I start with you, Ms. Hamilton first.
31:41 Well, it'll never let my mum and dad see me have my conviction quashed, so to me that's what it all looks like.
31:47 But, you know, apart from that, we need to see deeds, not words.
31:52 You can say things, but I just think for everybody now to draw a line under this,
31:58 the very minimum is the group of the GLO group who are still left looking for money.
32:04 It needs to be fast-tracked. There has to be a way of applying a bit of common sense to this and cutting out all the red tape.
32:11 Mr. Bates, sorry.
32:13 Yeah, Joe is right. Especially the GLO group.
32:17 Well, I mean all of them, but I mean the GLO group, they've been at this, many of us, for 20 years or so,
32:23 and they've got to put this out. You know, I was talking to one of the group at the weekend.
32:28 She's 91 years old. How many more years has she got to wait for a financial redress?
32:35 Has she got to wait till she gets a telegram from the king?
32:40 I just, you know, this is, it's ridiculous how long the system is holding this up.
32:47 It is absolute madness and it's very unfair and it's cruel.
32:52 Thank you, Chair. Thank you very much indeed.
32:54 Let me just conclude with a couple of questions that we just need to, that we just need to check.
33:01 Do you think that there are many victims still out there who haven't yet come forward, Mr. Bates?
33:09 There are people contacting me now who have had losses over the years and have disappeared,
33:15 and I'm sending them on to lawyers these days. But so, yes, they are starting to come through again.
33:22 I had a text in the taxi on the way over from Good Morning Britain this morning from someone who'd been to prison.
33:30 And so I'm going to pass her on to Neil. I said, give me a chance, I'll get out of this and I'll get back to you.
33:37 And yeah, so I think there are people out there.
33:41 And we've heard that some people who have taken financial redress didn't get legal advice when they put their claims in
33:49 and may therefore have been shortchanged. Is that your view too, Jo?
33:53 Yeah, well, for sure it will be. Yeah.
33:56 Okay. Mr. Bates, is that your perception?
33:58 Yes. Yeah.
34:00 And so finally, what are the key tests for the legislation, Mr. Bates?
34:07 What do you think this legislation that the government has now promised must achieve?
34:12 I'm sorry, which part of the legislation?
34:16 There's new legislation that I think is going to propose mass overturning of the convictions to speed up the path to redress.
34:25 What's the key test? When that bill hits Parliament here, we hope in weeks, let's hope it is weeks,
34:32 how would you judge it, whether it's good enough?
34:37 Well, I suppose really if it draws many more people out of the woodwork and actually come forward.
34:44 Do you know what would be ironic is if those people that just come forward would get their money before the group that fought for this.
34:52 Yeah. Well, thank you very much indeed for your evidence today.
34:57 After everything that you've been through, we are truly grateful for the evidence that you've given.
35:02 You've told us that the process of redress is like being tried all over again.
35:08 You feel like you're the guilty one. You know, why should you?
35:11 You know, I've not claimed for anything I'm not entitled to.
35:14 I'm not lying about anything, you know, but you have to back it all up with everything.
35:19 It's like, wow, they've got my tax returns. They can see, you know, what's so difficult.
35:25 Yeah. You've then gone on to tell us that you don't think, frankly, the bureaucracy is working hard enough to speed up justice and redress.
35:33 You've said something that has got to happen. You've welcomed the idea of legislation.
35:38 But you've also warned us that there are no details that have been published.
35:42 There's no details about this £75,000 idea. And crucially, there's no transparency about it either.
35:51 So those are big questions that we need to put to the minister when we see him a little bit later on.
35:58 But for now, thank you. That brings this session to a conclusion.
36:02 Thank you so much for your evidence. Order. Order.
36:05 Thank you.
36:07 The proceeding is currently suspended.
36:12 [END]
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