The Great Post Office Scandal

JESUS MAFA. Jesus drives out the merchants.

Like many people in the UK, I’ve been watching Mr Bates vs the Post Office, the drama detailing the greatest miscarriage in British justice (greater in scale even than the Hillsborough atrocity). The scandal began in 1999, as hundreds of sub-postmasters - the title is inclusive of women - were falsely accused by the Post Office of theft because of bugs in a software system called Horizon, run by Japanese company Fujitsu. Hundreds of sub-postmasters lost their businesses and had their reputations and lives shattered. Many were convicted and given prison sentences. The incredible stress caused nervous breakdowns and divorces. People were ostracised by their communities who thought they’d been stealing from customers. Four people committed suicide.

Thanks to the tireless campaigning of sub-postmasters like Alan Bates – a campaign he has conducted for nearly 20 years – and the equally tireless advocacy of journalist Nick Wallis, many convictions have been overturned, and the British public is now aware of the magnitude of the scandal. But there are still millions of pounds unpaid in compensation, and not one senior manager in the Post Office has faced prosecution for a criminal cover-up on a staggering scale. Yet.

It is difficult to contemplate something so wicked … that people in senior management knew there were serious problems with the Horizon accounting system, that the helpline staff were deliberately instructed to give desperately worried sub-postmasters that they ‘were the only one’ to be experiencing problems, and that senior managers did nothing to prevent criminal proceedings against innocent men and women. Whistleblowers were punished for speaking out. We have seen this time and again, when the highly paid and privileged feel under threat – they would rather protect themselves and their organisations than see justice done.

The Bible has a great deal to say about justice and the right way to treat people.

Verses like this:

If you see in a province the oppression of the poor and the violation of justice and righteousness, do not be amazed at the matter, for the high official is watched by a higher, and there are yet higher ones over them. Ecclesiastes 5:8 (ESV)

For I the LORD love justice. I hate robbery and wrongdoing. Isaiah 61: 1-8 NRSV

For from the least to the greatest of them, everyone is greedy for unjust gain; and from prophet to priest, everyone deals falsely. Jeremiah 6:13 (ESV)

“Were they ashamed when they committed abomination? No, they were not at all ashamed; they did not know how to blush. Therefore they shall fall among those who fall; at the time that I punish them, they shall be overthrown,” says the Lord. Jeremiah 6:15 (ESV)

When all the prisoners of the land are crushed under foot, when human rights are perverted in the presence of the Most High, when one’s case is subverted —does the Lord not see it? – Lamentations 3: 34-36

Unequal weights and unequal measures are both alike an abomination to the Lord. Proverbs 20:10 (ESV)

The Lord within her is righteous; he does no injustice; every morning he shows forth his justice; each dawn he does not fail; but the unjust knows no shame. Zephaniah 3:5 (ESV)

Behold, the wages of the labourers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, are crying out against you, and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts. James 5:4 (ESV)

There are many more! The theme of righteousness and justice runs right the way through the Bible, and Jesus reserved His harshest words for the rich and powerful, and those who thought themselves more righteous than others. God’s judgment falls on His people not just for idol worship and sexual perversity but for oppressing the poor and for ignoring cries for justice.

Like many, I felt deep anger as I listened to Nick Wallis’s investigations on Radio 4 and watched the ITV drama. Anger at injustice is a legitimate emotion, especially when it fuels people to campaign for what is right and just.

What authors have helped you become aware of the fight for justice? How do you tackle themes like this in your own writing?

I’m an Anglican lay minister and work full-time for the United Reformed Church as Administrator for their education and learning office. I wrote a devotional for the anthology Light for the Writer’s Soul, published by Media Associates International, and my short story ‘Magnificat’ appears in the ACW anthology Merry Christmas Everyone