The Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry has just a few more weeks to go, and more than 20 lawyers are under investigation by the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA).
The SRA’s latest news dated 20 June is here.
“Between 2000 – 2015, sub-postmasters and mistresses (SPMs) were wrongly prosecuted for offences based on information from a faulty electronic accounting system, 'Horizon', which made it look like money was missing. From wrongful convictions through to financial ruin and devastating personal consequences, the miscarriages of justice in this case have severely impacted the lives of hundreds of SPMs.
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We are here to protect the public.
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We have more than 20 live investigations into solicitors and law firms who were working on behalf of the Post Office/Royal Mail Group.”
One lawyer who is probably out of reach of the SRA’s investigations is Jane MacLeod, who was the General Counsel of Post Office Limited from 2015 to 2019. MacLeod replaced Chris Aujard who was the temporary GC for 16 months from late 2013 to early 2015 (the one who made a veiled threat to bankrupt Second Sight forensic accountant Ian Henderson if he didn’t keep his mouth shut after POL sacked Second Sight), and Aujard replaced Susan Crichton who appears to have been bullied out and contractually gagged by, or at the behest of, then CEO Paula Vennells in late 2013.
MacLeod is understood to have returned to her native Australia in 2020, and went on to work for a wealth management multinational called FNZ. Aujard is also Australian, and is, or was until recently working for FNZ in the UK.
For those who didn’t notice, the writer is a New Zealander blogging from Lower Hutt NZ, so in the ANZAC spirit I need to qualify this statement. Rodric Williams, who Ed Henry KC said was lying to the Inquiry is one of ours and we will be watching what happens to him, and reporting in a subsequent article. Per capita, we sent more of our trash to the UK and ultimately POL than Australia did.
There, I’ve said it. Back to Jane MacLeod…
Inquiry Chair Sir Wyn Williams made a statement on 24 May to the effect that MacLeod, who was due to give evidence to the Inquiry on June 3 and 4, was now refusing to turn up or even give evidence remotely. Shortly after this, amid initial confusion around where she was, I noted that the NSW Law Society’s public register indicated that she held a practicing certificate and was employed by FNZ. No surprises so far.
On 4 June the BBC’s Katy Watson doorstepped MacLeod in Sydney and she had no comment to make as per this 35 second video.
A few weeks later I checked the NSW register again and the reference to FNZ was no longer there. For context, FNZ does have the right, and even a duty to its shareholders to manage a reputational risk – presumably it employed MacLeod and Aujard in good faith, unaware of their role in a scandal that was about to explode! We’re talking major disclosure violations and cover-ups. But it would have been drawing a long bow to suggest that MacLeod and FNZ had parted ways at that early stage.
However, I checked again this morning and MacLeod is no longer registered as a lawyer in Australia. If she’s no longer a lawyer, then she can’t carry out the duties she was presumably employed by FNZ to do. Most likely, she’s gone.
And while no criminal charges have yet been laid against any POL executives or lawyers, MacLeod is possibly only the second person, after Vennells was forced to hand back her CBE, to experience a loss of status in that she no longer holds a practicing certificate in Australia. And we bet there’s plenty more where that came from.
*Los Angeles band Jane’s Addiction, the inspiration for the title, performed in London recently. Skip to 19.30 for Been Caught Stealing. Perry Farrell might as well have dedicated it to those now getting called out for stealing subpostmasters’ livelihoods.
Tristam Price
Editor
Leighton Associates
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