Solicitor for Post Office defends failure to disclose Horizon helpline calls

Lawyers for the Post Office opted not to tell a sub-postmaster about thousands of issues raised about the Horizon IT system out of concern he would be ‘swamped’ by disclosure.

The Post Office Inquiry heard yesterday that Stephen Dilley, solicitor for the Post Office in its civil claim against Lee Castleton, felt the request for disclosure by his opponent had seemed ‘onerous’.

Dilley, a partner with Womble Bond Dickinson (previously Bond Pearce), defended the decision not to disclose details of the 12,000-15,000 calls being made every month by other sub-postmasters reporting technical problems with the Horizon IT system. Castleton had consistently blamed the system for the £25,000 shortfall at his Bridlington branch before the Post Office pursued him through a week-long trial which resulted in his bankruptcy.

The inquiry heard that Dilley and his team had estimated it would take three to four weeks to go through the thousands of calls which would cost the Post Office up to £3,000. The organisation ended up spending £300,000 overall on the Castleton litigation.

Julian Blake, counsel for the inquiry, said the large number of calls was precisely the reason for investigating the Horizon system further and deciding what should be disclosed to Castleton about wider issues with it.

Dilley said: ‘First of all, I didn’t think it would generate relevant information or it might have flushed out, I suppose, both relevant and irrelevant information and, if you like, drowned Mr Castleton because if people are ringing with problems that are caused by themselves, then providing him with information about that is not going to help.’

Blake suggested the question of relevance should have been left to Castleton and his representatives.

Dilley responded: ‘One of the criticisms claimants sometimes make is “Oh, the defendant has absolutely swamped us”.’

The solicitor said he did not regret providing more disclosure, and his only regret was that the case could not be settled.

Dilley said Castleton’s disclosure on problems with Horizon at other branches had been late and felt ‘a little like bit like… going to the dentist and pulling teeth’.

Blake suggested to Dilley that the suggestion it was Castleton who failed in his duty of disclosure was ‘ridiculous’, adding: ‘Was he [Castleton] expected to go up and down the country to different post offices asking them if they had bugs, errors or defects, if they had Horizon problems?’

Dilley told the inquiry that he was only told about two other cases where sub-postmasters were involved in cases challenging the Horizon system.

But the inquiry also heard that the Post Office had – before the Castleton case came to court – received an interim report from auditors BDO citing ‘possible problems with Horizon’. Dilley said counsel had advised him not to disclose this report and he was also instructed by the Post Office not to disclose it.

There was also a discrepancy with Horizon flagged up before the trial by the person who took over the running of Castleton’s branch. Dilley asked him if this error was enough to account for £25,000 of losses and was satisfied this was not possible, so did not require further investigation.

Addressing the conduct of the civil case, the inquiry heard extracts of a note of a telephone conversation held a week before trial between Dilley and Post Office solicitor Mandy Talbot. The pair talked of the Post Office wanting to ‘play some brinkmanship’ and its barrister ‘effectively trying to ambush the other side because he thinks that when we serve these fifteen witness statements on them, they will be knocked reeling a bit’.

Blake asked: ‘Looking back, do you think the brinkmanship and the tactics were appropriate?’ Dilley replied: ‘Yes.’

Asked if he could and should have made wider disclosure, Dilley responded: ‘No’.

Dilley was due to finish his oral evidence on Friday morning, following which Richard Morgan KC, counsel for the Post Office in the civil proceedings against Castleton, is due to give evidence to the inquiry.