Cover-up is normal

Cover-up is normal. The excruciating explanations offered last month by Paula Vennells, the former CEO of the UK Post Office, when presented with historic evidence of her efforts, along with managerial and legal colleagues, to suppress information about the colossal miscarriages of justice suffered by sub-postmasters, meant that some of the mechanics of corporate cover-up have been revealed to the British public, owing to the public inquiry at which she was testifying. Those of us who have worked for years as journalists are accustomed to them. The exceptional nature of the Post Office scandal lies in the scale of the wrongdoing, the length of time for which justice has been delayed, and the breadth, depth and diversity of senior professionals in the Post Office, the Fujitsu IT provider, the legal system and the British establishment who collectively delivered this monstrous injustice, and covered-up much of the evidence for years afterwards. The scandal involved hundreds of innocent sub-postmasters sent to prison by flawed computer data from the Post Office Horizon IT system, thuggish executives and investigators, corrupt lawyers hiding evidence and extorting false guilty pleas, and judges who were either incompetent or corrupt, or both.

Cover-up is routine in management. The cases in this article are British, but obviously the problem is global. I consciously chose the word ‘exceptional’ to describe the Post Office scandal, not ‘unique’. The scale of the affair is colossal, but what is not unique is the type of cover-up techniques deployed. When Jason Beer KC asked Ms Vennells if she was the ‘unluckiest CEO in history’ he probably meant it sarcastically. Many of us in the press gallery will have felt it was a literal observation: most executives covering up similar or worse crimes, with similar methods, do escape with impunity. NHS Trusts covering up avoidable deaths by gaslighting whistleblowers — with copious help from law firms and Employment Tribunal judges — are probably the worst offenders in the UK (the cases of whistleblowers Dr Usha Prasad, Mr Martyn Pitman, and Dr Chris Day are typical; this is a representative selection — there are hundreds of similar cases, and an established playbook is in operation, as exposed last month by the Daily Telegraph). The devious and oppressive tactics by law firms representing NHS trusts are often tolerated or approved by judges in the Employment Tribunal service. As one NHS whistleblower told a support meeting that I attended: ‘At least in Putin’s Russia, you know the proceedings are going to be unfair.’

The Post Office scandal has witnessed similar collaboration with unjust cover-up tactics by members of the legal system, though thankfully not all. If just one individual — Justice Fraser in the 2019 High Court case — had sided with the Post Office and not the sub-postmasters, Ms Vennells would have retired a wealthy woman with her CBE and reputation intact. Given that hundreds of other judges oversaw guilty verdicts in kangaroo courts involving no actual evidence of monies ending up wrongfully in the personal possession of the sub-postmasters, this was an extremely close call. So she has, by a narrow, calculating, cynical measure, been exceptionally unlucky.

Cover-ups often come with amber warning signs. Three of those that I have come across many times in 35 years as a journalist have been on copious display in the statements of Post Office executives and communications officers. They are as follows:

· Use of the word ‘robust’. If an organization has systems that actually are robust, its spin doctors never feel the need to reach for this adjective.

· Resorting to generic statements of policy when quizzed on a specific action, in particular the phrase ‘We/I would never…’. Ms Vennells claimed that she ‘would never’ base a policy on the recommendation of an individual communications officer, even as she was being presented with email evidence that she had done precisely that, opting not to open investigations into historic Horizon-related cases on the advice of Chief Communications Officer Mark Davies, guided by his ‘steer’ (her choice of word) that it would have led to high-profile and negative media coverage.

· The phrase ‘no evidence’. This may well mean that no relevant investigation has taken place or, as in the case of Ms Vennells closing down the Second Sight investigation and other proposed reviews of potentially unsafe convictions, were allowed to be completed.

Cover-ups may involve scientists. In the long-running scandal over injury caused by toxic fumes, especially organophosphates used in agriculture, aviation and the oil industry, the British government and Cranfield University in 2011 carried out a study that monitored air quality on typical airline flights, resulting in — you’ve guessed it — a finding of ‘no evidence’ of contaminants at levels likely to cause harm. The problem, however, was that the researchers only investigated the typical or average level, not the high concentrations associated with a leak or sudden burst of oil vapours, which campaigners, and some other researchers, had found to be the source of the problem. It was the equivalent of claiming that there is ‘no evidence’ of road traffic accidents on the basis of observing 100 journeys safely concluded. A scientific show trial, in other words. This was a similar tactic as that adopted by the Post Office in its handling of the Second Sight investigation: give an impression of an independent inquiry, but ensure that it doesn’t get too close to the truth. Note that the aviation industry succeeded where the Post Office ultimately failed. My report from February 2014 is here: https://dossierphilipwhiteley.wordpress.com/2014/02/10/employers-duty-of-care-in-airlines-suspected-breaches/

Cover-ups are institutionally normalized. In all corporations and public sector bodies, it is automatically a disciplinary issue if an employee gives an unauthorized statement to a journalist, even if they are telling the truth, but it is not a disciplinary matter for a member of the press office to give misleading information to a journalist, or even tell a straight lie, if this is the ‘line’ approved by executives and the board.

Cover-ups involve bullying as well as deception, legalistic dirty tricks and scientific show trials. One of the most extraordinary experiences of my journalistic career came in 1998, shortly after the election of the New Labour Government. Its flagship policy was the New Deal, a training scheme to help long­-term unemployed people back in to work. On the Personnel Today news desk we learned that one employer had withdrawn from operating the scheme, on the basis of the poor quality of recruit. We ran with the story. A furious head of the press office of the relevant department harangued me on the phone with such verbal aggression that I recall physically still shaking when I arrived home. He had discovered that the employer was still nominally a signatory to the New Deal, therefore his spin to the national press news editors became that Personnel Today had got the story wrong, was unreliable, and so on. You may say this was no great scandal; actually that is my point. If the most senior communications officer of a government department will go to such extreme lengths to keep a potentially minor policy setback out of the national press, one gets an insight into the ferocity with which major institutions will, well, cover things up, big and small. Paula Vennells’ cover-up tactics may shock you, and they are shocking, but her conduct is not an outlier. Her tactics were Cover-up 1.0 — the bog-standard playbook, as practised by thousands, and exposed by a very few.

If you are setting out on a career as a journalist, here is some advice from a white-haired old hack. If a press office ever comes out with a statement on the lines of:

‘Our systems are robust. An independent survey has found no evidence of injury caused by our products. We would never place our employees or the public at risk of harm…’

My advice is: Dig, dig, dig. There’s a story there.