Public Lectures from the Faculty of Law, University of Cambridge

'Can the 'Post Office convictions' be quashed by legislation?': Jonathan Rogers (audio)

Jan 23, 2024

Legal expert Jonathan Rogers discusses the government's plan to quash convictions of subpostmasters prosecuted by the Post Office based on faulty Horizon software. He explores the challenges in reviewing old cases, the need for a legislative solution, and possible outcomes. Rogers also examines the right to a fair trial, the appeals process, and proposes legislative solutions to address subpostmasters' appeals dilemma.

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Introduction

00:00 • 5min

Challenges in Scrutinizing Convictions and the Need for Legislative Solution

04:42 • 3min

Revisiting Unsuccessful Appeals and Impersonal Acquittal in Post Office Convictions

08:07 • 2min

Analysis of the Fair Trial Right and the Right to Appeal in Post Office Convictions

10:33 • 4min

Solving the Sub-Postmasters' Appeals Dilemma

14:05 • 3min

The government has recently announced that it intends to quash by legislation convictions of hundreds of subpostmasters who had been prosecuted by the Post Office for, variously, theft, fraud and false accounting. This follows a number of appeals which have already succeeded where it has been accepted that convictions that are based on generated by the Horizon software are necessarily unsafe. Usually, one would expect other subpostmasters to have to follow that same route, but the government is concerned about the delay in processing so many cases. Nonetheless it is unprecedented to quash convictions by legislative fiat in a situation when the courts would yet be competent to do the same; and notwithstanding the concerns of criminal and constitutional lawyers, a Bill to this effect appears likely to be produced this year and to receive support from all sides of the House of Commons.

In this short video Dr Jonathan Rogers explains the background, explores the challenges that will face those who draft the legislation, and comments further on the likely reservations that many will still entertain about this innovation.

Jonathan Rogers is Associate Professor in Criminal Justice at the University of Cambridge, and a Fellow of Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge. He co-founded the Criminal Law Reform Now Network (http://www.clrnn.co.uk/) in 2017 and leads an ongoing project by that network into the reform of private prosecutions, and in that capacity he gave evidence to the Justice Select Committee in 2020 on safeguards in the wake of the Post Office scandal.

For more information about Dr Rogers, you can also refer to his profile at:

https://www.law.cam.ac.uk/people/academic/jw-rogers/78191

Law in Focus is a collection of short videos featuring academics from the University of Cambridge Faculty of Law, addressing legal issues in current affairs and the news. These issues are examples of the many which challenge researchers and students studying undergraduate and postgraduate law at the Faculty.

This entry provides an audio source for iTunes.