Yet another falsehood from Farage...
Nigel Farage’s latest attempt to spread falsehoods has backfired, after the former UKIP leader tried to claim that Labour leader Keir Starmer had failed to act during the Post Office scandal which saw hundreds of subpostmasters wrongly prosecuted for false accounting, theft and fraud.
The scandal, widely described as the most widespread miscarriage of justice in UK history, saw around 700 subpostmasters and mistresses accused of fraud and theft, with the Post Office denying that its Horizon IT system was to blame for the financial discrepancies in the company’s finances.
Between 1999 and 2015 the Post Office relentlessly pursued operators, despite knowing that from at least 2010 onwards that there were faults in the centralised accounting software.
Hundreds of sub-post office operators ended up with criminal records and punishments as a result.
Farage went on X, formerly Twitter, to post his thoughts on the scandal, writing: “Why did
@Keir_Starmer not intervene in the Horizon scandal when he was Director of Public Prosecutions?
“The story first broke in 2009, yet the prosecutions continued until 2015.
“Given the mounting concern at the time and over 700 cases, he has serious questions to answer.”
Nazir Afzal, former chief prosecutor, quoted Farage and wrote: “Because the Post Office prosecute their own cases and the CPS that Starmer led had no say or power over it
But then you know that …”
X also added a community note to Farage’s post, adding: “Royal Mail Horizon prosecutions were private criminal prosecutions.
“This is not uncommon in England. Organisations like the RSPCA regularly bring private criminal prosecutions.
“The Crown Prosecution Service (and Director of Public Prosecutions) are not involved in these.”
Basit Mahmood is editor of Left Foot Forward
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