The repeated failures by the Post Office to provide timely and complete disclosure to the Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry have led to the organisation being severely criticised. Many have even gone to suggest that these various disclosure failings were attempts by the Post Office to frustrate the inquiry’s process.
What is disclosure and why should your organisation be aware of it?
What were the key disclosure failures in the Horizon Scandal?
How can you ensure that your organisation doesn’t make the same mistakes?
What is disclosure?
Disclosure is the transfer of information from one party to another. It takes place in both civil and criminal cases. In civil proceedings, it is used to refer to the transfer of evidence and other relevant material in the case. In criminal proceedings it is used to refer to the revelation of relevant ‘unused material’ by the prosecution to the defence. In criminal proceedings evidence is ‘furnished’ or ‘served’ by the prosecution on the defence.
This may sound simple, but in practice, the process of disclosure during legal proceedings can be complex, costly and often a logistical nightmare for the person or people responsible in an organisation. Sometimes the reputation of an organisation or persons within an organisation can be at risk but the obligation to disclose information will likely outweigh these concerns.
Why should your organisation be aware of disclosure?
Organisations across most sectors will instruct investigators to carry out civil, criminal and regulatory inquiries. Those conducting investigations may not always be clear on where their investigation may end up – be it a criminal, civil, employment or even regulatory proceeding. But investigators must be prepared, regardless.
The investigator’s role is to gather and explore all available evidence and information and produce a fair and accurate file of evidence that can be used in legal proceedings, should they arise.
Failure to conduct proper investigations, including thorough case file preparation, could result in evidence being inadmissible, unreliable or without weight. This may adversely affect the outcome of any legal proceedings.
What were the key disclosure issues in the Post Office Horizon IT Scandal?
In November 2023, two key witnesses were due to give evidence in the inquiry. However, on the morning they were scheduled to attend, the Post Office carried out a late disclosure of more than 300,000 emailed from after 2012, which had previously been missed due to a technical problem dating back to an email gateway software migration in 2016. This led to the testimony from these key witnesses being delayed by a number of months to allow for the inquiry, witnesses and other core to process this new evidence.
This substantial delay is one of several disclosure failings by the Post Office – previous delays were caused by hard copy documents being found in new Post Office locations and a misuse of search terms in the disclosure exercise. All these issues which increased and potentially wasted costs, not to mention upset and distress to the parties involved in the inquiry.
This substantial delay caused increased and potentially wasted costs, not to mention upset and distress to the parties involved in the inquiry.
What can you do to ensure that your organisation doesn’t make the same mistakes?
- Appoint a person or persons within the organisation to be responsible for internal investigations, which may or may not lead to civil, criminal or regulatory proceedings.
- Ensure that the relevant persons within your organisation understand the principles of case file management and disclosure.
- Implement a proper case file management process, with the systems in place to support this process.
- Ensure that the relevant persons within your organisation have the knowledge and skills to produce comprehensive case files, which contain all the relevant documentation and information required for hearings.
Bond Solon’s two-day Case File Preparation Disclosure course has been created to ensure that investigators preparing criminal cases to pass to advocates for presentation have the requisite knowledge and skills to produce comprehensive case files with all the relevant documentation and information required for criminal proceedings.
For more information or to find out how you can book this course please contact 020 7549 2549 or email info@bondsolon.com