Good description.
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Jason Beer is doing his job - and (IMO) doing it very well.
Discrediting PV and others, completely, should be his aim. I have no problem with that - based on what I have seen today, from PV.
Claiming she didn’t know, simply does not wash.
She was Post Office CEO - it was her job to KNOW. Everything.
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Exactly: other people were accountable to her, but she was RESPONSIBLE for the Organisation, which is, I believe, how the thing works…
People are sacked for far less in the private sector ( whether one thinks it fair or not) than Vennells’ ineptitude (or deliberate malfeasance, if that is the correct term).
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Just finished my lunch after the start of the break. I have to agree, Jason Beer is worth every penny of his no doubt very large fee.
When i was much much younger i used to be a direct sales salesman. The key to getting a sale was “always be closing”, that is always ask closing questions so that the customer has no where to go when you actually ask them to sign on the dotted line. Jason Beer is doing exactly the same thing with his questioning of Vennells and this is only half way through the first day of three. I think he has a hell of a lot more that he will screw her into the ground with before the three days are up.
In fact, i’ll wager that at some point she will have to refuse to answer a question…which of course tells the inquiry and all that are watching on TV just how guilty she is. I can’t wait to see the smile on Jason Beer’s face when that happens.
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She seems to have had better lawyers doing her research and coaching her. Where the others claimed lack of memory and were then caught out, she often claims lack of memory and shows that knows whether there is no “documentation” to challenge her.
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That was a cracking open question this morning by Jason Beer “Do you think you are the unluckiest CEO in the United Kingdom”
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Back in 2015-18 I occasionally did some work for the National Federation of Sub Postmasters – whose bombastic CEO of the time, George Thompson, has serious questions to answer when he appears before the Inquiry on 21 June:
As a result I met Paula Vennells a number of times. I always wondered how on earth she came to enjoy such an elevated position as – unless she was a very good actor – she seemed weak, ineffective, timid and incompetent; and judging from today’s answers to the Inquiry, remarkably incurious too. Utterly unfit for the job. The other impression I had of her was that she was the kind of person who’d dodge diffult question or decisions, preferring to run away or bury her head in the sand instead.
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…or perhaps like the Ronnie Reagan sketch done by the Not The Nine O’Clock News team, they need to told what to say at every juncture, as perhaps the highly pertinent closing question from Sir Wyn highlighted?
A strong CEO marches to the beat of their own drum. Playing cute with a HoC Select C’tee isn’t a sensible career move.
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Not sure PV has much of a career now TBH…
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Peter Principle in action.
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As CEO she was responsible for the Corporate Culture , and she seems to have failed miserably
PS Wonder who is paying for the lawyers ?
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Not just was the culture at the top awry it seems, but the whole PO construct post separation from RMG was obviously wanting across so many fronts and in so many crucial core operational disciplines. I’m convinced PO was the next on the block for an IPO post developing it out as a separate brand, blessed with suitable financial results and a satisfactory ‘look forward’ story.
Much is said of how complex a business it is, yet, the powers that be didn’t opt to install a ‘heavy hitting’ commercial business CEO, instead they promoted from within, and we’ve already heard from other later entrants how deficient many of their processes and controls were. It’s such a mess.
It’s got all the facets of a public sector attempt at business, where lack of experience, responsibility are often key features, and much wider eyes are needed, allied to the ability to stamp out potential issues when they arise, and not let them fester. Of course, the genesis of all this was the public sector-style procurement of Horizon in the first instance.
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At the risk of edging towards conspiracy theory territory, is there a chance she might have been deliberately elevated to this position precisely because she was naïve and incurious?
IIUC, the organisation’s problems were almost certainly known and understood at the time she became CE - I wonder if they wanted someone who, in the short term, wouldn’t ask difficult questions and, in the longer term, would be a convenient fall guy?
Mark
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Having seen some excerpts on this evening’s TVNews, I hope and trust that her carefully rehearsed tears Were re ognised for what theyclearly were, or at least that is how I felt given a complete absence of any form of emotion, let alone sorrow, contrition or even empathy any time in the past.
Please don’t tar all the public sector with the same brush, there are good and bad examples in both private and public sectors, it’s just that we hear less about the private sector mess ups. I’ve been finance lead on some massive public sector procurements, like £1bn massive. Please don’t equate public sector with incompetence.
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The PO scandal isn’t about incompetence, although there’s been plenty of that, it’s about the establishment protecting itself. It’s what the establishment does - Public, Private and Religious - time after time after time ….
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It’s what people do…
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The, ‘they’re all the same’ rationalisation beloved of wrong doers?