Watch: Paula Vennells refuses to answer questions about Post Office scandal

Former boss, seen cycling on Sunday, asked by Channel 4 News whether she knowingly lied to MPs amid evidence of cover-up

Paul Vennells, the former Post Office boss, refused to answer questions about the Horizon scandal after being seen in public for the first time since the airing of the TV drama that highlighted it.
Ms Vennells, who was seen cycling on Sunday morning, was asked whether she had knowingly lied to MPs amid mounting evidence of a cover-up.
Leaked recordings have suggested she knew about a “covert operations team” that could remotely access the Horizon system, used by sub-postmasters, that ultimately resulted in more than 900 wrongful convictions.
Channel 4 News filmed Ms Vennells as she left a church on Sunday morning and asked her whether she had anything to say, whether she had “lied to MPs” and whether “there had been a cover-up”.
“There is a lot of evidence that there has been a cover-up – have you anything to say?” Alex Thomson, from Channel 4 News, asked as she cycled away.
It was the first time she had been seen in public since the ITV series Mr Bates vs The Post Office aired earlier this year, in which she was portrayed by Lia Williams. 
The drama put the retailer and its bosses in the public spotlight as it revealed the scale of the financial and emotional damage done to hundreds of sub-postmasters for more than a decade.
Last month Patrick Spence, the show’s producer, suggested Ms Vennells was “in hiding” ahead of an appearance at the official inquiry into the Post Office scandal.  The inquiry is set to restart next week, and she is expected to appear during its next phase.
Remote access to sub-postmasters accounts by the Fujitsu Horizon system has been central to the inquiry into the scandal and allegations of a cover-up.
In 2015, the former Post Office chief executive denied to Parliament in correspondence that remote access was possible.
In written evidence to the business, innovation and skills committee inquiry, the Post Office said: “There is no functionality in Horizon for either a branch, Post Office or Fujitsu to edit, manipulate or remove transaction data once it has been recorded in a branch’s accounts.”
MPs questioned whether the £1 billion system was reliable, but under Vennells’ leadership the Post Office continued to prosecute sub-postmasters despite evidence that the computer system was at fault. The Post Office brought in an investigation firm, only for it to be “sacked” before it finished its work.
In 2015, Ms Vennells told the Commons business select committee that “we have no evidence” of miscarriages of justice but by the time she left the Post Office in 2019, after earning nearly £5 million, it was on the brink of losing a High Court battle.
On Friday, Nadhim Zahawi, the former Chancellor, told ITV News he believed Ms Vennells did not tell the truth when questioned by MPs, including himself, in 2015.
Mr Zahawi called on the Post Office to be investigated for corporate manslaughter following the deaths of Horizon victims who took their own lives. At least four sub-postmasters are known to have done so.
It comes after Channel 4 News obtained a recording from 2013 in which Susan Crichton, the Post Office’s chief lawyer, confirmed twice that Ms Vennells had been briefed about a “covert operations team” that could remotely access the Horizon system and adjust branches’ accounts.
The secret recordings suggest Ms Vennells was aware of the allegations that remote access to branch accounts was possible two years before prosecutions were halted against sub-postmasters.
Ms Vennells forfeited her CBE in February. She had been awarded it for “services to the Post Office and to charity” but faced pressure to return it after more than one million people signed a petition to have her stripped of the title.