Mr. Bates vs. The Post Office

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I watched the final episode tonight.

They had no money to take a civil case against the Post Office for compensation.
They were approached by a solicitor who said that a fund would take on the risk for a share of any winnings.
They did not say on the programme what the share would be at the time. I am sure that Bates would have clarified that and discussed it with the other 549 people in the group.
They won their case and the Post Office began proceedings to get the judge to recuse himself on grounds of bias.
The legal team wanted the sub postmasters to settle. Bates refused.
The judge awarded them €68m
The funders and legal team took €56m leaving the sub postmasters with only €20k each. Many had lost their savings, their homes and over 200 had criminal convictions.

I thought that this was very interesting. I have seen it in Ireland where legal firms take cases on a no-foal, no-fee basis. When it gets to the Court the solicitors always push for a settlement so that their fees will be paid. The consumer often gets little or nothing. But their solicitors frighten them telling them that the case is not as strong as it looked and they might lose their home if they lose the case and the bank is awarded costs.
 
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By comparison, the AIB Prevailing Rate case cost AIB €300m.

There were no legal costs with the Ombudsman - although we had spent €12k on legal advice before going to the Ombudsman.

Brendan
 
Brendan Burgess said:
The judge awarded them €68m
The legal team took €56m
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That's not correct Brendan, and the programme doesn't make that claim.

The lions share of the difference went to those who funded the action, who understandably charged a huge risk premium on the grounds that they would have lost their entire investment had it failed.

The villains here are the Post Office and Fujitsu, both of whom had clearly considered it impossible for the victims to mount a case. That they were able to do so at all is to the immense credit of both their legal team and their funders.
 
T McGibney said:
That's not correct Brendan, and the programme doesn't make that claim.

The lions share of the difference went to those who funded the action, who understandably charged a huge risk premium on the grounds that they would have lost their entire investment had it failed.

The villains here are the Post Office and Fujitsu, both of whom had clearly considered it impossible for the victims to mount a case. That they were able to do so at all is to the immense credit of both their legal team and their funders.
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Thanks for adding that Tommy as I was confused how the legal team were stating that they did a lot of their work for nothing, yet this huge sum of money was allocated away from the subpostmasters. I'm still a bit confused though about how those who funded the action came to receive a sum in the tens of millions. Is there any breakdown of what the original funding was (and what that funding was for) and the premium for the funding?
 
Bates had an article in the FT at the weekend saying that this sort of action might not be possible in future as a Supreme Court ruling has made it unenforceable

www.kingsfords-solicitors.com

Litigation Funding - the Post Office and Horizon IT scandal - Kingsfords Solicitors

The recent ITV series Mr Bates vs The Post Office has drawn to the Public s attention the fact that over 900 postmasters were wrongly criminally convicted of...
www.kingsfords-solicitors.com www.kingsfords-solicitors.com

In the summer of 2023 however a Supreme Court Ruling in the case of PACCAR and others v Competition Appeal Tribunal and others threw into doubt the enforceability of such Litigation Funding Agreements, having severe implications for both Litigation Funders and law firms relying on such third party funding models. Without protections in place, the whole sector could have been placed in jeopardy and with it the unintended consequence that the ability of “David” to take on “Goliath” would diminish.

So he still believes in it.

Brendan
 
From the same article

As an aside Mr Bates and his Alliance colleagues is not finished with litigation yet. They seek to re-open their litigation and set aside the Settlement Agreements they entered into with the Post Office due to their failure to act in good faith. Although the group received a reported £56.75m the individual Post-masters received around £20,000 each after deduction of costs associated with the action, including to the “no win, no fee” litigation funder. It is asserted that the Post Office’s deliberately legal team were trying anything and everything to run the litigation funding dry. In so doing, this forced the Postmasters into accepting the settlement terms previously secured to ensure they received something from the exercise.
 
Ceist Beag said:
I'm still a bit confused though about how those who funded the action came to receive a sum in the tens of millions.
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Well if I advance you a sum of money to help you take a David v Goliath case, I'm going to need a high multiple of that sum in the event of victory to justify the risk, if the venture is a commercial proposition.

In the event of defeat, I know I won't see a cent of it.
 
Brendan Burgess said:
Just caught the first two episodes of this today. It really dramatises what sub-postmasters went through and how the Post Office behaved.

It would be great to see a similar drama about the Tracker Mortgage scandal.

Brendan
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I can't imagine it ever being made. Ireland is too small a country to rock the boat and banks for some reason remain very powerful. Fine Gael in particular ran for cover for much of the scandal. The Central Bank of Ireland to their eternal shame refused to meet with many of the early victims pleading for help while banks were quite literally robbing them blind. The banks boards and directors got off scot free. Many bank directors ended up in other roles including in the state sector despite their appaling behaviour and damming findings against the boards on which they served. Moreover the endless delays in enacting the Central Bank Individual Accountability Framework is indicative of the foot dragging in government and the Central Bank which so often typified the whole horrific scandal. And now we have so few banks left you can be sure there's no appetite in RTE to make or commission anything like this. Yet the stench remains. Hopefully the human stories might yet be told. The stories of suicide, ill health, marriage breakdown, home repossession and financial loss remain in many cases untold.
 
George Patrick said:
Hopefully the human stories might yet be told. The stories of suicide, ill health, marriage breakdown, home repossession and financial loss remain in many cases untold.
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We did discuss some of them on here at the time. Not that it did any good. An awful lot emigrated as well. It's still not over for some. The banks go on, as do their boards. And as you said, the Central Bank was shameful in it's turning a blind eye.
 
I watched it, very powerful and moving. Without the funders they could not have gone to court, it took years to start the case. And it went on for years. The post office still think they did nothing wrong. And their deliberate plan was to run the litigation into the ground by racking up the costs. I think the costs of both sides was about €30 mil.

And even not in the official inquiry the stuff that is coming out is just bonkers. The culture in the post office was to promote from the ground up and all those senior staff are now saying they never questioned anything, just said yes and agreed to everything. And they all still work there.
 
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