Mr Bates vs Parliament

On the 1st January 2024 the first episode of the Mr Bates vs The Post Office was aired. A brilliant drama, which prompted many protestations of support from our MP’s, for the Post Masters falsely accused of corruption. But how much did our politicians already know about the Horizon scandal?

The answer is, a huge amount.

These charts, taken from the ScrutinyCounts mobile app, show that MP’s collectively contributed 113,000 words to debates about the Post Office over the previous 12 months. In fact, in every month there was at least one debate or session that related to the Post Office.

This following screenshot shows some of these debates but it is by no means exhaustive.

So which MP’s were leading these debates? Kevan Jones (Labour) is the backbencher who contributed the most over the past 12 months.

Back in July 2023 Kevan was expressing concern over the Post Office’s continuing incompetence.

If you want to know more about what our MP’s knew, and what actions they were taking, use the Topic Search within the ScrutinyCounts app.

Go to the Public Services Topic:

Then use the Gold “View Sub Topic” Filter:

Then select “Post Office & Royal Mail”

From there you’ll be able to see a charted summary of how much Parties and MP’s have contributed, along with a list of all the debates which you can click through and read.

The upswell of pressure that resulted from the excellent TV Drama could have come sooner if we, the people, had all been better informed.

If you haven’t got time to watch Parliament TV and you want to keep an eye on what’s going on in Parliament, try the ScrutinyCounts app.