Barry Duke, the Angry Atheist

THE Anglican priest, who apparently found Mammon more attractive than Jesus and destroyed hundreds of lives while amassing a fortune, is to surrender the CBE she was awarded for services to the Post Office and charity

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PAULA Vennells was practically unknown to most Brits until ITV—in a recent heart-wrenching four-part series—Mr Bates vs The Post Office—revealed that she was ultimately responsible for the wrongful prosecution of more than 700 Post Office innocentt owners for theft, fraud and false accounting between 1999 and 2015.

Some committed suicide while others to prison following their convictions. Many were financially ruined.

After the series aired, all hell broke loose, and more than a million people signed a 38 Degrees petition calling her to stripped of her honour.

It became the fastest growing petition in 38 Degrees’ history.

Set up three years ago by 38 Degrees supporter David Smith, the petition had just 1,000 signatures until the evening of Monday, January 1, when shocked ITV viewers flocked to the petition to demand removal of the honour. After the final episode aired, it surged to over 1.2 million signatures.

But while the government was actively considering taking away her CBE, Vennells, according to the BBC, announced today (Tuesday) that she was surrendering it.

The BBC also reported that the avaricious Vennells was shortlisted to be Bishop of London in 2017 when it was aleady known to investigators and parliamentarians that she was in the midst of the biggest miscarriages of justice ever experienced in Britain.

Images via Youtube

The Archbishop of Canterbury, according to the BBC, was a keen supporter of Vennels and wanted her to become London’s Anglican bishop. Vennells was interviewed for the role—the third most senior in the Church of England—but not appointed from a final shortlist of three.

Sarah Mullally, who was formerly England’s chief nursing officer before she became a priest, was announced as the first female Bishop of London in December 2017 instead.

Vennells stepped back from her priestly duties in 2021, but before doing so, she said a few years earlier that there are many parallels between the Post Office and the mainstream of the Church of England.

Both are highly valued, national institutions providing care, support and services to many communities right across the country.

Oh, the irony!

‘An exceptional British money manager and Anglican minister’

As recently as yesterday, the Seattle-based Sip Magazine ran a hagiography that signally failed to mention anything about her role in this hackle-raising British horror story. Instead it described her as:

An exceptional British money manager and Anglican minister renowned for her varied leadership roles … Vennells was an invaluable presence at Post Office Limited during a period of considerable change and development; her leadership style and decisions during this period became widely debated among business analysts.

In 2019, Vennells decided to step down as CEO, transitioning into her next challenge as Chairperson of Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust; unfortunately due to personal circumstances this tenure proved short lived.

And then, most ironic of all:

Vennells’ dedication and time management abilities can be seen both at her church congregation as well as with her corporate duties. Her journey is an inspiring example for many who seek to balance their professional ambitions with personal convictions and community service.

Rewarded for lies, obfuscation and abuse of power

In 2021, Computer Weekly carried a piece that revealed that Vennells was awarded bonuses worth hundreds of thousands of pounds in her final year at an organisation that has now been forced turn to the government for a payout to clean up some of the mess left after her departure.

Vennells left the Post Office in 2019 just prior to a damaging High Court judgment, which slammed the management of the company that punished subpostmasters for mistakes made by its own computer system. She took over £400,000 in pay and bonuses with her.

According to the Post Office financial results for 2019/20, she took salary already earned in the year she left of £21,250, plus benefit payments amounting to £6,137. In August 2019, she received a payment from the organisation’s long-term incentive plan of £245,000, along with a short-term incentive plan bonus of £143,820, for performance in the financial year 2018/19.

During the seven-year period she ran the company, the Post Office prosecuted subpostmasters and blamed them for unexplained accounting shortfalls caused by faulty Horizon software provided by tech giant Fujitsu, which may now have to have to fork out millions for compensation for sub-postmasters and postmistresses wrongly convicted of fraud.

When I posted the petition to my Facebook page, I suggested that the rapacious Vennells should not only be stripped of her honour, but be put behind bars too, and have them welded shut.

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