Talk:Mr Bates vs The Post Office

This article is rated C-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects:

Software: Computing Low‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Software, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of software on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.SoftwareWikipedia:WikiProject SoftwareTemplate:WikiProject Softwaresoftware articles Low This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale. This article is supported by WikiProject Computing. Computing: Software Low‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Computing, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of computers, computing, and information technology on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.ComputingWikipedia:WikiProject ComputingTemplate:WikiProject ComputingComputing articles Low This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale. This article is supported by WikiProject Software (assessed as Low-importance). Finance & Investment Low‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Finance & Investment, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of articles related to Finance and Investment on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.Finance & InvestmentWikipedia:WikiProject Finance & InvestmentTemplate:WikiProject Finance & InvestmentFinance & Investment articles Low This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale. Law Low‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Law, an attempt at providing a comprehensive, standardised, pan-jurisdictional and up-to-date resource for the legal field and the subjects encompassed by it.LawWikipedia:WikiProject LawTemplate:WikiProject Lawlaw articles Low This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale. United Kingdom Low‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject United Kingdom, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of the United Kingdom on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.United KingdomWikipedia:WikiProject United KingdomTemplate:WikiProject United KingdomUnited Kingdom articles Low This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale. Human rights This article is within the scope of WikiProject Human rights, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Human rights on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.Human rightsWikipedia:WikiProject Human rightsTemplate:WikiProject Human rightsHuman rights articles ??? This article has not yet received a rating on the project's importance scale. Television: British Low‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Television, a collaborative effort to develop and improve Wikipedia articles about television programs. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page where you can join the discussion. To improve this article, please refer to the style guidelines for the type of work.TelevisionWikipedia:WikiProject TelevisionTemplate:WikiProject Televisiontelevision articles Low This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale. This article is supported by the British television task force (assessed as Low-importance).

The significance of ITV omitting from this otherwise excellent docu-drama any mention whatsoever of the central role in the perversion of justice suffered by hundreds of postmasters that was allegedly played by its own 7+ yr CEO Adam Crozier who was, also for 7+ yrs, Vennells' predecessor, CEO at Royal Mail of which the Post Office was then a division.

Having been subjected to RL harassment and threats of litigation over bringing this to the public's attention, I have raised it at [[1]] since this is the editor who deleted my entry here. Please read the discussion on that Talk page. Sometimes what's not there needs highlighting, in addition to what is there.Albin-Counter (talk) 17:49, 9 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Better to discuss here. The following is the section added by Albin-Counter and reverted by myself. -- Wire723 (talk) 19:03, 9 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Quoted verbatim from your Talk page, since you prefer to discuss this more openly:

Suppression of _relevant_ truth about the strange case of the dog that didn't bark is not the Wiki way, It is highly significant that in a 3hr 8min (ignoring intros & outros) docu-drama, ITV neglected to mention the central involvement of its own 7+ yr CEO in the knowingly wrongful prosecution of hundreds of wholly innocent subpostmasters....

Neither is the DT a deprecated source, as could be inferred from you reversion, nor is the article just SM title-tattle. I suggest you study Adam Crozier and DYOR, for example by studying https://www.amazon.co.uk/Great-Post-Office-Scandal-multimillion-ebook/dp/B098GGKMW7 or at a minimum following all the links to pre-2011 conduct in British Post Office scandal before re-intervening in the significance of ITV suppressing coverage, even in this otherwise excellent docu-drama, of the shameful participation of their own 7+ year CEO in the criminality perpetrated against the subpostmasters.

I will leave this on hold for a while to give you time to digest the matter and perhaps educate yourself on it and then either change your mind or frankly justify your position that it is not worthy of coverage. IMO, there has been enough suppression of the truth in this horrific scandal already. In accordance with Wikipolicy, I am presuming absolute good faith on your part, and putting from my mind any suspicion that you might have some latent connection to the litigious Saatchi & Saatchi and Blairite types harassing, in RL, for many years those who wish to bring Crozier's apparent culpability into the public eye. Thanks.Albin-Counter (talk) 17:36, 9 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

=====

It is not up to you to rule the Daily Telegraph as a deprecated source in Wiki. It is, as a matter of fact, not. Delete errors or what is irrelevant; this material does not qualify at all. If you can't see that a media organisation claiming transparency and freedom from bias chooses to exclude even the briefest mention of its own 7-year CEO's culpability in this matter, held by Nick Wallis (author of the definitive book on the scandal, and research scholar) to be at least as guilty as Vennells who inherited a corrupted and busted flush, then perhaps you shouldn't be a [.... ......]. NPOV! Freedom from political bias or agendas! The dog that didn't bark can be more significant than the one that did. That the 3h8m drama is otherwise so wide-ranging, factual and engaging makes this evidently deliberate omission more egregious.I haven't yet used the term "vandalism" or "censorship"; it is quintuply unwanted in this massive cover-up in which all three major UK political parties are guilty.

I see you are no stranger to such controversies over your deletions....... your turn.  :-) Albin-Counter (talk) 20:52, 9 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The series produced and published by ITV contains no mention at all of Adam Crozier, CEO of Royal Mail from 2003-2010 as the Horizon scandal grew, and then of ITV plc from 2010-2017. He was in effect Paula Vennells' immediate predecessor as CEO since during his regime as CEO, the Post Office was part of Royal Mail. His own culpability has been suggested is equivalent to that of Paula Vennells.^[1]

My concerns are 1) This is about an omission from the programme but many other facets were omitted; 2) The culpability accusation is not mentioned in the British Post Office Scandal article, 3) the Telegraph source is of low journalistic quality, being a comment piece largely sourced from social media. -- Wire723 (talk) 19:12, 9 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

New BT chair Adam Crozier left a trail of wrecked lives as Royal Mail boss (Headline, The Guardian, 19 August 2021), and what Wire723 contends to the contrary is irrelevant

GG... :(

Again, in accordance with policy, I presume absolute good faith on your part.

1) Why have you not consulted, and if you have, referred to, the contents of Adam Crozier, as suggested at the start? Plenty there to refute your contention. Do you note the faint irony of you relying on something not being there (no material reference yet to Crozier in British Post Office Scandal while deleting me for pointing out what's missing from the ITV docu-drama?

2) Perhaps you are unfamiliar with Google; I apologise for not directing you to use it and providing a URL - this one is a good start: [[2]] "Adam Crozier" scandal

That leads you straight to all of the following, many articles of which ask precisely the same question ("A Missing Figure in the Narrative" is typical) as underpinned what you kindly deleted, viz., why is Crozier M.I.A. in the otherwise nearly flawless ITV series, given that his role was as if not more central than Vennells', as the following articles tend to agree -

THE TIMES [[3]] archived from paywalled [[4]]

THE GUARDIAN - [[5]]

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH - [[6]] (Different article)

LBC - [[7]]

DAILY EXPRESS - [[8]]

PRIVATE EYE - [[9]]

BNN - [[10]]

DIGITAL SPY - [[11]]

I hesitate to cite a justly deprecated source, but, FWIW, here THE DAILY FAIL is on the money - [[12]]

Short of setting up my own website to put up fair-use extracts from the aforementioned definitive book [[13]] on the series, written by someone who devoted even more time to this scandal than I have, how can I convey the scathing analysis therein of Crozier's role? Unfortunately, perhaps to boost sales, "Search within" is disabled therein on Amazon and B&N. And if its contents were untrue or misleading, why would the multimillionaire Saatchi & Saatchi wizard and former CEO of ITV and the Post Office/Royal Mail, and current CEO of BT not have sued the solvent Nick Wallis for libel?

etc. honestly no space in the margin to add more than a sliver of what google throws up on the subject - but not to be found in Wikipedia in the most obvious place, thanks to your "diligence" and "vigilance"?

FTAOD, I am as or more scathing about Vennells, and played a central role in the petition. I maintain NPOV in the matter of Vennells vs Crozier!

Perhaps, next time, consider employing a search engine before deleting willy-nilly - far more productive to suggest a source more to your own tastes than just excise. I showed the good form to engage with you privately on your talk page rather than simply reverting you - a courtesy you did not afford me before your act of non-vandalism and non-censorship. :-)

At this point the sensible editor blames me for not choosing (a) better link(s), and then discreetly bows out, sensing I have plenty more reference material. Are you going to be sensible, then?

What you did do is worth citing in the next edition of the GPOS biblebook - Seema Misra, a victim of the Crozier-Vennells regime, is ready to amend her intro piece to include other examples of silencing whistleblowers.

The above is the milder version of my response.... a little knowledge..... did you not pause to consider before deleting in what would appear, even to the meanest intellect (no reference to you) is a highly-charged, ultra-highly-emotional current affairs scandal and fiasco? Albin-Counter (talk) 03:33, 10 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

There is a further (and personally unpleasant) development; kindly consult your Talk: page and respond. Thank you. Albin-Counter (talk) 18:12, 10 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I saw yesterday's Times article (your 3rd source) and I feel it supports my case. Yes, Crozier is listed as someone with questions to answer ... but alongside ten others (Vennells, Perkins, Parker, Greene, Cook, Smith, Keegan, van den Bogerd, Jenkins and Chambers). I still don't see the need to devote a section of this article to the absence of (specifically) Crozier from the TV programme. -- Wire723 (talk) 20:42, 10 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The buck stops with the CEO and he was CEO for the seven years immediately preceding Vennells. The eight other than Crozier and Vennells are all in lesser capacities. Did The Times state or suggest potential culpabilities were equal or equivalent? No.

Many of the offending lawsuits began or were concluded entirely during Crozier's tenure and under his eye. These include the appalling bankrupting of Castleton over 2005-7 (Post Office v Castleton [2007] EWHC 5(QB), to which and to whose character the documentary rightly devoted a great deal of screen time; memory-jogger, £321,000 costs order on an indemnity basis, i.e., as bad as it could possibly get).

Crozier has extra relevance for then being CEO of ITV which produced the documentary that is the subject of this Wiki article, and which gave viewers the impression that Vennells was responsible, while in fact Vennells became CEO and acquired relevant responsibility three years after Castleton was destroyed and his case closed. Familiarise yourself, please, with the timeline documented in the final section at Womble Bond Dickinson.

You are picking and choosing (e.g., your interpretation of The Times' article I linked to behind the paywall) and I'm advised you may be trolling me. I hope not. I strongly suspect you honestly have no idea how much I, and many other activists, have "invested" in this exposure of wicked corruption.

I will therefore reinstate the material, with better references/citations, and not as a section on its own (demoted), which is what your immediately preceding contribution apparently takes issue with, but combined with other commentary. Let the length be in the references and not in the article text, where a single sentence will suffice and leave it to those interested to explore. Compromise is the Wikispirit. If you think I am attempting to deflect attention from Vennells, you will swiftly learn from a review of my recent contributions that the opposite is true. If you now delete my impending compromise edit, I will consider it disruptive editing if not vandalism, and it will be reported to ANI, and I will seek other remedies. But I hope you will see reason, as I do. Thank you. Albin-Counter (talk) 22:49, 10 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

"If you now" ... Kindly refrain from making threats against other editors. Wire723 (talk) 09:58, 11 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

"Threat"? Perhaps you are unfamiliar with internal Wiki processes to resolve edit wars, and terminology?

However, any attempt to downplay or suppress this scandal, viz., why the former ITV CEO got a free pass in the otherwise excellent ITV docu-drama, simply won't work any more.

This is because in the last day, events have progressed, and the question as to why Crozier was excluded has exploded in the media - https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=%22Adam+Crozier%22&tbm=nws&tbs=sbd:1 and https://archive.ph/HtARq (this works better than https://web.archive.org/web/20240111123100/https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=%22Adam+Crozier%22&tbm=nws&tbs=sbd:1 on archiving google searches) and thus merits chronicling in Wikipedia.

But, thanks for the motivation; truth will out. Albin-Counter (talk) 12:32, 11 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Is that really necessary? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 17:04, 17 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]