Watch: Post Office inquiry continues as former CEO and managing director give evidence

Watch as Adam Crozier, the former CEO of Royal Mail and Alan Cook, the former managing director of the Post Office gave evidence to the Post Office Horizon IT inquiry on Friday 12 April.

They took to the witness box a day after fellow former managing director David Smith acknowledged the “substantial distress” he had caused after appearing to celebrate the conviction of a pregnant subpostmistress who was eventually jailed.

Mr Smith told the Horizon IT inquiry he understands the “anger and upset caused” after telling Post Office staff the result of Seema Misra’s trial was “brilliant news”.

Ms Misra was handed a 15-month prison sentence in November 2010.

Speaking in the witness box at the inquiry on Thursday, Mr Smith said that “looking through the 2024 lens” he could see his email was “poorly thought through”.

Ms Misra began running a Post Office in West Byfleet, Surrey, in 2005, but was suspended in 2008 after being accused of stealing £74,000.

She was handed a 15-month prison sentence on her son’s 10th birthday in November 2010 and was eight weeks pregnant when jailed.

Ms Misra’s conviction was quashed by the Court of Appeal in 2021.