Today, we have published The Great Post Office Scandal. 

It is a monumental achievement by the author, Nick Wallis, and we are proud to be able to play a small part in bringing this shocking story to wider attention.

This morning I have already read one review from the eminent legal commentator Joshua Rozenberg and a facet of the story he picked out really struck home for me. Joshua notes  “the improper prosecutions might never have come to light if it had not been for a series of striking coincidences”. He is referring mainly to the chance meeting that led Nick, then a presenter at BBC Surrey, to become embroiled in the scandal but it was a similar chance meeting that led to the book.

Earlier this year we were helping the journalist Louise Tickle run a series of broadcasts on reporting in courts. Nick happened to be a panellist when I was chairing one of these sessions. It overran and I was getting urgent Zoom chat messages from Louise saying ‘get Nick on!’. I think I scraped him in for the final five minutes but I assume that he didn’t feel nearly ignored as the next day I got a call from him with the idea for this book.

Although our usual fare is law books, we needed very little persuasion to take this one on. We have followed the story in Private Eye over the past few years (though I now realise without absorbing the full horror), so we knew that it needed to be told. Little did we know then how brilliantly that telling would be done. As publishers we have read the book many times, but each time it has the power to appal. There is a memorable quote in the book from Paul Marshall, one of the barristers representing the SPMs at the Court of Appeal, who, on discovering some devastating new evidence, said 'it made his teeth fall out'. We know that feeling. 

This is a testament to Nick’s storytelling but also the nature of the story he is telling. And that is why we have stuck our necks out and are pleased we have done so.

PS You can read more about the book itself  and order your copy - here.