The turning point for Great Britain special issues was 2015, and here's why.

Readers of this blog fall into several different camps.  Some are specialised Machin or Post and Go collectors (the latter not finding that much to read or collect these days), and some are avid collectors of Great Britain's special (sometimes 'commemorative') stamps supplied by Royal Mail's Philatelic Service.

That used to be known as the Philatelic Bureau, indeed it still produces a Philatelic Bulletin, which fortunately contains some philatelic articles on pre-21st century matters, as well as plenty of puff and glossed images showing the latest offerings.   

In the early part of this century we had a number of stamp issues for which cover producers were presented with certain licensing problems, but they were all essentially British.  Lord of the Rings - the books (2004), Independent Television & The Ashes (2005), World Football Cup (2006), The Beatles, Harry Potter (books) and Scouting (2007), James Bond books, RNLI & HM Coastguard (2008), Album Covers & Wallace & Gromit (2010), Thunderbirds & Thomas the Tank Engine (2011),  Roald Dahl and popular Comic publications - and of course the Olympics and Paralympics (2012), London Underground & Dr Who (2013), Children's TV & Commonwealth Games (2014) - all British.  

 

It can be said that 2015, then, marked a sea-change in the Royal Mail Stamps & Collectibles issuing policy.  

In the autumn of 2014 we were promised "an exciting programme (for 2015) with a great mix of issues that offer high profile opportunities and press coverage alike including stunning new illustrations for the eternally popular Alice in Wonderland. Despite being 150 years old the characters of Alice in Wonderland still bring enormous joy to many children around the world although perhaps a large part of thanks for that goes to Disney as the story features prominently in their Fantasylands across its Theme Parks".  

And that news of the January issue was a taster for what was to come.

So what have we had since 2015?  Here are just a few:

   

 

What do these have in common? They all - and others - require payment to license-holders, but more importantly they, and many more, have all been brought to the Royal Mail programme by Matt Parkes, Managing Director of Royal Mail Stamps & Collectibles since 2015. 

In his profile on Linkedin (kindly sent to me by one of our readers) he writes that 

"Since my appointment, I have pivoted what was a unit in decline into a rapidly growing and sustainable IP licensing and collectibles business, significantly exceeding revenue and profit targets each year.

I have developed and overseen the implementation of a new content strategy, acquiring major licenses including Star Trek, Marvel Comics, Game of Thrones, Harry Potter, David Bowie and Queen.

I am a member of the Royal Mail Group Products & Marketing Executive Board and am Chair of the Stamps Advisory Committee, whose members are selected for their specialist knowledge and outstanding achievement within their area of expertise. I also act as a key liaison with the government and Buckingham Palace."

He has "worked as a senior executive in the entertainment sector for twenty five years, with a particular focus on general management, licensing, business development and marketing" and came to Royal Mail after spells with BBC Worldwide, BSkyB, Virgin Media, Microsoft (Xbox), karaoke business Lucky Voice, and Copyright Promotions Licensing Group (CPLG).  CPLG's clients include, according to Wikipedia, Spider-Man, Peanuts, World Wide Wrestling, Bob the Builder, Sesame Street, LazyTown, Star Trek, Felix the Cat, Where's Waldo, England Rugby, England football, England Cricket & St Andrews. 

It seems likely that his network of contacts from previous employments facilitated the inclusion of heavily-copyrighted and licensed subjects such as those pictured above.  

It didn't take long to make an impact. 

Whether or not it was underway before his arrival (and a two-year preparation period is normal) the first Star Wars issue came in October 2015.

After that we had David Bowie and more Star Wars in 2017, Game of Thrones and Harry Potter (films) in 2018, Marvel Comics, Elton John and yet more Star Wars in 2019, James Bond (films), Coronation Street, Queen Sherlock, Rupert Bear and Star Trek in 2020.  This year we've only had Only Fools & Horses, Paul McCartney, and Dennis & Gnasher - so far;  the second issue of next month has yet to be identified but a 'blockbuster' is usually included in the Quarter 4 programme.

Nasty or Nice?

There has been a declared strategy to “Extend Beyond Philately” by making available products such as special edition PSBs (wherein the stamps are the same as the standard one), 'fan sheets' (Music Giants), and framed products which are marketed to the niche fan markets.  But the fact is, the subject of most of the stamp issues which lend themselves to this approach are ones of which the traditionalist collector might not be in favour.

So is Matt Parkes Mr Nasty, responsible for driving thousands of collectors worldwide away from British stamps while developing the business to attract income from the non-philatelic fanbase of all the colourful and well-known subjects for which stamps have been issued?

Well no, Matt is a nice guy really, I've met him and had email exchanges.  I suspect he has just been doing the job he was hired to do when Moya Greene was CEO of Royal Mail Group. 

But there is no doubt that the income for the Stamps and Collectibles business which comes from genuine stamp collectors (while still the bigger proportion) has swung - which was the idea all along - towards non-collectors due partly to the income from some traditional collectors drying up altogether. 

---

New Machin business sheet - 2nd Large M21L

For the record I am now able to show the 2nd class Large Business Sheet for 2021.  This has the date and sheet number applied in a very 'italicised' way vertically on the reverse and show that it was printed on 5 January this year.

2nd class Large M21L Business Sheet, printed 5 January 2021.

---

Consequences of The Horizon Trial for lawyers - does 'legal ethics' have any meaning?

Last week I repeated a piece from Nick Gould about what he referred to as not only The Post Office Scandal, but "a legal, political, and ethical" scandal, and also about Corporate Governance.  This week we have a piece from barrister Paul Marshall, who successfully argued that "the way the Post Office acted in bringing the prosecutions was not only an abuse of process (through failure to properly investigate and/or disclose material) it was also an affront to the conscience of the court and therefore justice itself. "

Paul Marshall was invited to address The Queensland Law Society of 4 August, an address entitled "Legal Ethics and Morality: A Modern Case Study, The UK Post Office Scandal".  You can read it in full here on LinkedIn (it looks like a video/audio presentation but is actually more like a series of slides, page by page).

 

I've picked out a few paragraphs.  (... indicates where sentence or phrases have been omitted by me; ---- indicates where paragraphs have been omitted.)  Emphasis (in bold) is mine.

 

I am talking to you today about the most extensive series of miscarriages of justice in recent English history. On 23 April 2021 the Court of Appeal Criminal Division handed-down judgment in 42 appeals.1 39 appellants had their convictions for theft and false accounting quashed. That number of conjoined appeals arising out of similar circumstances is without precedent. .... In journalistic terms, for 20 years the Post Office hijacked the English criminal justice system and used it, essentially, as an instrument of the Post Office. 

It effectively manipulated and withheld important evidence ... and thereby secured the wrongful conviction of hundreds of innocent postmasters for offences of dishonesty. The Post Office continued to withhold evidence from those it had convicted, even after it was aware, from 2013 at the latest, that the convictions it had secured in many cases might be unsafe.

Natural questions arise from what I shall briefly describe; these include what was the motivation that drove the Post Office, from its board downwards, to act as it did? Secondly, how is the risk to the legal system that such conduct represents to be avoided in the future? To my knowledge those questions have not previously been publicly raised, still less answered.

------

To put it in concrete terms, between about 2000 and 2014 it seems likely that the Post Office as a prosecuting authority secured more convictions and caused more miscarriages of justice on the basis of flawed, incomplete and misleading evidence than there were executions for witchcraft in England, until the offence of witchcraft was abolished in English law under the Witchcraft Act in 1735. There were around 500 such executions. Present estimates for the number of those prosecuted by the Post Office stand at not far short of a thousand. 

------

All legal systems make assumptions about the way in which truth can be elicited. In mediaeval Europe trial by ordeal was commonly believed to deliver truth by divine intervention. We consider ourselves much more sophisticated and believe that the right result is most likely to occur through the competitive presentation of relevant law and facts in which the judge holds the role of neutral umpire. In short, the trial process, whether in civil or criminal law, is a competition in which the supposed outcome is justice.

But competition itself entails certain a priori assumptions. The English theoretical model is that all things being equal, the adversarial process, where facilitated by disinterested robust advocacy on both sides, should deliver the right result.

it was said that a finding for the group claimants would put at risk the Post Office’s existing business model. ...  for the Post Office it was a sort of fight to the death. It is, I believe, for this reason that the Post Office at various points abandoned ordinary norms of litigation conduct, even where those norms reflect conventional ethical standards to which most, if not all, lawyers would publicly subscribe. The most basic of these is the requirement to disclose material in your possession that is adverse to your own case. The Post Office’s non-disclosure was persistent, long-term and systemic.

-----

One of the many remarkable features of the Post Office scandal is that the Chair and board of the Post Office which had conduct of its ‘scorched-earth’ litigation strategy remain in place. It might be said that the government, as its owner and shareholder, does not act in the way that an ordinary shareholder might ordinarily be expected to act.

-----

The problem with adversarial model is that while predicated upon the assumption that all things being equal truth will emerge from competing arguments on the law and facts, experience shows that in reality things all-too rarely are equal. Where there is disparity in access to information and evidence, and disparity in resources, the outcome is apt to be skewed. Further, the impartiality of lawyers is easier to state as a theoretical ideal than is sometimes found in practice, especially where the imperative to win assumes particular importance for a client and, by extension, its lawyers. 

The Post Office scandal is a scandal not least because it starkly exposes the difference between the theory of the administration of justice and its practice. It is an extraordinary embarrassment for the English judiciary. This is in part, but not only, because it was within a hair’s breadth of not being discovered.

-----

EVIDENCE FROM COMPUTERS – SOME PROBLEMS
There is a widely held perception (in truth, a belief) that computers are fundamentally reliable. It is also commonly assumed that most computer errors are readily detectable or the result of user ‘input’ error. That perception and those assumptions, that are false, have received a warmly enthusiastic embrace by a judiciary that sometimes struggles in correctly evaluating evidence, especially technical evidence. .....

In earlier times, before computers became pervasive, the [law] required that evidence from computers, that is technically hearsay, should be subject to proof of the reliability of its source. A change took place from 2000 as the use of computers became more widespread and more people, including some judges, became more familiar with their operation and the fear of unreliability
and inaccurate documents diminished. Law Commission papers recommended to Parliament in 1993 and 1997 that existing statutory formalities ...  should be repealed. Those recommendations were carried into effect.

-----

The first problem that the Post Office litigation painfully exposes is that judges and lawyers commonly do not understand the propensity of computers to fail – or, rather, to not work as intended. Innocent people went to prison because judges were insufficiently critical of the evidence adduced by the Post Office in its prosecutions and in civil proceedings. They were also institutionally deferential. The Post Office ruthlessly exploited both the imbalance in technical expertise and also the institutional deference of the courts to the Post Office as a respected public institution. A little bit like the manipulation by banks of the LIBOR, it was virtually unimaginable that the Post Office was engaged in ‘gaming’ the entire justice system. Sometimes imagination of the worst is both prudent and necessary. It’s after all why we buy insurance.

-----

INSTITUTIONAL ETHICAL FAILURE
The thing that most seriously infected the Post Office’s prosecutions and the civil litigation in which it was involved was what I call mendacity – institutional ethical failure, if you will.

-----

The third aspect of ethical failure by the Post Office is what can be called “the cover-up”.
From the time when I first became interested in the Post Office scandal, in about January 2020, it appeared to me that something was seriously wrong where a national institution had succeeded, as it seemed to me, in manipulating the justice system by withholding from disclosure information about flaws in its Horizon system that were known to it, as was exposed in the Horizon Issues judgment of December 2019.

-----

There is a requirement for the legal profession in England to ask itself the same question [referring to an earlier case judge: “did no one stand back and ask themselves the simple question ‘is this right’”?] in connection with the Post Office scandal. How did the miscarriage of justice on such a scale over such a long period happen, with so very many lawyers involved? 

A further question that merits an answer is what values do we as lawyers uphold? Justice Owen expressed his perception that there is a danger that the words ‘corporate governance’ may become a mere formula, empty of content. There is the same danger, it would appear, with ‘legal ethics’; what are these in practice and what does it cost to do the right thing? How are values to be balanced and maintained, in the adversarial contest, against the imperative to win – even where for the client, the issue may be existential? These are weighty questions that merit rather more attention than they receive. 

Failing to address them will invite repetition of the Post Office scandal.

[Ends]

Nick Gould also referred to another piece by Richard Moorhead and his team (the Exeter University team I think) including this paragraph:

Lawyers’ obligations to justice
A key question arising from the comments of Mr Justice Fraser are whether the POL’s lawyers put their duty to their clients ahead of their duty to protect the administration of justice and the rule of law and their obligations as officers of the court? 

The approach to the case clearly led to the court being given misleading repeatedly: through pleadings, submissions, evidence, and cross-examination. An issue as regards the lawyers involved, and which warrants further exploration, is whether this may on occasion have been done knowingly or recklessly. The repeated nature of the problems may go some way to counter any argument that all of the problems can be blamed on the clients or their witnesses. 

The breadth of problems with the POL’s case perceived by [ the Judge ] raise a question as to whether the case was being run with a Nelsonian eye to the weaknesses in evidential and factual submissions. How POL’s legal team responded to the POL’s case unravelling over the course of the litigation, especially in the Common Issue and Horizon trials are unknown and also demands exploration.

An interesting question, is whether, as it became apparent that POL (and Fujitsu) witnesses were not being honest, there came a point at which the lawyers involved should have resigned.

"This has been sent it, on behalf of clients, to the President of the Law Society and the Solicitors' Regulatory Authority, which has been asked to investigate 20 years of lawyering misdeeds by POL legal teams.

It is also relevant because Aria Grace Law ( founded by Lindsay Healy) was set up to be, and is, an ethical law firm." (Nick Gould).

---

Additions to our online shop - 21st century sets and PSB panes

When we moved our e-commerce site from osCommerce to Freewebstore, not all products were moved immediately, which is why I find that while some pages in the stockbooks are almost empty, others are quite full.   I hope you find something of interest in our Recent Additions.

These are some of the additions (SG numbers quoted)

MS2201 - Weather MS
2202-5 - Submarine Centenary
MS2206 - Submarine Centenary flags MS 

2224-9 Punch & Judy strip
2232 - Nobel Prizes Centenary

2253 - Golden Jubilee set, and panes with upright watermark
MS2291 - World Cup
2309 - London's Bridges
2316 - Postboxes

MS2367 - Wilding Anniversary MS
MS2416  Rugby World Cup Winners

2574 - Trafalgar Bicentenary set, miniature sheet & panes
2721 - World of Invention gummed set from PSB
2734 - Beside the Seaside set

2868a - RAF Spitfire and Red Arrows pane
2955a - Treasures of the Archive double-head pane 1st/20p
2957a - ditto, Lord Mayor's Show pane
2964a/7a - Royal Navy Uniforms panes
2970a - Royal Navy Flags pane

London 2010
3066a - 1st & £1 double-heads pane of 6
3067a - Empire Exhibition pane of 4
3070a Seahorses pane of 2.

3216a - First Aerial Post Centenary panes

and others.

 

More will be added as we take a hard look at what else we have to offer.  I hope you will find that prices are generally below normal market prices, and if you see any glaring errors (eg decimal point in the wrong place!)  please do let us know!

 

---

Wider implications of Post Office Limited's Horizon Scandal - the lawyer's view, and the academics' project.

Anybody who has followed the sad case known variously as the Horizon Trial, The Post Office
Trial, #PostOfficeScandal, or Bates v Post Office GLO, beyond this blog will have probably seen the name Nick Gould.  

Mr Gould is a partner at Aria-Grace law which "assisted on a pro bono basis" some of the Horizon trial appellants, and supported the argument of barrister Paul Marshall that the way the Post Office acted in bringing the prosecutions was not only an abuse of process (through failure to properly investigate and/or disclose material) it was also an affront to the conscience of the court and therefore justice itself.  Marshall initiated the enquiries that Aria-Grace law took up which led to the revelation of the Clarke Evidence.

In a disturbing article, Mr Gould has written about the process of the prosecutions and the conduct of all those involved, including those in the legal profession and politicians.  What his analysis reveals is that the pervasive nature of attitudes extends more widely and could affect any of us, not only those involved in this case. 

This is the piece I said I’d write about the Post Office Scandal; it’s not nice nor cosy nor comfy.

This is the piece I said I’d write about the Post Office Scandal; it’s not nice nor cosy nor comfy.

These views are my own although Aria Grace Law, is assisting (please note that word), various people involved in this Scandal. Some were jailed and some weren’t. All were metaphorically if not actually “beaten up”. At least one person is still waiting to see whether their conviction will be overturned.

I’ve written it to make you wonder, how and why? And so you understand something similar could happen to someone you know.

This is not intended to be an academic piece or indeed a piece about the abject failures of the criminal justice system or of the Establishment closing ranks – but you might pick up those thoughts as an aside. It is selective in its comments – it must be. There is much more and I’m looking forward to numerous books coming out.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 I’m sure that, last week, some people were perhaps delighted to find that, having waited for years and even decades, they would get some sort of initial recompense for the life changes caused by the #PostOfficeScandal. That is for another day.

But now let’s look at the dark side of all this. The Scandal happened because some (many?) of a key group of individuals connected with Post Office Limited (POL) – including, perhaps, some of the previous and current chairmen, directors (executive and non-executive), senior management, internal and external legal advisors, and internal and external auditors thought -- what precisely?

That they were above the law? That the rules of litigation, when it came to disclosure, didn’t apply to them? That shredding document was somehow acceptable? That lying was, ok? That POL governance systems were fit for purpose? That brand protection was all that mattered. Or perhaps that they would be able to keep the Scandal under wraps for ever? On that last point, they succeeded for a long time, although not quite for ever.

And as we consider the key players in the Scandal, let’s not forget Fujitsu which (for reasons some can perhaps guess but have yet to be discussed) has manged to keep its head far below the spotlight down over the last couple of years. Except of course that two of its former employees were referred to the Director of Public Prosecution by Sir Peter Fraser more than 18 months ago and then on to the Metropolitan police. In this country, “justice” moves extremely slowly.

I have written about all this over the last 15 months or so. I knew nothing about the Post Office Scandal until late 2019. But, of course, POL and certain of those who advised it, were expert in making sure it was kept under wraps. Otherwise, a few people might have thought that prosecuting more than 730 sub-postmasters, would raise a few eyebrows. If you average it out, it was about one each week, for 14 years.  

None of this makes comfortable reading – I don’t necessarily enjoy writing it either. I’m a lawyer, I used to think more of the law than I do these days. But, for reasons I’m also not clear about, not many in the legal world seem to want to discuss it.

Just to repeat because it can’t be repeated enough:

Between 1999 and 2015, hundreds of sub postmasters were sacked or prosecuted, many were jailed. They blamed flaws in the IT system, Horizon, but the Post Office denied there was a problem. Some might say there was a deliberate cover-up.

The Post Office bullied postmasters into pleading guilty to crimes they knew they hadn’t committed.

Others who weren’t convicted, were pushed out of their jobs, or forced to pay back thousands of pounds of 'missing' money. Some had to move homes and sometimes move villages or towns because the Post Office had trashed their reputations (ironic that–when you read the last sentence of this piece); they were spat on, and their children abused. Some were forced into bankruptcy when lawyers for the Post Office submitted legal bills of hundreds of thousands of pounds.

Here is an even more concise summary: The Post Office Scandal is a major British business, legal, ethical and political scandal involving the prosecution and conviction of hundreds of sub-postmasters, for alleged theft, false accounting and/or fraud, resulting in imprisonment, loss of reputation and livelihood, bankruptcy, divorce, and even suicide amongst those involved

A legal, political and ethical scandal…

I get asked numerous questions about the Scandal and most often it’s something like this. “Why isn’t anyone in jail”?  Here is the thought process. “Crimes” were committed and covered up over a long period. As a result, people got sick, are still sick, at least one person committed suicide, people gave up and some died, they lost their livelihoods and years of their lives disappeared. No wonder there is palpable anger among so many people.

Did any auditors (internal or external) wonder about any of this? All those missing funds in all those dozens and hundreds of post offices.  There were numerous lawyers / law firms involved. What did they think? Where were they or as has been written previously, where weren’t they?

When Vince Cable—the Department of Business Cabinet Miniser with ultimate responsibility for POL over several years, was interviewed recently about some of these issues, he seemed on particularly shaky ground. Did this go high up into the government—how high? Did he and any of his junior ministers know? If yes, why didn’t they do something and if not, who was covering up and for how long?  And of course, the ultimate owner of Post Office Limited is the Department of Business—which is perhaps about to put its hand in its pocket to maybe make the first compensation payments that I mentioned at the start. What else could it do? Once those 39 appeals were granted by the Court of Appeal on 23rd April, it had little choice. But there is much, much more to be done.

Finally, as some people know, I have an interest in #corporate governance. Post Office Limited, must be a case study for use in all those hundreds of organisations, university and other faculties which attempt to teach it, “how to do it all wrong”. Another obvious question that has been raised. Why is the Chairman of POL, appointed in 2016, still in office—what is needed for him to be removed? He remains strangely silent over these matters. Others have asked, why are any of the current executive directors or any of the senior executives still in place? A quick look at the Companies House website shows that the CFO was appointed in 2015 and at least four other directors were appointed more than two years ago- perhaps before the judgements by Sir Peter Fraser at the end of 2019.

Where are those two words we so often hear about or read about, “responsibility” and “accountability “, hiding? It’s easy to write/ lecture / teach about them—I know, I do it too. But look what happens when they are ignored utterly, I showed you above—and saying “sorry, sorry”, doesn’t really cut it.

I have read several times, that ultimately POL decided it had to protect its brand at all costs. Were all those hundreds of wrongful convictions, dozens of people wrongly jailed, the deaths, the losses, the sicknesses worth it?

Just one quote from Tracy Felstead also bears repeating – I make no apologies for doing so either. In 2002, Tracy was just 19 years old when she was jailed. She finally had her conviction overturned on 23rd April 2021.

“In prison I had a job in there taking hot drinks to the cells, but in this one cell there was a girl, she was hanging, she was dead.”

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Epitaph: I’ve asked numerous people what they think about the Post Office brand today--- they think the Post Office brand is trashed.  

Published on Linkedin July 28, 2021

---

Meanwhile, on the academic front, the Evidenced-Based Justice Lab at the University of Exeter Law School has produced the first in a series of Working Papers on what it has entitled 'The Post Office Project'.

PROJECT BACKGROUND

The Hamilton and Bates cases raised a number of concerns relating to governance and management at the Post Office (and Fujitsu), the conduct of their lawyers, and the operation of the criminal and civil justice systems, including criminal defence practice.

The case offers a seminal opportunity to examine important issues in corporate governance; criminal justice; and professional regulation, as well as government and parliamentary accountability.  The outpouring of concern that the scandal has prompted reveals a desire for change which needs to be maintained and harnessed.

We will be examining issues raised by the cases, deepening the evidence base on them, and working to ensure that identified concerns are taken seriously by regulators, policy makers and others able to affect change. As lawyers and legal educators, we want to ensure lawyers and law students hear the stories of the victims and learn about their mistreatment; but we also want to see rules and practices change, where appropriate, to make unethical behaviour less likely to happen in the first place and more likely to be punished when it does.

We have established a research team with expertise in lawyers’ ethics (Moorhead); miscarriages of justice (Helm); and organisational culture and ethical behaviour (Nokes) to take this work forward.

RESEARCH PLAN

Our plan initially is to review existing evidence to identify and analyse evidence of corporate and institutional failure, professional ethics failures, and systematic problems in the criminal justice system that led to Bates and Hamilton. We see the issues to be investigated by us as including:

• The design, execution, and enforcement of contracts.

• The conduct of investigations and prosecutions arising from Horizon (including charging, plea bargaining, disclosure and expert evidence failures, and the influence of shortfall recovery on approaches).

• The conduct of appeals including post-conviction disclosure decisions.

• The management of information about Horizon within and beyond the legal processes (e.g. submissions to Parliament and Government).

• The handling of independent investigations, including those by Second Sight.

• The role of legal professionals and their advice in the management and representation of Horizon within and beyond the Post office.

• The oversight of legal processes and information on Horizon’s flaws by the PO Board, including non-executive directors, and BEIS including the conduct of the Bates litigation and the Hamilton appeals.

• Evidence of pressures to plead guilty for defendants, including potential sentencing inducements and over-charging.

• Differences between the handling of Scottish and England and Wales cases.

• Variability in sentencing decisions.

We will begin this job over the Summer months, scoping the available evidence base and writing a full submission to the Williams Inquiry and lawyers’ professional regulators, providing them with our preliminary views on the issues arising in the case. And we will begin to suggest areas of reform for criminal justice, professional regulation, corporate governance, and governmental accountability and work on how to change the behaviours and cultures that led to such injustice.

These are only our initial thoughts on the issues raised by the scandal that we think we can contribute to. We consider it critical to our project that we consult with and listen to others – victims and experts. We think there is particular value in learning from subpostmasters and others affected by the use of law against them in ways now shown to be an affront to the public conscience by the Court of Appeal.

A copy of their first working paper is available here: this too makes interesting reading and raises important questions.

WP1_Conduct-of-the-Bates-LitigationDownload

---

Virtual Exhibits at Alternative Scottish Congress - until 31 August 2021.

"Due to the ongoing Covid-19 Pandemic The Association of Scottish Philatelic Societies Scottish Congress which was due to be held in April and hosted by Kirkcudbright Philatelic & Postcard Society and Dumfries Stamp & Postcard Club has been cancelled."

Instead the ASPS has hosted the displays online here.

Note that this ends on 31 August 2021 - I have only just discovered it.

Exhibits list:

Traditional Exhibits:

Canada Definitives 1992 - 1998
Scouting pre-printed Stationery
The Helsingfors Local Post
Agriculture
Henry
The Romance of Central Africa's British Commonwealth
Tobago - An Island's Stamps in One Frame
New Zealand Circular Kiwi Stamps
The Village of Borgue
General de Gaulle
Admiral Issue of 1912 - 20 Cents Value
The ‘Dienstmarken' (or 'Official Stamps') of Switzerland
Early QV Designs, Nordic Countries & 1893 New Zealand Advertising Stamps
"Blue" Stamps & Selected Macau "Crown" Pages
Traditional Christmas Issues
Sarawak Stamps - The First 50 Years
Sir Ernest Henry Shackleton
Queen Elizabeth Commemoratives
New Zealand Roses Issue
Beyond the Stuffed Monkey
France
King Christian X of Denmark
So What is a Stamp
The Haji
Revenue Stamps
Bertil Skov Jorgensen
Samoa 1850 - 2000 A Transition
Steam Locomotive Development in Malaya

Postal History Exhibits:

Scottish Postmasters
Twopenny Blue Usage
WW2 in East Africa: Polish Refugee Settlements
Queen Victoria Post
Early US Temperance Movement
The History of the Nova Scotia Provincial Exhibition
19th Century Victorian Hand-Illustrated Covers
O.A.S. in WWI
Galloway T.P.O.
19th Century Kirkcudbright
1915 War Charity Issue
Aspects of the Russification of the Finnish Postal Service from 1899
The German Post Office in Zanzibar
Scottish Experimental Duplex Cancellations

Thematic Exhibits:

Circus
Wildlife on Stamps - Big Cats
Energy and the Environment
Preserved Ships
The Life of an Insurance Policy
Butterfly Hierarchy
Switzerland - Costumes and Coats of Arms 2021
Mutiny on the Bounty
U.S. Transportation
1813 A Momentous Year for Opera Guiseppe Verdi and Richard Wagner
That's Entertainment
Bird Watching in Kirkcudbright
The Rose

Postcard Exhibits:

Happy Days at Carnoustie
Italian Consolata Missions: Missione del Kenya Postcards
An A-C of Lanarkshire Postcards and Postmarks 1900 - 1914
Places of Education
Greenland Life
Flights of Fancy
The Zeiss Planetarium Projector
Andrew Gardiner, The Great War, Lockdown Diary, HMTS Mars on the Tay
Scottish Islands - St. Kilda
Kirkcudbright
William Burn

Aerophilately Exhibits:

Aviation
American Airships
Early Scottish Aviation
Newfoundland: Winter Air Mail Flights (1921 - 1923)
Austria - Hungary 1st Airmail Service
Disruption of BOAC Services in June 1940

---

August Slogan postmarks, and others - and other postal markings.

This is the place for all new slogans for August, and any other interesting postal markings that I find or which are reported.

Well, a third of the way through the month and no new slogans reported since Dog Awareness Week in early July.  But if there are any reports, then this is where they will be shown.

 

UPDATE 24 August:  I can't let the month end with no postmarks at all, so in the absence of any special slogans so far this month here's the default which arrived in Norvic Towers today, posted at BA BS GL TA Mail Centre 23/08/21:

Default 'Action for Children' slogan in use nationwide for the whole month so far, this example from Bristol mail centre dated 23/08/21

---

Return to Sender - no phone number

This is a label I don't remember seeing before, although I have seen many 'Return to Sender' labels and handstamps used after delivery has been attempted.

Return to Sender label OE1071 March 12 (ie printed 2012) for mail which could not be sent to the destination country.

As you can see this is quite different to those which are applied when delivery has been attempted and failed ("No such address", "demolished") or negated ("refused", "gone away", "deceased").  

The heading reads: We were unable to forward this item to the destination country because

and the reasons are - Service Suspended, Underpaid, Obsolete Product, Service Not Available, Oversized, Overweight, Damaged, Delivery Address Incomplete.

Royal Mail's information on Dubai indicates that a telephone number of the addressee is required. I suspect this could be for one of two reasons - either the tracked service is handled by a Courier company rather than Emirates Post, or because VAT is changed on all imports and a phone call could be used to collect payment - though in the current UK situation of phone scams referring to further payments to be made for parcel delivery, I can't see that sort of thing working here!

UPDATE 23 August.  John F writes: I have noticed for some time now that my correspondents in India insist that I use their mobile number as the last part of the address.  Apparently they do not have a delivery to the door as we do but they have to call at their local Post Office from time to time to collect their mail.  However when it is a tracked or signed item from the UK they get a phone call from their local Post Office advising them of its availability and they can collect it immediately. 

In the past I used to use the Internationally Signed service and in India it seems to have been treated as a registered item.  However more recently I have been using the Internationally Tracked service
(marginally cheaper now) and it has been received and treated as a  Speed Post item at least initially.

---

August snippets - updates to previous blog posts.

When updates are made to earlier blog posts a link will be provided here.  Once more blog posts have been made when there is more news to report, this post will be deleted.  

No comments are allowed here; comments (if any) on the original posts, please.

9 August 2021

- Reports of another PSB error, this time on the Industrial Revolutions book.

- 'Dry print' or other problem with 1st class Machin from Queen's 95th birthday pane.

- Images added to the Post and Go post for 'Black Tot Day'.

- Did you spot the change to counter sheets shown on the 'More Machins' post?  I didn't!

23 August 2021

- Supplies of £2.55 stamps arriving at some branches are the 2017 De La Rue printing.

 

---

Stamp, Postal History, Postcard & Militaria fair Banstead Surrey this Saturday!!

I'm pleased to publicise this local fair which , if you are in the Surrey area, would be a great way to test the post-Covid philatelic water.

From a forum post:

If you are in the area this Saturday why not visit the Fair. Although being staged by the Forces Postal History Society all are welcome not just members. Additionally its like a medium sized stamp fair not just Military material. After so long without any fairs its great to see some taking place.

War & Philately

The FORCES POSTAL HISTORY SOCIETY

is pleased to announce a

STAMP and POSTAL HISTORY FAIR

a celebration of a GREAT hobby for all ages

Banstead Community Hall
Park Road, Banstead, Surrey, SM7 3AJ

SATURDAY 7th AUGUST 2021
10.00 – 4.00pm

Exhibition and displays of postal history, stamps and
Postcards, all with a ‘wartime’ theme.
_________________________________________

Why not come and see what the hobby can offer YOU ?

FREE Admittance

Local philatelic and postal history societies’ stands.
Wartime postal items, stamps, stationery, books and
ephemera on display and for sale.

Also similar ‘peacetime’ items as well !!!
______________________________________

Stamp / postal history / postcard dealers’ tables available

Full details from Peter High: 07842 962703

FREE ample car parking

Refreshments available throughout the day – Tea, Coffee, Soft Drinks, Delicious Cakes and Sandwiches

Buy and sell stamps, postal history and books

See a small display of German POW letters sent from Banstead POW Camp WWII and other postal history displays

Meet and chat with stamp & postal history friends and make new acquaintances

Join your local Philatelic Society here

A few miles from J8 of M25
Train Station & buses within short walk

Funded by FORCES POSTAL HISTORY SOCIETY

Local pubs and shops within short walk
Many Charity Shops in High Street
Waitrose, Tesco & M&S Food in High Street

Dealers’ tables for stamps, postal history, postcards, books and ephemera

Join the FORCES POSTAL HISTORY SOCIETY

 

---

ISP Walsall presses for Datamatrix stamp printing.

We often get requests from marketers to publish on our blog an article which "may be of interest to your readers". These are usually totally unrelated to any of the subjects covered here, so they are declined.  

We do like to publish relevant articles, and today I'm pleased to say that we have been given to reproduce this article from Digital Labels & Packaging.  This article was published on 19 July 2021, and our thanks to regular contributor DougF for drawing it to my attention.

 

Wolverhampton, UK-based International Security Printers (ISP) has invested in advanced hybrid print, finishing and inspection systems for barcoding of postage stamps.

As a renowned global security printer, ISP produces high calibre print for a large global client base from production sites in the UK and France. Its work and expertise enable the business to create highly innovative, secure options for industries with high monetary or intellectual value products and services. From security printing, to advanced track and trace and authentication capabilities and ‘tailor-made’ consultancy services, ISP’s wide-ranging and unique products help companies combat fraud to better protect brands and revenues.

ISP has invested in hybrid digital print and finishing for barcoded postage stamps, either in sheets or booklets

Specifically, ISP’s investment in hybrid production will enable postal authorities worldwide to add unique barcodes to stamps and, by doing so, be able to offer their customers more convenient, new services in the future such as track and trace to provide protection against counterfeiting and reuse. The barcodes, which can match stamp colour, sit alongside the main body of the stamp, separated by a simulated perforation line.

The fully inline hybrid systems incorporate equipment from selected global specialists, including A B Graphic (ABG), Domino and Lake Image Systems. They are based on two types of machine configuration: one producing sheets of stamps and the other booklets. For sheets, the inline system consists of an ABG non-stop unwinder to automate production by splicing together two rolls of material on the fly, ensuring a non-stop feed of material into an ABG Omega Converter 430. This modular and multi-functional converter houses a four-colour Domino N617i UV inkjet digital print module that prints the stamps and barcodes, inline and in colour. A Lake image Systems inspection system is also integrated and this is surrounded by ABG’s die-cutting and sheeter modules to cut the web down into final sheets. Any sheets with defects are instantly recognised and diverted into a waste compartment for non-compliances, whilst good sheets continue and are fed neatly on to a 2m-long shingle conveyor.

The hybrid system for booklets of postage stamps is along the same lines as the sheet configuration, except for the inclusion of a Domino K600i printer to print barcodes in monochrome, as well as the colour barcodes printed by the N617i engine. A barcode is also printed on the outside of the booklet to identify the stamp barcodes inside. A second ABG die-cutting module is configured as part of this setup for enhanced functionality.

ABG global sales director Matt Burton commented, ‘For postal stamp applications, this is the first time that various key industry parties have joined together to provide hybrid print and finishing solutions. All manufacturers have been fully on board throughout the project, wanting to see a successful conclusion. Clearly we are all delighted that both systems are now fit for purpose and we look forward to seeing ISP rolling out the initiative.’

ISP managing director Ian Brigham said, ‘We are proud to part of a monumental change in the history and fortunes of the postage stamp. The coming together of experienced print and finishing specialists to create these systems has been both unique and impressive – our thanks to them for a job well done.’

 

---