A former Post Office finance chief has said the company’s chief executive, Nick Read, prefers to work with teams of “younger, deferential males”, with very few senior roles held by female colleagues.
Alisdair Cameron, who officially left the company in June after a year of sick leave, provided his view on the culture at the Post Office in response to the public inquiry into the Horizon IT scandal.
He was asked for his view on a newspaper article that alleged that Read oversaw a “culture of misogyny”.
“It has seemed to me, and I have raised this with Nick, that he is instinctively more comfortable with a team of younger, deferential, male colleagues – who are often also talented, enthusiastic and hard-working. By contrast very few senior and independent-minded colleagues, especially female colleagues, have thrived at Post Office Ltd, and a number have been paid off and left the business,” Cameron said in written evidence.
A former chief people officer at the Post Office, Jane Davies, has previously accused Read of bullying. An investigation by an independent barrister cleared him on all counts of misconduct.
In April, the Post Office said Read had “the full and united backing of the board”. Read, who took charge in 2019, temporarily stepped back from his role in July to give his “entire attention” to preparing for his appearance next week. He now plans to step down next year.
Cameron, who joined the Post Office in 2015, said Read first raised the matter of the chief financial officer’s departure in early 2021, with a plan for him to leave by the end of June that year.
“He did not give me any reasons for this, but he was clear that it was not a reflection on my performance and that the Post Office would reach a financial settlement with me,” Cameron said. “In my experience, it is not unusual in the commercial world for chief executives to want to recruit their own teams. Indeed, even within the Post Office, many executive colleagues had previously received settlements to leave the business.”
Cameron subsequently raised a grievance and, when Read was unable to secure a financial settlement, he asked him to stay on.
“I remained open and supportive of Nick for the remainder of my employment. He was largely reluctant to share his personal views or opinions, although he could be very negative about colleagues,” the former CFO said.
Cameron said that, from late 2022, he felt issues he he had raised – including deducting pay from postmasters to cover trading shortfalls, governance problems, the lack of a cost-cutting programme and difficulties with replacing the Horizon IT system – were “not being tackled”.
“There was a lot of resentment I was asking those questions,” he said, telling the inquiry that one senior executive told him to “mind my own business”.
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“I didn’t like working in an atmosphere where I couldn’t do my full role. I felt that we were not fighting hard enough to improve the business and get adequate support from [the government],” Cameron added.
He was signed off sick after he was told his position was “untenable”, with his last day in the office on 7 May 2023.
Cameron agreed a financial settlement of £500,000, the equivalent of two years’ salary, excluding benefits.
Earlier on Wednesday, the postal minister, Gareth Thomas, admitted that Post office operators affected by the Horizon scandal would not all receive payouts by the March 2025 deadline called for by the campaigner Sir Alan Bates.