The series takes its name from the court case instigated by the former subpostmaster Alan Bates and others.
Synopsis
A faulty IT system called Horizon, developed by Fujitsu, creates apparent cash shortfalls that cause Post Office Limited to pursue prosecutions for fraud, theft and false accounting against a number of subpostmasters across the UK. In 2009, a group of these, led by Alan Bates, forms the Justice for Subpostmasters Alliance. The prosecutions and convictions are later ruled a miscarriage of justice at the conclusion of the Bates & Others v Post Office Ltd judicial case in 2019.[3][4]
Journalist Nick Wallis, who has written extensively about the scandal, was a consultant on the series.[11]
Financial losses
Although the series had been watched by an estimated 13.5 million people as of late-April 2024, ITV said it had made a loss of around £1 million on the production. Kevin Lygo, ITV's managing director of media and entertainment, partially blamed the lack of international appeal in the subject matter for these losses.[12]
Broadcast
The series was shown on ITV1 from 1 to 4 January 2024, and was released in full on ITVX on the same date.[13] In the United States, the series premiered on PBS's drama anthology Masterpiece in April 2024.[14] In Australia, the series premiered in February 2024 on Channel Seven.[15] In Germany and France the series was shown on Arte in March 2025 and is available on the Arte Mediathek until 24 June 2025. [16][17]
Immediately after the final episode, ITV broadcast a documentary Mr Bates vs the Post Office: The Real Story.[2]
Reception
The series was well received by critics and awarded four out of five by reviewers in The Times, The Daily Telegraph and The Guardian. Martin Robinson, writing in the Evening Standard, said: "The Kafka-esque situation is thoroughly humanised by the performances".[18] On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, 94% of 16 critics gave the film a positive review, with an average rating of 8.3/10. The website's critics' consensus reads, "Dramatizing a grave injustice with terrific acting and plain-spoken righteousness, Mr Bates vs the Post Office shines much-needed light on a national scandal."[19] On Metacritic, the series holds a weighted average score of 80 out of 100 based on seven critics.[20]
It was nominated for Best Limited Series at the 30th Critics' Choice Awards in February 2025.[26] The series was awarded a special recognition award at the 2025 Broadcast Awards and "Jo watches as the numbers on her screen increase as she is on the phone to Horizon IT support" won TV Moment of the Year. The series was also nominated for Best Drama Series or Serial.[27][28] That scene was also nominated for Most Memorable moment at the 2025 British Academy Television Awards.[29] It was nominated for Best Single Drama or Limited Series, and Monica Dolan was nominated for Leading Actress at the Royal Television Society Programme Awards in March 2025.[30] That month, it was nominated at the 2025 British Academy Television Awards for Best Limited Drama, with Toby Jones and Monica Dolan nominated in the Leading Actor and Actress categories.[31]
Impact
The series was credited for igniting public interest in the scandal and led to demands for the former Post Office CEO Paula Vennells to have her CBE withdrawn; a petition that accrued more than 1.2 million signatures.[32][33][34]
Vennells issued a statement on 9 January 2024 that she would "return [her] CBE with immediate effect".[35] However, this had no formal and immediate effect, as only the monarch can revoke or annul honours.[36][37] Vennells’s appointment as CBE was formally revoked by King CharlesIII on 23 February for "bringing the honours system into disrepute".[38][39][40]
Such was the impact of the drama that the scandal became a major news story, and on the following day Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced new legislation to exonerate wrongly convicted subpostmasters and said there would be a "new upfront payment of £75,000 for some of those affected".[41][42]
Post Office Minister Kevin Hollinrake said £1bn had been budgeted for compensation payments. Lead actor Toby Jones spoke of being "very proud" of the impact the drama had, telling BBC Radio Stoke that "there have been many dramas in the past that have had a political influence, but not quite as urgently and directly as this" and that the drama was "brilliantly dramatised by the writer and the fact that it was being spoken about in Parliament within three weeks is absolutely extraordinary."[43]
Consequential legislation
The Post Office (Horizon System) Compensation Act 2024 received royal assent on 25 January, authorizing compensation payments.[44]
Another Act, the Post Office (Horizon System) Offences Act 2024, was passed on 24 May, the Friday a week before Parliament was dissolved for the general election, and came into force the same day.[45] On 13 June a similar Act of the Scottish Parliament received royal assent to deal with offences that came within its legislative competence, coming into force the next day.[46] These Acts quashed all convictions where–
it was alleged to have been committed between 23 September 1996 and 31 December 2018;
it was for false accounting, fraud, handling stolen goods, money laundering, or theft, or in Scotland embezzlement, fraud, theft, or uttering, or for attempting, conspiring, encouraging, inciting, aiding, abetting, counselling or procuring any of those offences;
the defendant was operating a post office business or working in a post office, and the offence was alleged to have been carried out in connection with that work; and
the post office in question was using Horizon at the time.
The non-Scottish Act made an exception for offences which had been considered by the relevant Court of Appeal. The two Acts also ordered records of cautions and other alternatives to conviction relating to relevant offences to be expunged.
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