Post Office scandal campaigner Alan Bates gets knighthood in King's Birthday Honours

Former sub-postmaster and Post Office scandal campaigner Alan Bates has received a knighthood in the King's Birthday Honours, revealing he learned of the honour while at the Horizon IT public inquiry as ex-boss Paula Vennells was giving her evidence.

The lead campaigner, who is the title character of the ITV drama Mr Bates Vs The Post Office, said he hoped the honour would be 'another string to my bow to help me go forward and get some finality for people'.

Sir Alan previously turned down being made an OBE while Ms Vennells held on to her CBE award because it “felt wrong” – but calls for him to be knighted after the former chief executive returned her honour were backed by Number 10 earlier this year. He was one of more than 550 claimants who brought legal action against the Post Office, known as the group litigation, over the Horizon IT system between 2017 and 2019.

READ MORE: Prison workers 'infatuated' with robbers smuggled 'sniff' and 'tiny phones' into jail for them

Trial judge Mr Justice Fraser concluded that Horizon contained a number of “bugs, errors and defects” and that there was a “material risk” that shortfalls in Post Office branch accounts were caused by the system. More than 700 subpostmasters were prosecuted by the Post Office and handed criminal convictions between 1999 and 2015 as Fujitsu’s faulty system made it appear as though money was missing at their branches.

Reacting to the knighthood, Sir Alan, of Llandudno in north Wales, told the PA news agency: “It was a bit of a surprise, it sort of came out of the blue. I’m quite honoured by it – to be recognised for the work that I’ve done over the years. It’s been a hard slog over many years.”

Sir Alan went on to explain how he had spoken to the