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Former Post Office legal boss referred to disciplinary council

Post Office general counsel, who led court case against subpostmasters, failed to appear at statutory public inquiry

Karl Flinders
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Published: 25 Jun 2026 15:49

The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) has referred a former Post Office general counsel to the Solicitors Disciplinary Council over her statutory public inquiry no show.

Jane MacLeod, who headed up the Post Office’s legal department from 2015 to 2019, has been referred due to failing to give oral evidence to the Post Office Horizon scandal public inquiry.

MacLeod, who lives in Australia, headed the Post Office’s legal department from 2015 to 2019, during a period when the organisation was attempting to quell the emerging scandal. She is a “significant individual” in the Metropolitan Police-led criminal investigation into the Post Office scandal, known as Operation Olympos.

According to the SRA: “The tribunal has certified that there is a case to answer in respect of allegations which are or include that: Between 11 April 2024 and 31 July 2024, Ms MacLeod failed to co-operate fully with the Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry (‘The Inquiry’) in relation to a request for her to give oral evidence to the Inquiry.”

The period in which MacLeod headed up the Post Office legal department included the High Court battle with subpostmasters, which she regularly attended. The Post Office spent more than £100m in taxpayers’ money attempting to prevent subpostmasters from proving the faulty Horizon system was to blame for unexplained account shortfalls.

In a written statement in May 2024, inquiry chair Wyn Williams said the public inquiry “considered it important to hear oral evidence from Ms MacLeod”, adding: “Further, it offered to meet Ms MacLeod’s travel and accommodation expenses. However, Ms MacLeod has made it clear that she will not cooperate with the inquiry by providing oral evidence, whether by attending the inquiry in person or by giving evidence remotely via live video link.”

Speaking to Computer Weekly at the time of Williams’ statement, one former subpostmaster said: “For someone who took such a keen interest in the trials to not show up for the inquiry speaks volumes because she could have given them lots of useful information.”

In 2015, MacLeod wrote a threatening letter to Computer Weekly as it was investigating and reporting on the scandal. This came at the time the Post Office was sacking independent forensic investigation firm Second Sight and ending its mediation scheme.

As MacLeod is a non-British national living outside the UK, Williams said he had “no adequate means of compelling MacLeod to attend pursuant to the Inquiries Act 2005”. He added that he had significant evidence relevant to the former legal boss: “I shall be able to compare what Ms MacLeod says in her witness statement alongside the extensive contemporaneous documentation I have received.”

Jonathan Peddie, executive director of investigations, enforcement and litigation at the SRA, said the case is in relation to “conduct that took place in the period after the main events of the Post Office Horizon scandal”.

He added that wider investigations are ongoing: “This includes issues relating directly to the Horizon scandal, where we are working closely with the Inquiry team and the Metropolitan Police. We can and will act if we find that solicitors we regulate fail to meet our standards.”

The Post Office scandal was first exposed by Computer Weekly in 2009, revealing the stories of seven subpostmasters and the problems they suffered due to Horizon accounting software, which led to the most widespread miscarriage of justice in British history (see below timeline of Computer Weekly articles about the scandal since 2009).

Timeline: Computer Weekly articles about the scandal since 2009

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