Post Office inquiry live: Ex-boss Paula Vennells cries and admits ...

Jason Beer KC shows an email exchange from August 2015 between Vennells and other Post Office executives, in which she wrote that her "priority is to protect the business and the thousands who operated under the same rules and didn't get into difficulties".

Beer says that Vennells and the Post Office were aware at the time of at least three bugs that had impacted on Post Office branch balances in different ways.

So why did you again send the message that because many branches did not raise an issue, those complaining backed up the Post Office's stance that their problems weren't Horizon related, he asks.

Vennells repeats that she is sorry, and that "this reads badly".

She says she thought at the time that those who had complained were a minority.

Why did you concentrate on the people who Horizon was working for, rather than those for whom it wasn't? Beer interjects.

"We were concentrating on those who had raised issues individually," Vennells replies.

"That's not your priority according to this," Beer says.

Vennells fumbles with her responses, before eventually saying "that wasn't how I intended it to be read".