TORY leader Kemi Badenoch has blamed civil servants for Horizon IT scandal payout delays. 

The former business secretary claimed today that the government allowed “bureaucracy to get in the way of redress” for wronged subpostmasters.

She told the Horizon IT inquiry that she and ex-postal affairs minister Kevin Hollinrake had “wanted to get the money out there” but were “always given a reason why we couldn’t” by government officials.

Ms Badenoch added that the Post Office would have “disappeared in its current form long ago” if it was a private organisation, adding that it is a “20th-century organisation that is struggling to evolve in a 21st-century world.”

Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds told the inquiry today that the Post Office’s corporate culture is at the root of the Horizon scandal.

Mr Reynolds said that he takes “ultimate responsibility” at governmental level for full, fair and prompt redress for subpostmasters and that there had been a “significant increase in the pace at which compensation has been paid” since the general election.

He told the probe he did not believe it had been “at the cost of fair or accurate compensation being made,” adding: “I think despite the scale of this scandal, the Post Office is still an incredibly important institution in national life.

“But I don’t think postmasters make sufficient remuneration from what the public want from the Post Office, and I think that’s going to require some very significant changes to the overall business model of the Post Office.”

More than 900 subpostmasters were prosecuted between 1999 and 2015 after faulty Horizon accounting software made it look as though money was missing from their accounts.

Hundreds await compensation despite the previous government saying those with quashed convictions are eligible for £600,000 payouts.