Former Post Office chief executive Paula Vennells may have been told two years before she appeared in parliament that a “covert operations team” could remotely access Horizon systems and adjust branch accounts.

Amid the emerging allegations, Ms Winnells was informed by the Post Office’s general counsel that a department at Fujitsu’s headquarters in Bracknell had remote access to the deputy postmaster’s account.

tape winner Channel 4 Post Office chief lawyer Susan Crichton is shown confirming this twice Ms Vinnells aware of the accusations.

In the 2013 recording, Ms Crichton can be heard saying:

“[Paula] Learn about the charge. She knows we’re trying. “

She added: “She had it all. The way I tried to brief Paula was that as soon as I had evidence that there was a problem, she would know the next minute”.

The recording was taken two years before the Post Office stopped prosecuting its deputy postmaster general and two years before the former CEO told MPs in 2015 that it was impossible to remotely access the deputy postmaster general’s account.

In written evidence submitted to the Business, Innovation and Skills Committee inquiry, the Post Office said: “There is no functionality in Horizon for a branch, the Post Office or Fujitsu to edit, manipulate or delete transaction data once it has been recorded in the branch’s database In, account.”

More than 700 branch managers across the UK were sued by the Post Office between 1999 and 2015 over a flaw in Horizon accounting software that made their stores look like money was missing.

Evidence that Fujitsu operators may have remotely accessed Horizon systems is at the heart of the current Post Office scandal.

The newly discovered recordings come from a conference call involving investigators from the forensic accounting firm Second Sight and several postal service executives.

The call also named Michael Rudkin, a former postal union official who was central to the discovery of Fujitsu’s covert operations unit.

In the recording, Second Sight representative Ron Warmington warned Ms Vinnells could be questioned over Operation Bracknell by Lord Arbuthnot, who is running for deputy postmaster general.

“If James had said something like, ‘What do you think about Rudkin’s reference to the Bracknell covert ops team?’” Warmington asked.

“Well, this is a specific case. We will discuss this again after the investigation is completed,” Ms. Clayton responded.

“Yeah, well, as long as she doesn’t come back and say, ‘Look, so what’s the Bracknell question, what is he talking about?’; ‘Oh, we knew that two months ago,’” Mr Warmington tried. road.

“She is aware of the allegation. She is aware that we are working to resolve this issue,” Ms Clayton responded.

The tapes also show lawyers rushing to prevent lawmakers from taking an interest in the unfolding scandal.

In the audio, a Post Office lawyer can be heard saying: “There needs to be a plan in place somehow to close this process. I mean, stop MPs from sending cases even now. So how do we close the process on the MP side? What?” What will work for members of Congress? What can we sell to members of Congress? How quickly can we do that?”

She continued: “So, is there any way, and I’m thinking out loud here, is there any way to end the MP’s case and make James and his friends happy so that they basically go away?”

Mr Rudkin, a former union employee, told Channel 4 the tapes went some way to confirming what he had always known: “The moment I first heard it, I was delighted to say ‘Rudkin you That’s right!’”. The second is sadly thinking “Why does my wife and kids have to go through this?”

He continued: “It’s not just us who are affected. It’s the whole family. The way you are shunned in the local community – whispered, ‘no smoke without fire’. Susan’s reputation and mine are in quagmire.”

“I cannot for the life of me understand why it took the Metropolitan Police so long to resolve this issue. Someone has to take responsibility”.

Susan Crichton and Paula Vennells did not respond to Channel 4 News’ requests for comment.

A spokesman for the Post Office said: “We remain fully focused on getting to the bottom of what happened and support a statutory public inquiry, which is chaired by a judge with the power to examine witnesses under oath and is therefore best placed to help achieve this” .

Fujitsu has been contacted for comment.