Sub-postmaster 'never lived to see the truth' of Post Office scandal

Jane Eastwood says she was left feeling "angry, bitter, and very sad"

A retired sub-postmistress said she wished her husband had lived to see he had never done anything wrong now that the Post Office scandal has been exposed.

Jane Eastwood ran the Goodworth Clatford office, near Andover, Hampshire, with her late husband Tony.

But they were forced to take on loans to make up a shortfall due to the faulty Horizon IT system.

About 700 people were prosecuted from 1999 to 2015, and some went to prison.

"I wish he'd known, I really do, but he never did know it wasn't us," said Tony Eastwood's wife Jane

The cases were based on information from Horizon, a piece of accounting software that indicated money had gone missing.

A public inquiry is ongoing, and the Post Office said it aimed to get to "the truth of what went wrong".

But Mr Bates vs The Post Office - an ITV drama broadcast earlier this month - thrust the issue into the spotlight again.

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Ms Eastwood told the BBC she watched the programme "with tears running down my face - it was so accurate and I feel so much for those who were so much worse off than I was".

She described the stress at the time as "enormous", and explained the couple "felt so alone". Tony died in 2003.

"I wish he'd known, I really do, but he never did know it wasn't us," she said.

This made her feel "angry, bitter, and very sad," she added.

Ms Eastwood kept meticulous records of her bookkeeping, but the IT software contradicted them

"It's the injustice, and the knowing that they knew, and the lying, and the fact that they were completely prepared to throw everybody under a bus.

"They knew and they were treating everybody abominably."

Ms Eastwood explained how she and her husband began to "dread" Wednesdays, "never knowing whether this week would end in a demand for yet more money" despite meticulous bookkeeping.

She said she once told her bosses: "'I can't afford to pay all this money all the time.' [They said] 'We'll take it out of your salary if you don't pay.'

"In the end we borrowed from family to put the money in."

The Post Office did not respond to a BBC request for a comment on Ms Eastwood's case.

The government has pledged to bring in a new law to "swiftly exonerate and compensate victims" of the scandal.