Horizon scandal convictions continued after Crown Office meeting

At the start of the year, former first minister Humza Yousaf suggested that everyone convicted in Scotland as part of the Post Office Horizon scandal would be cleared.

In January, Ms Bain said not every case involving Horizon would be a miscarriage of justice and that each case would have to be carefully considered.

In today’s statement, she was quizzed by MSPs about her stance on mass exoneration and she said that her comments had been taken out of context.

She said: “In my previous statement I made it clear that as Lord Advocate, I could only seek to address miscarriages of justice within the legal framework that is available to me.

“For this reason, despite what some have wrongly suggested, it is not possible for me to achieve mass exoneration of all those who have been impacted.

“I wish to make it clear that this was not a comment on whether I supported the concept of mass exoneration.”

She added: “I can only use the tools which are available to me as I have done to date.”

Ms Bain said she was committed to reflecting on whether anything could have been done differently by Scottish prosecutors and would await the outcome of the UK inquiry.