Post Office Horizon Computer Scandal.

[Cyker]

What needs to happen is for

1) Every wrongly jailed victim needs to be released ASAP,

2) Every victim needs to have all the money they gave to try and cover the false discrepancies returned immediately, then an independent body needs to be established to figure out how much compensation should be given to each person based on how badly they've been affected and what is required to get their lives back where they should be.

3) Then we can start dealing with everyone involved in perpetrating this and dragging it on for so long.

 

The Post Office should not be allowed to dictate compensation - They had a chance to make this right and they've fought it tooth and nail the whole time, and they've already denied further compensation to all the groups who took them to court despite those people not really getting anything due to lawyers fees.

I read somewhere they're *still* challenging appeals to overturn convictions, which is partly why it's taken so long for those that are still in jail to get released!!

They know they're in the wrong but they're still doubling down on the atrocities they've already committed! I just don't understand what they're trying to achieve, unless it's to become the most evil and despised organization in the UK...!?

 

[Mojo1010]

No one is in jail now, that happened a long time ago. A woman was sentenced to 18 months in prison while she was 8 weeks pregnant, got released on good behaviour just before giving birth. Had an electronic tag while giving birth, she also had a 10 year old daughter. A 19 year old young woman got sent to jail too.

All those executives of the post office if they knew that the horizon system was faulty and still prosecute postmasters need to go to prison for a long time. Sell their assets and use it to pay compensation, not tax payers money. It won't be enough to cover though.

[Haliotis]

Accepting that the docudrama was close to reality, the “Post Office Police” marched into the sub-post offices, !Removed! Gestapo style, and told each sub-postmaster in turn that their’s was the only branch affected, so the postmaster must be dishonest, and took immediate steps to punish the “crime”(?), even though they were aware of there being a problem with the Horizon software, as they exercised their accusations.

The posters on this forum have expressed clear feelings of disgust towards the Post Office, which must pale into insignificance how the victims must have felt.

For myself, I cannot help but believe that there were at least a few government ministers who must have had insider knowledge that all was not right with the situation, yet there appears to be evidence of a minister/MP raising the question.

In the interests of justice, this must not be allowed to go away until all victims have been fully compensated, and the guilty parties all received adequate punishment for what they have done.

2 hours ago, Mojo1010 said:

 

 

2 hours ago, Mojo1010 said:

 

 

[Stopeter44]

17 hours ago, Cyker said:

They know they're in the wrong but they're still doubling down on the atrocities they've already committed! I just don't understand what they're trying to achieve,

Simple. Avoiding paying out any money. Nothing is going to improve their reputation, but they can at least save the government some money (for tax cuts ?).

[Mojo1010]

Just watched this panorama programme on it Link at Bottom

I think Paula Vennells and some executives of the post office will likely face prison when this is all done. There were the judge, jury and executioner. This power will be taken away in due course. 

[Rhymes with Paris]

I know a judicial review is not the answer to everything, maybe one is called for.

And will  be too late for some of the victims or as I prefer,targets of some of these power crazed individuals.

But it might be the best this country has to offer to redress the balance somewhat.

But to be wrongly accused is bad enough, and then ruined financially, and reputationaly,by these incompetents , hopefully full restitution first,PDQ for the victims, and then severe penalties for the people who were knowingly wrong , who continued to pursue badly suffering victims until ruin,or in the even more tragic cases until death.

[Bper]

Does anyone know of anyone who has been involved with similar injustices who has sat at the top and been jailed. The worst case is Paula Vennells will loose or give back her CBE. She will be protected by the establishment whilst them telling us that justice will be served.

No doubt her pension benefits along with personal wealth will provide her with a secure future, job or no job.

This will obviously run for a while in the media and then some other news around the world will become more relevant.

Unfortunately history attests this time and time again.

[Haliotis]

Well, it is really great to see that the scandal is kicking off with the media.  Even the PM is having to get involved - the Tories are already in dire straits - and to ignore this would be political suicide.  I’ve been watching the TalkTV programme, and the presenters have been issuing scathing comments about the Post Office hierarchy.  The general public will be rightly expressing disgust, and this problem will not go away until justice is seen to be done.

[Mjolinor]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-67925304

[Haliotis]

Gareth Jenkins, the architect of the faulty Horizon IT scandal, who gave evidence used to convict sub-postmasters, has demanded immunity before agreeing to appear at the public enquiry.

So, haul him kicking and screaming into the enquiry, and any “no comment” response be decreed to be admission of guilt.  Let him suffer the kangaroo court tactics that the accused/convicted sub-postmasters were forced to endure.

In the interests of justice, it’s time for the gloves to come off, and the true guilty parties get the hammering and punishment they have avoided for far too long.

[Mjolinor]

With each passing day the UK gets closer to the "banana republic" way of life.

I am so glad I am not a teenager.

[Stopeter44]

1 hour ago, Haliotis said:

Gareth Jenkins, the architect of the faulty Horizon IT scandal, who gave evidence used to convict sub-postmasters, has demanded immunity before agreeing to appear at the public enquiry.

.....

In the interests of justice, it’s time for the gloves to come off, and the true guilty parties get the hammering and punishment they have avoided for far too long.

He may have been the architect, but he was not necessarily aware of the mistakes in implementation. What I mean is, he knew what he designed/specified but the implementation was handled by another team or entity. It's possible, unless you know for certain he was aware of the systems failures ?

[Haliotis]

1 hour ago, Stopeter44 said:

He may have been the architect, but he was not necessarily aware of the mistakes in implementation. What I mean is, he knew what he designed/specified but the implementation was handled by another team or entity. It's possible, unless you know for certain he was aware of the systems failures ?

If he is clean, then why demand immunity before agreeing to appear at the public enquiry?

[Stopeter44]

It's good question, but until proved otherwise the doubt remains.

 

[Cyker]

I just hope this doesn't turn into a witch hunt as that will make it easier for the people really responsible to lay blame on some random peon to escape punishment.

The people they need to go after are the ones that gaslit the postmasters, saying they were the only ones with the problem, the ones that ignored and/or dismissed the problems despite multiple reports and didn't bother to investigate further, the ones that pressed on with charges even though they were aware of the problems, and the ones that buried any evidence or reports that there was a problem.

To me, the fact that there were flaws in the system is just an inevitable consequence of rushing out a big system; The people potentially responsible for those flaws are not to blame; The people that knew about the flaws and either covered them up or ignored them and basically lied about its fitness for use, however, deserve a good share of the blame and subsequent butt-kicking.

Most of the people in the leadership will be directly responsible for the majority of this atrocity - They get paid the big bucks to make the big decisions, so they deserve the fallout for making such bad decisions.

 

[Bper]

Amazing how those involved are squirming behind the scenes and denying they had no knowledge as to the extent of the problem. Sir Ed Davy “ I was misled by the Post Office”

Paula Vennells “Quick, have my CBE back”. Gareth Jenkins “I will give evidence but only if you give me immunity”. 

Fujitsu handed £5billion pounds of our money for Government contracts since 2019 and the executives being hauled in front of government ministers next week to answer questions if they put profits before people.

It will probably go something like this - “Minister, did you put profits before people?” Fujitsu - “No of course not, we accept that there may have been some teething problems with the software but we robustly deny altering figures remotely”. Minister - “Thank you, that's all we need to hear”. 

The Post office being questioned by select committee.

Minister - “Ms Vennells, what did you know about this problem?” “Nothing, but I gave my CBE back and have also attempted to give back the £5 million pounds that I received as pay off for my successful time at the post office but computer says ‘No’.😂

 

[Haliotis]

7 hours ago, Stopeter44 said:

He may have been the architect, but he was not necessarily aware of the mistakes in implementation. What I mean is, he knew what he designed/specified but the implementation was handled by another team or entity. It's possible, unless you know for certain he was aware of the systems failures ?

It was his responsibility to check and recheck the viability of the system - I would imagine that it was not (or should not have been) implemented until he [the architect] confirmed that the system was safe.   Of course, we do not know if, or by how much, he may have been pressurised by the Post Office hierarchy into saying that the system was fit for purpose.  However, if he did succumb, and knew it wasn’t safe, then he should have blown the whistle - failure to do so includes him in the circle of guilty ones.

[Stopeter44]

13 hours ago, Haliotis said:

It was his responsibility to check and recheck the viability of the system - I would imagine that it was not (or should not have been) implemented until he [the architect] confirmed that the system was safe.

I see you point. If he was a top level honcho, I just don't see him getting involved with the nuts and bolts.

There will be all kinds of management levels in a project with envergure of the Post Office project,  people will have deemed that testing was complete at all levels, and it's highly likely that the system worked perfectly with all the test data available including a simulation of the real world data.

I worked on real time systems for years, big projects, and the minute they went live "Crash, bang" happened often enough, that it's damned near impossible to implement a new system without the least hiccough. (In a way, if it doesn't go crash bang, you are left wondering "what's wrong, it didn't crash", because that means the bugs are harder to detect and fix.)

The real crime is not so much the flaws in the system, it's the post implementation assumption that the system was functioning perfectly. To my way of thinking it's the operational management that is the guilty party.

[Stopeter44]

14 hours ago, Haliotis said:

Of course, we do not know if, or by how much, he may have been pressurised by the Post Office hierarchy into saying that the system was fit for purpose.  However, if he did succumb, and knew it wasn’t safe, then he should have blown the whistle - failure to do so includes him in the circle of guilty ones.

There's something I forgot. Engineers/Architects design and implement systems and know how they are supposed to work, and will test, or organise testing of, the system knowing how it's supposed to work and with what objectives in mind. Put that system into the real world, with people who don't necessarily know what the objectives are, then they may well use the system in ways that the designers never for a minute thought about.

[AndyN01]

I wonder if the "user manuals" are available? And, if so, I'd like to know what someone actually did when told by a Postmaster/mistress that "I followed the manual exactly but it's wrong......" .... And, of course, who they are..... At every level.

I don't work in computing but I've never known a "new" system actually work "properly" when it goes live. And often the "helpdesk" haven't got a clue either - not their fault - BUT, IMHO it is their job to escalate it.

Andy.

[Stopeter44]

2 hours ago, AndyN01 said:

... but I've never known a "new" system actually work "properly" when it goes live. And often the "helpdesk" haven't got a clue either - not their fault - BUT, IMHO it is their job to escalate it.

And they will, but what happens when they have "escalated" the problem is totally out of their hands.

[Haliotis]

“The real crime” is that, when things were obviously going wrong, instead of trying to do a cover up, the Post Office hierarchy and Fujitsu should have been open with the sub-postmasters and admitted that there was a serious problem, and to bear with them whilst it was sorted out.   It should have been obvious to the management that over 700 sub-postmasters would not simultaneously embezzle money.

As was pointed out on a TalkTV news discussion, no money was actually stolen, and sub-postmasters have reimbursed the Post Office with sums of money they have “supposedly” stolen.  Which means that the “lost money” and the “reimbursements” have found their way into the Post Office profits.

Things are certainly beginning to look very ugly!

[Mjolinor]

It would be interesting to see a graph of prosecutions from say the 1970s to see if there is a noticeable step increase or not.

Some must be correct and I have no idea if that many would appear abnormal to a significant degree.

 

[Haliotis]

25 minutes ago, Mjolinor said:

It would be interesting to see a graph of prosecutions from say the 1970s to see if there is a noticeable step increase or not.

Some must be correct and I have no idea if that many would appear abnormal to a significant degree.

 

Not quite sure what you mean, John.  Do you mean a graph across the board, or just in one company - viz. The Post Office?    Very difficult to apply that logic where 700+ sub-postmasters are concerned.

[Mjolinor]

Prosecution by the post office by year since the 1970s.

Was there a step increase 1995-1996 and 1999 on.