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Original poster

Paula Vennells was back in Phase 5/6 of the Post Office Inquiry and now we're at Phase 7 - thread 5

523 replies

nauticant · 23/09/2024 22:34

A continuation of this thread about the Post Office Inquiry:

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5105378-paula-vennells-is-history-but-now-at-the-post-office-inquiry-is-fujitsu-distinguished-engineer-gareth-jenkins-thread-4

The Inquiry is at Phase 7 which is about how things stand now and looking to the future. Here's the timetable:

https://www.postofficehorizoninquiry.org.uk/phase-7-timetable

When the hearings are going on, live-streaming can be found here:

https://www.youtube.com/@postofficehorizonitinquiry947/featured

All of the previous hearings can be found here:

https://www.youtube.com/@postofficehorizonitinquiry947/videos

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minou123 · 15/10/2024 21:42

I love Ms Page. She has such a great stare, after she asks a challenging question.

She's pointed out Mike Young blames Paula Vennells and Paula Vennells blames Mike Young.
Mike just said that Paula was at POL for another 7 years, so she's more to blame.
🤷‍♀️

minou123 · 15/10/2024 21:38

Mr Stein has got it.

He is stopping Mike Young from blaming others for why he didn't raise his concerns. And he should take some personal responsibility.

Mike Young is not loving this.
He seems to think that because Lesley Sewell, Paula Vennells, Fujitsu didn't say anything, then it isn't his fault.

But he can't gave it both ways. He can't say on one hand that he identified the scandal long before anyone else, but because no-one else spotted it, he isn't to blame for not raising it.
It's a nonsensical argument.

minou123 · 15/10/2024 21:27

Here goes Mr Stein.

minou123 · 15/10/2024 21:20

Here's another good example.

He is talking about giving a comment to the Computer Weekly article.

He is saying he knew at the time Horizon data was not reliable for the prosecutions, but because he was having a bad day, that wasnt his fault, he just followed the corporate line and didn't do much else to sort it.

minou123 · 15/10/2024 20:53

That's exactly it @Lunde

He has got himself into a right pickle with the receipts and mismatch bug.
Because he kept talking and talking. Everything he was saying didn't match up to his email he wrote at the time.
Sir Wyn had to step in to get him to give a direct answer.

To me, he is trying to come portray himself as someone who knew the prosecutions were wrong, but for various reasons that are not his fault, he didn't raise his concerns.

Lunde · 15/10/2024 20:37

Young made the mistake of not keeping his answers short. His long-windedness only raised more questions than it answered.

An example of this was when he was sent an e-mail meant for (I think) Lesley Sewell - he could have just said "I have no idea about any of the points raised here as I was not dealing with these issues and shouldn't have ever received this message." But instead he waffled on and on which raised new and follow up questions.

minou123 · 15/10/2024 20:16

He identified, at the time, that the prosecutions was wrong based on the Horizon data and Fujitsu were not an independent expert. Yet did nothing.

He claims he was told not to raise it, either by John Scott or Lesley Sewell, and just let the process happen.

I'm not buying what he is selling.

minou123 · 15/10/2024 20:08

He is being challenged, as a former police officer, that it was the SPMR who had to prove thier innocence, and have hard evidence.

First he says he can't recall.
But he's changed it to maybe he did think it was wrong, but he didn't do anything about it and blames the sheer number of emails he got, that he didn't do anything about it.

Original poster
nauticant · 15/10/2024 20:05

He definitely came across as being strong willed and, mostly, having a grip. As such, he was a rarity in Post Office witnesses in the Inquiry by being seemingly capable.

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minou123 · 15/10/2024 20:05

Here comes the Ismay report.....

minou123 · 15/10/2024 20:00

there's nowt on telly.
😂

Well, so far Mike Young likes to talk and doesn't get to the point.
Thing is with Mike is he has had the opportunity to watch everyone else's testimony and read thier witness statements.
Where the evidence is in a letter/email/document he has got an answer for it.
If there is no document, his memory is fantastic and he can remember exactly what was said. Strange as other people have struggled to recall conversations from 12-15 years ago.

Original poster
nauticant · 15/10/2024 19:31

It's good testimony and helpfully illustrates some of the important threads running through the scandal. My overall take is that Young didn't want to find that Horizon was unreliable and that he was keen to seize on things, such as the Ismay Report, that enabled him to not make that finding.

Oldnall, not so much. Unless you've got spare time and there's nowt on telly.

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minou123 · 15/10/2024 19:01

Clearly I am very behind.... Im. just starting to watch Mike Young now. 😁

Apologies if I'm.repeating anything rivermum, *nauticant and Lunde has said. *

Lunde · 15/10/2024 17:09

At least Sir Wyn clarified for the record that the statements that Mike Young was missing and couldn't be found were mistaken and he had in fact been in touch with the inquiry team

Lunde · 15/10/2024 17:05

Yes - Oldnall was an anti-climax after the morning/early afternoon session

Original poster
nauticant · 15/10/2024 16:45

Easy. Done just after 16.10. I have nothing to report from his evidence.

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Original poster
nauticant · 15/10/2024 15:05

That's Young done. Let's see whether they can gallop through Oldnall and be done by Sir Wyn Williams' indicated cut-off time of 16.45.

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Original poster
nauticant · 15/10/2024 14:06

Interesting body language from Young, anticipating tough cross-examination. Leans right back in his chair and seemingly often looking off into the distance and not at counsel. A rather "distancing" approach.

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rivermum · 15/10/2024 13:27

Nauticant is spot on. Stein went straight for the unanswered questions.

As for the atmosphere here, it's quiet.
There are only 20 visitors, so we are relatively spread out. But definitely gasps of incredulity at Young's attempt to conflate the 2 issues.
And patience running short at his lengthy non-answers.

Original poster
nauticant · 15/10/2024 13:16

One thing Young made very clear. At the time he was being made aware of new problems with Horizon he was fully occupied with separation from Royal Mail and opening such a can of worms was something he needed like a hole in the head.

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Original poster
nauticant · 15/10/2024 13:14

Stein was digging into a fundamental point, that Young did not bring "new" bugs to the notice of the Board (seemingly keeping this knowledge to himself). Young went along with this to some degree and then pushed back hard, perhaps at the point where he could see it turning into him confirming that he was an executive who had failed to carry out his responsibilities.

Two 25 minutes sessions of further cross-examination to come with Oldnall supposedly taking less time than Young.

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Lunde · 15/10/2024 13:01

Getting snappy now with Mr Stein

minou123 · 15/10/2024 12:38

rivermum · 15/10/2024 11:44

I'm attending today. Interesting to see in person, but in reality it's much like you see on YouTube.
I agree with the assessment so far. Initially I thought he was surely out of his depth in the role when they covered his background. But with a wide ranging remit he does come across as reasonable and professional. I bet he's very glad of the Ismay report.
Definitely very waffly.

Thank you @nauticant and @rivermum for the excellent updates.
I am in back to back meetings today. So will catch up later.

@rivermum is it quite tense in the room?

Original poster
nauticant · 15/10/2024 12:35

There was a significant discussion after the morning break. Counsel was showing that Young had been engaged in correspondence about a new accounting bug after roll-out. Young pushed back hard, and unsuccessfully tried to pull the wool over the eyes of the Inquiry by claiming that this had been a bug during the pilot phase. This was Young at his most hard-line and least convincing. It then became clear what was at stake. If after roll-out Young was seeing new bugs, then by not bringing them to the attention of his direct report, John Scott, Head of Security, he was enabling the dysfunction that led to wrongful prosecutions of subpostmasters.

I'd suggest that he wasn't seeing new bugs, and more importantly wasn't discussing them with his subordinates, because he didn't want to see them, and was relying on the Ismay Report that they couldn't be seen because it was "known" that they weren't supposed to exist.

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Original poster
nauticant · 15/10/2024 11:47

This though is a narrative to paper over a more fundamental problem. Young rightly said in his witness statement, I think in paragraph 30, that large complex computer systems will always have bugs, errors, and defects, and an essential feature in running them is to have processes to manage when they have an impact. This thinking was discarded at Post Office and the issue was collapsed into the problem being either thieving subpostmasters or a faulty system, and Post Office orthodoxy was that the system wasn't faulty, for example as shown by the Ismay Report.

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