The post office scandal

[Bringonthesun24]

Not sure if there is a thread. There probably is. I've just watched this video and I'm utterly in shock!

It seems that there could be potential for people at fujitsi to have altered the post masters accounts which could have been ordered by the top at the post office.

Why did they get rid of only that 1 vistor book. Why did they pay that guy a visit the day after he went to fujitsu.

There is so much more to this than meets the eye. I've watched some of videos and clips of other post masters and it breaks my heart to see how broken they are. How their lives were ripped from them and the shame they had to bear whilst knowing they were innocent. I actuay feel so angry for them.

Why is something only being done now after a bloody drama on TV. Why were the public not as aware of this scandal?

https://vm.tiktok.com/ZGejPxjAx/

To my old-fashioned mind, accounts are either right or they're not, and I don't indulge in the concept of them being "materially" right where materiality is an arbitrary concept and can disguise big problems within the firm

Your comment reminds me of something I read in a detective novel, of all places, and it was said by an accountant.

'Figures don't lie. Eventually the figures will show the truth.' And we're seeing that with all the talk about the money from the pms being in suspense accounts. I still can't get over the fact that no-one seems to have asked where the defrauded money was going. I mean, there are two sides to a transaction, that's basic bookkeeping!

To my old-fashioned mind, accounts are either right or they're not

I'm the same vintage as you. If the accounts are wrong you look and see where.

Depends on whether Fujitsu itself actually did anything wrong. A lot will depend on what their contract with the Post Office said. If they truly did remotely access the system, without the knowledge of the PO, then they’re likely liable for something, and if any individuals actually lied on oath, then they’ll be personally liable but I doubt Fujitsu can be held accountable simply for the system being flawed and not working - again, what was in the contract? Government departments are notoriously crap at IT contracts. It’s why so many IT providers can make millions out of the government and hardly ever deliver. And it wasn’t Fujitsu that prosecuted individuals who were known to be innocent of the crime they were accused of.

I agree. There's the old adage of "garbage in, garbage out" which is ever more true of government procured IT contracts where the specification given to the IT company is usually incomplete/flawed etc. The IT company just provide what was specified, and then it turns out that the specifications weren't right, hence the "extras" in terms of corrections, enhancements etc., which is where they make the real money. It happens because the civil servants who produced the specifications don't really understand it, don't know what they're doing, so they aren't actually capable of providing a valid specification in the first place.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/jan/12/alan-bates-post-office-horizon-scandal-house-of-lords

Imagine the complete collapse of confidence in HMRCs use of Fujitsu.

Not by us plebs, but by big (possibly international ?) Corporations who have to answer to foreign shareholders.

I can already see Amazon, Google and Apple all mounting vigorous appeals against their tax bills on the basis the Fujitsu systems must have been pants.

And I couldn't fault them. There is no way the Horizon system is the only crock of shite Fujitsu have peddled.

Many middle aged people have got nothing better to do

eh?!

*Many middle aged people have got nothing better to do

eh?!*

Just your standard MN ageism.

It would seem so.......

I find it frightening that we live in an age where a computer can be believed over a human being. I have another good example.

From a review from a HA employee Taken from glass door

"OneSanctuary SAP is the name of a multi-million pound software system brought in by Sanctuary in 2016, designed for use by all areas of the business. It has been an unmitigated failure, and is a huge drawback of working for this company.
The issues caused by SAP are staggering and difficult to keep track of. Because SHA tried to implement SAP in a cost effective manner, they ended up vastly under-investing in critical elements. There is no tailoring of the generically presented system ('vanilla SAP'), which is an issue as social housing is a unique environment from a service delivery and CRM perspective, whereas vanilla SAP is more geared towards providing a solution for manufacturing industries. Thus, the system uses corporate nonsensical buzzwords and methods of handling accounts which absolutely do not reflect industry practice.
Here are just some examples of the more specific issues faced by staff:
No rent statements have been issued since it was implemented in August 2016, and if a resident insists on a rent statement it has to be prepared manually in a spreadsheet.
The rent and calculations for accounts are hard to use, and often completely wrong. Mostly because the system was never designed to understand housing benefit payments, and this has a very convoluted workaround which a computer cannot make sense of.
SAP cannot interface with Local Authorities Housing benefit systems so payments are missed, lost or misattributed
Direct debits do not work reliably, and for a long time following the implementation did not work at all. Front line staff are now preferring standing order.
The front end system of SAP requires far more testing and money spent on it. Each customer account is a total mess of information, with no discernible way to separate notes left between differing departments, with information left by staff often going into the wrong account entirely. This needs looking at as from a compliance (DPA) point of view the breaches are serious.
From a usability point of view, the view of a customers account within SAP CIC does not display appropriate information to the user (as stated before this is likely because the system was never designed to be used by a HA) and the user often has to go trawling around back end systems to find obviously relevant data (e.g tenancy start date, account balance, property type etc). This is a seemingly minor but considerable waste of resources"

Even AFTER i posted this i had the SH haters on here screaming PAY YOUR RENT at me when it had already been paid, So plenty on here believe computers over humans

Problem is that if the HR/investigatory panel in any company doesn't want to see there's an issue because it's easier for them, then there's very little any employee can do.

If a grievance isn't done properly then the only response from an employee is going for constructive dismissal.
That involves them having to resign first, and then going through a lot of stress while starting a new job (hopefully) and even if they win a lot of employers will look a bit sideways at them for doing it, so they may struggle to get one- and there's a very high chance they won't win.

Having seen someone go through that with multiple witnesses, who were willing to speak up, to the incident that led to the grievance, and they still didn't get it upheld (because they said it was unproven, and they got that by not speaking to any of the witnesses).

And, let's face it, anyone with a half-reasonable grievance is not going to be in the best mental health state, to be going through extra stress.

There needs to be more legality round such things. At the moment everything seems to be "guidance". So they "should" interview witnesses, they "should do it in reasonable time" they "should make sure it's fair", but there's nothing that says that they "have" to interview witnesses and take that into consideration, and no actual time frame for "reasonable time" so they can spin it out across months etc.
And the only possible repercussion is that if the person has the mental state to take it to tribunal with constructive dismissal, then they might get a very slightly bigger fine. (which is normally a proportion of salary, so for those who are paid at the bottom end, peanuts to most firms)

ITV drama skews middle aged (like me) and older and it's a fact that the first week in January is a peak time for ITV premieres because the available viewing population is really high. A much higher proportion of the population is in the mood to curl up in front of the telly in the dark and the cold when they're too broke after Christmas to go down the pub or have made New Year's resolutions not to.

There's a reason why Dancing on Ice and the Masked Singer premiere at the beginning of January and the decision by ITV to put it on when they did will have contributed to its cut through.

My unrepresentative straw poll at work bears out what the statistics say: the over 40s were aware of it and/or watched it, the under 30s weren't. It's a very old school mainstream, very analogue story.

I don’t understand why it’s taken this long.

I know some of the journalists who were investigating the story (starting in 2004), I did start a conversation this week with one recently why the police weren’t involved but we got sidetracked but I’ll pick that up again. I heard the R4 series in 2020.

I had assumed the PMs had all been cleared and refunded/ compensated by now.

Companies and tech firms have a lot invested in ‘procedures’ and have a lot to lose if they are found to have a dodgy system (NHS I’m looking at you). Easier to blame humans than tech. The chinook scandal was another one they worked on - where the pilots were blamed for crashes when it was actually a software error that caused the crashes.

I wonder how many other IT issues there are waiting to be exposed - and with AI being feted as the be all and end all, who knows where we are headed?

Absolutely! Rishi is probably rubbing his hands together and thinking I can look the hero here

The fact is that paula will never face real justice as she is rich

Yes. Paula will be able to afford all the lawyers she needs to prepare her witness statements for the inquiry.

There is a danger in this that the 'little people' will be the scapegoats. Take Stephen Bradshaw - he came across as a thoroughly unpleasant person and deserved the grilling he got. But it's clear he had no help preparing his evidence - the same generic statement repeated about the investigations being conducted in a proper manner. He was hammered for that when he was questioned. A legal adviser could have seen to it that he found the right line between showing remorse and incriminating himself. I'm not saying that's a good thing, but you can bet Paula's evidence will be expertly crafted.

@Ifailed the Labour Party were in power from 1997 to 2010. Horizon was instigated in 1999. "Saint" Tony Blair had meetings with Fujitsu.

The Labour Party had over 10 years to do something about it.

You can't just blame the Tory's.

It's unbelievable that Stephen Bradshaw, who appears ho have had little or no training for his role as an investigator was invested with so much power over the sub-postmasters lives. Its Dickensian, he'd be a perfect fit for playing the Mr Bumble the beadle "More?!". Beyond absurdity.

You are correct, however the first reports were in Computer Weekly in may 2009 (Alan Bates set up Justice for Sub-postmasters Alliance in September 2009).

The Tories took power in May 2010, so whilst there was a period of Labour Government, the vast majority of the time that problems were evident in Horizon, it's only in 2024 that the Tory Government have taken much notice.

100%. That is why I am uneasy though; he came across very poorly at his grilling, but he is one of the 'little people' and his reputation is damaged now. It is the PO who put him - a manifestly unsuitable person - in a position of such power in the first place, then left him adrift to damn himself at the investigation.

Will the people who are truly accountable be subject to the same I wonder?

No, Horizon was instigated in 1995 by Peter Lilley, the then Social Security Secretary (Tory) under the name of Pathway. It was then continued by Labour 1997-2010 and by all successive govts (Tory-LibDem coalition & pure Tory).

Article in Independent from 1999, when it was already known to be a car crash:
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/icl-stumbles-on-pathway-to-hell-1092947.html

And this very interesting transcript of the current inquiry for the day of 10 October 2022, which quotes material from the 1990s and seems an excellent summary of how the disaster unfolded (I haven't read all of this transcript):
https://www.postofficehorizoninquiry.org.uk/sites/default/files/2022-10/POH%2011%20October%202022.pdf

There's lots of interesting stuff in there, including the way the original decision to go with ICL (Fujitsu) was made. If short of time you could start reading at p131, the acceptance testing debâcle.

Eg (pp144-145):
According to Tony Oppenheim, the Finance and Commercial Director of ICL Pathway, this agreement tacitly acknowledged that the accounting integrity control did not provide a complete solution to the data integrity issues which had first been identified as part of AI 376.

In his evidence to the Inquiry, he will state this is WITN03770100 the Third Supplemental Agreement recognised that in some circumstances it would not be possible to identify what had gone wrong, and therefore what correction should be made. Such instances were to be expressly disclosed by Pathway to Post Office Counters. Although not expressly stated, the logic was that it would fall to Post Office Counters as ultimate owner of the service and of the relationship with its clients and subpostmasters, to exercise a judgment in such cases.

Sir, you will undoubtedly wish to explore whether or not Post Office Counters shared that understanding of the terms of the Third Supplemental Agreement, and if so, why it was that Post Office Counters frequently exercised its judgment in a manner which was so detrimental to the interests of its subpostmasters

Fully agree with you @Livingtothefull

Beg your pardon, that day of evidence I've just linked was 11 October 2022.

(Sorry if I've sent anyone on a wild goose chase, if they were looking for it on the inquiry website rather than the link.)

https://www.postofficehorizoninquiry.org.uk/sites/default/files/2022-10/POH%2011%20October%202022.pdf

2019- papers national national news - when the 555 got their convictions over turned.

The 555 did NOT have their convictions overturned in 2019. That case decision only opened the door for people to appeal criminal convictions.

Only 93 people have had their convictions overturned. Out of nearly a thousand wrongly convicted.

That and some military action. He must think it's Christmas.

Ah ! ICL. another story of the white heat of UK innovation brilliance being pissed on by the tyranny of mediocrity.

I'm currently on the 3rd episode of Mr Bates vs the post office. Each episode just gets worse and worse. The anger I feel for these people.

I also read the article someone posted about the panorama episode. I cannot believe the threats the PO was making to the BBC. So if they did that then no wonder it hadn't got as much mainstream coverage on a wide scale. People may have been worried about getting sued.

Paula Vennels should be ashamed of herself. I wish someone could hold her and her other senior staff accountable

There were concerns about the Horizon system even before Blair signed the contract in 1999!

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/jan/14/a-tragedy-is-not-far-away-25-year-old-post-office-memo-predicted-scandal

and

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/sir-tony-blair-had-close-links-with-fujitsu-before-he-became-prime-minister-and-signed-off-on-the-900m-post-office-contract-with-the-firm-in-1999-despite-being-warned-that-the-horizon-accounting-software-looked-increasingly-flawed/ar-AA1mVG3p?ocid=msedgntp&pc=U531&cvid=41d5d453cf814211b3914c0c8b951262&ei=12