Paula Vennells is history but now at the Post Office Inquiry is Fujitsu distinguished engineer Gareth Jenkins - thread 4

[nauticant]

A continuation of this thread:

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5094266-paula-vennells-was-done-the-other-week-the-post-office-inquiry-is-now-questioning-associates-and-others-thread-3

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

Lurk

Not sure I can watch tomorrow, but will try to catch a little.

I love watching Jason Beer KC do his job. I marvel at his brilliance.
I can't believe that Gareth Jenkins gave evidence against the subpostmasters based on a 'confidence' that the system was ok rather than checking his facts. Shocking.

Forgot to say thanks for the thread OP!

Thanks for the new thread, nauticant.

Out most of tomorrow so will miss it, but placemarking just in case.
I see that Seema Misra won't accept his apology saying that it's too little and too late.

Jenkins himself, although he seems a bit of a Post Office dupe, might yet find himself in prison.

Thanks for the new thread.

I have to say that Gareth Jenkins was not what I was expecting. Having been thrown under the bus by PV and the lawyers I was expecting a very slimy senior manager from Fujitsu who was some sort of technical mastermind/pantomime villain.

Instead we got Gareth from IT - a lifelong techie who had the cases dumped on him at short notice and was out of his depth as an expert witness (relying on the "help and advice" of Jarnail Singh about his role. Fujitsu were passive, gave him no support and expected him to review these cases in addition to his normal workload whereas the PO called the shots and pressured him to change his evidence.

I can't believe the arrogance of the "Fujitsu Senior IT Architect" (or whatever it was they described Jenkins as but not an"Expert Witness" and definitely not "Doctor" ) continuing to claim that there were no bugs in the programmes

If he were indeed capable of designing something that had no bugs and always operated perfectly without fault, then he should be not just a millionaire but a billionaire and far from having to be the subject of a long running and very expensive enquiry, let alone all the miscarriages of justice and destroyed lives, the entire world would be queuing up to avail themselves of this perfect programme and those that were capable of designing it

Quick question, as I've only dipped in and out of these threads: has anyone been identified as being responsible (or admitted responsibility) for designing the Horizon system(s)? Or is it an amorphous blob of "techies"?

I think the word “designed” the system may be misleading. I am not an IT person so may have this wrong.

I think it is more of a collaborative process with coders creating different elements which are brought together to create a system. There should be an over arching architect but that wasn’t GJ.

Additionally there are systems that are designed for a generic purpose e.g. accounts, payroll, purchasing etc. that organisations buy and their IT teams configure and customise. Customising can lead to unexpected outcomes.

Joining.

Thank you for the new thread @nauticant

I've managed to catch up with yesterday's evidence.

I thought it was really interesting.
But my overriding thoughts so far could be summed up with:
What is the meaning of words?
It's like a bad version of the Two Ronnie Fork Handles comedy sketch.

Distinguished - turns out this title doesn't mean anything, but could be why someone assumed he was Dr Gareth Jenkins.
He didn't need any qualifications, or any particular experience to gain this title.
It was just a way for Fujitsu to make some of their employees feel better, without having to give then pay rises.
It's a bit like when your teacher made you 'Milk Monitor' at school
I think today I'm going to ask my manager to give me the title of Legend'.
From now on I am Minou the Legend.

Robust - from.what i understand this is just based on his feelings. He only knew of any bugs if he was allocated one to sort out or he happened to be sitting next to someone in the office and they mentioned it.
He had no total overview of Horizon, his opinion is only based on what he personally saw. There was no deep dive into what was going on.

Expert - GJ is not completely to blame for this, but I think potentially there was a little bit of an ego boost when people called him an 'expert'. Clearly he is regretting that now.

The public will want scalps. Jenkins is a good choice to throw to the wolves. There's easily-identifiable and easily-explainable wrongdoing. That can be tied to individual victims who have certainly suffered and who the public will have considerable sympathy for. Getting a conviction looks like it would be straightforward. Those factors together will go some way to placating an angry public. He's isolated so he can be done without needing to pull in other people.

I've said this before but I think it will be difficult to secure convictions in relation to other big names in the scandal. Perhaps some will face prosecutions in any case just so that it appears that something is being done, even if there's little expectation of guilty verdicts. But I think the authorities will want some successful prosecutions so some bit players might also go to court, for example some of the Post Office investigators.

Distinguished - turns out this title doesn't mean anything, but could be why someone assumed he was Dr Gareth Jenkins

Yes, ‘Distinguished Engineer' is a typically-Japanese title - what a Fujitsu salaryman would be called in the parent company. Arguably it's given an air of greater gravitas by being used in English.

IMO Gareth Jenkins is truly pathetic (though I have no sympathy for him) - he clearly loved being part of the prosecution team and being the “expert” witness in this new (and for him exciting) legal world. However those who should be on trial are so many of the PO senior staff - Alice Perkins I found particularly vile but there are so many! For reasons I fail to understand it does feel like the criminal conspiracy SS described. I hope there will be real consequences for those at the top of this stinking heap.

To all those innocents who have suffered I am truly sorry - I hope there is proper redress for you.

Agree with what many have said, that Jenkins comes across as naive outside his field rather than actively malicious, constantly trying to be helpful to whoever was asking – be it the PO or Second Sight

The plotters (Vennells, Perkins, Parsons, some Fujitsu management) ran rings round him.

I agree Gareth Jenkins was not at all as portrayed by previous witnesses. Frankly, he’s been quite the patsy if even 50% of his testimony is to be believed.

Worked at same company since 1973(?) straight from uni doing a maths degree - he had no frame of reference for the way other tech businesses reviewed and monitored work - this kind of business was in it’s infancy then. I think he was flattered to be seen as the go-to guy for Horizon and is now paying the price.
He’s been forthcoming and answered questions readily with a clear thought process justifying his answers, which far exceeds the evasive bullshit spouted by PV, Chris Aujard et al. Fujitsu lawyers in particular should have had a clear document confirming “expert witness” duties signed off by him if he had genuinely had this clearly explained prior to participating in any court cases. He was absolutely unswerving in his assertion this role was never explained to him by any of the multiple lawyers involved.
I am a bit curious as to why his expert witness status was never queried by any of the courts? He obviously declared who he worked for and what his job was - why was that not questioned as he would clearly be partisan?

Also, I gave been playing catch up on the enquiry picking and choosing on YouTube - Chris Aujard anybody? What an absolute snake/rat/ferrety downright oily bastard. How could he think anyone could afford his testimony any credibility! 😱

I didn’t think I could dislike anyone more than PV, but then I saw Alice Perkins. I thought her arrogance was completely off the scale. She had been fairly senior in the civil service. However no commercial or banking experience. How, how do people get these sinecures?

Jason Beer KC sounding a bit ropey. Seems that he's still not shaken off the cold he had.

Sir Wyn Williams is in attendance today rather than over video link.

If you think about it, he's been struck in that room for ages. He was bound to pick up something!

Surely the worst person was Lord Grabiner. Utterly amoral when the hourly rate was high enough, with bonus off-the-scale arrogance and disdain for the insects he had to deal with.

Lord Grabiner and Chris Aujard are definitely up there as the worst.

For me, it's Raymond Grant. The Post Office investigatior who couldn't be bothered to write a witness statement because he is super busy.
But more horrendously he arrogantly insisted SPMR William Quarm was guilty of stealing and refused to acknowledge he had got it wrong and his investigation was fucked up.

(William Quarm was sent to prison and has since passed away. His conviction has been overturned)

This is awkward 😬

Is this not perjury? He denied receipt of the letter yesterday and was on oath.

So much for GJ's claim to have not seen the Bond Pearce letter of 18 November 2005 setting out very clearly the duties of an expert witness before the court. It turns out that he received it as an attachment to an email that was addressed directly to him.

Jason Beer is being understanding that GJ could have been mistaken in his evidence but is making clear that GJ's position of being unaware of his duties is now on very shaky ground.

This surely can’t speak well to the consistency and reliability of Jenkins's evidence generally.