Topic: The Post Office Scandal

[Red Beret]

Exactly.

A very dangerous precedent is about to be set, which will be ignored/misunderstood by the general population.

A further step towards an authoritarian government.

It's similar to waving through all the asylum seekers just to claim they got the backlog down. Rishi just wants to bury this before the election so he'll be happy to throw out what amounts to a blanket pardon.

That's the problem with populist government. They don't lead - they react. Sunak will be looking to sweep all manner of shite under the rug this side of the election.

[thaddeus]

When you say Joe Bloggs is that a assumption or there are cases when Postmasters accounts were over paid.
I also wouldn't assume a Postmaster would say nothing when they know theres been a mistake overpaying them thousands, the big jump in profits that week/month would stand out like a sore thumb.

I knew my monthly Company pension was due to drop a few yrs back as I chose this option when retiring, I checked to see if it did drop when the time came which it did so it wasn't a problem but I knew a couple of people who chose the same option whose pensions continued when they should have been lowered, they were overpaid for a few yrs and then suddenly got a letter from Pension scheme telling them about the over payment, they had to pay back thousands, nobody suggested fraud on their part as the mistake lay with the Pension fund but they did demand the over payments to be paid back in full over time, I wouldn't put myself in that position and I would take the same attituded if I was a postmaster, it all builds up and your waiting for that letter telling you it all has to be paid back.

I wouldn't assume the majority are as honest as you.  I worked with a lady that continued to be paid for almost a year after she left as her manager (her sister!) didn't process the leaving form correctly.  After being stonewalled over repayment of the money for a few years it was eventually written off.

It's clearly apparent from all the evidence that there was a dreadful fault within Horizon and unforgivable heavy handedness from the Post Office in dealing with the fallout from that.  I dare say though that there are some genuine fraudsters in amongst the overwhelming number of innocent people.

[TSC]

Exactly.

A very dangerous precedent is about to be set, which will be ignored/misunderstood by the general population.

A further step towards an authoritarian government.

I’d envisage the legislation will require, and probably receive, cross-party support.

[Buck Pete]

I'm a Project manager now but spent many years as part of an IT support team for a reasonably large Telecoms software company.

What I can't seem to get my head around, is how all these different post offices were each reporting very similar issues and them not being linked early doors.  Did the Horizon customer support team leader not have some kind of daily (or at least weekly) team standups, reviewing each other's open tickets?  Trust me, these types of ticket reviews are standard on helpdesks.  Were the postmasters even able to actually log a support ticket or were they just handled on the fly by 1st line support staff (The switch it on/off off brigade)

As Rob and Andy rightly pointed out.  Every IT system has bugs, always have, and most probably always will.  The key is, how quickly you identify, prioritize, and then escalate these issues.  If the software devs didn't know about the issues then they couldn't have done anything to fix it.

You identify, escalate, fix, then apologize to your customer for any inconvenience caused and move on.

What jumped out at me on the drama, was how sketchy the support process was.  I'd be curious to know how the support process was in real life for the Horizon software.

How the PO auditors and suchlike reacted is a whole different conversation altogether though.

[oldfordie]

I wouldn't assume the majority are as honest as you.  I worked with a lady that continued to be paid for almost a year after she left as her manager (her sister!) didn't process the leaving form correctly.  After being stonewalled over repayment of the money for a few years it was eventually written off.

It's clearly apparent from all the evidence that there was a dreadful fault within Horizon and unforgivable heavy handedness from the Post Office in dealing with the fallout from that.  I dare say though that there are some genuine fraudsters in amongst the overwhelming number of innocent people.

You would think they would have more sense then, am not a thief but honesty wouldn't be the reason for telling the Post office about the over payments. it would be down to believing it would only be a matter of time before someone noticed a over payment, that would trigger a review of my whole account which would bring up all the other past over payments. what started as a few hundred maybe thousand which would mushroom the longer it kept on leaving you in massive debt.
The people I spoke too who were over paid came to a agreement, it came out of their monthly pension payments. I also wouldn't like it on my mind knowing it would be only a matter of time before I got a letter or phone call telling me ive been over paid.

[Wabaloolah]

I’d envisage the legislation will require, and probably receive, cross-party support.

well of course it will as it's not really something the opposition parties could oppose, it's a trap set by Sunak.

I'm not comfortable at all with parliament being able to overrule the judiciary, even though this is clearly a miscarriage of justice, there are mechanisms in place that should be swiftly dealing with it

[John C]

I'm not comfortable at all with parliament being able to overrule the judiciary, even though this is clearly a miscarriage of justice, there are mechanisms in place that should be swiftly dealing with it

Your discomfort is probably due to our collective mistrust of MP's and the establishment. But I do think in this case the sub-postmasters deserve swift action and not have to go back to court in a very lengthy process to be declared innocent.

I'm happy for Parliament to give itself the power and the country to endorse that power without protest to enable legal closure for them. Many of them will still have other battles and issues to face.

The public at large need to monitor and react to any future situations when Parliament take such action, but this time it should be welcomed, imo.

[Red-Soldier]

well of course it will as it's not really something the opposition parties could oppose, it's a trap set by Sunak.

I'm not comfortable at all with parliament being able to overrule the judiciary, even though this is clearly a miscarriage of justice, there are mechanisms in place that should be swiftly dealing with it

I agree with you.  It really does set a dangerous precedent.

[John C]

^ ^ ^
and it's a real shame that some people place their personal cynicism before the well-being of others and the necessity to urgently reverse an injustice.

[Red-Soldier]

^ ^ ^
and it's a real shame that some people place their personal cynicism before the well-being of others and the necessity to urgently reverse an injustice.

Nothing to do with that at all - not for me anyway.

The country has already moved into a less-open, less democratic, restricted society, over recent years - The Police and Crime Bill, for example.

A summary:

“Are we feeling queasy about it? Are we looking down with sort of queasy sense of vertigo? Yes, we are”, he said. “It breaches a fundamental principle which is effectively the government legislating against decisions, against the independence of the courts. These are exceptional circumstances, it is an extraordinary measure. It must not, must never be seen as a precedent.”

What then are these extraordinary circumstances? There are the appalling failures, and indeed “malevolence”, as Hollinrake put it, of the Post Office’s prosecution of innocent people based on evidence many knew full well was not to be trusted. The courts did not have such evidence at the time.

Then there is the fact that many convicted post office operators have been reluctant to apply to have their convictions overturned as they simply could not face further engagement with authority. Many are of an age where time is not on their side.

But a big part of the explanation for why the government is legislating in such a way lies in the incapacity of the appeals process to deal with the sheer number of cases involved.

The extraordinary circumstances, McNeill said, included the running down over many years of the level of resourcing in the criminal justice system, leaving it unable to fulfil its role.

“Justice delayed is a denial of justice,” he said. “With the state of the courts at the moment, realistically, it can’t be adapted. It doesn’t have the capacity to deal with these hundreds of cases. The Criminal Cases Review Commission is already overwhelmed.

“Every single court in the land, every single type of court is facing growing backlogs. There’s not enough judges, not enough court staff, not enough lawyers, to be able to progress just a normal caseload and then for the whole system then to have these hundreds of some quite complicated cases coming through, it does not have the capacity to do it. How many years it would take to deal with these cases through the normal system? Many, many years, maybe a decade or more.”

[oldfordie]

I agree with you.  It really does set a dangerous precedent.

I think the difference here is this is about clearing hundreds rather than a few, all the convictions are based on unsound evidence, it's unique, the accused had to prove their innocence rather than the prosecution proving their guilt. we know the people who accused them lied, they withheld vital evidence.
Maybe we are looking at this the wrong way. the dangerous precedent was set a few hundred years ago when the Post office were given the power to by -pass the CPS. the innocent having to prove they are innocent rather than the prosecution proving their guilt.
Nobody is suggesting we do away with the court of appeal.

[CHOPPER]

Scouse twat Bradshaw. Grrrrrrrr Typical!

[CHOPPER]

Bet he’s a blue!

🤣😂

[Red Ol]

Your discomfort is probably due to our collective mistrust of MP's and the establishment. But I do think in this case the sub-postmasters deserve swift action and not have to go back to court in a very lengthy process to be declared innocent.

I'm happy for Parliament to give itself the power and the country to endorse that power without protest to enable legal closure for them. Many of them will still have other battles and issues to face.

The public at large need to monitor and react to any future situations when Parliament take such action, but this time it should be welcomed, imo.

I think you’re right on that although you can appreciate the mistrust!

There needs are probably three main elements towards getting any real justice. First is getting the truth and overturning wrongful convictions. Second is getting compensation. Third is going after the people who knowingly and deliberately hid the truth and allowed hundreds to suffer to divert away from their own shortcomings.

Great that the first seems to be happening. The second, Financial compensation, welcome of course, but doesn’t do nearly enough to right the wrong. It’s the third thing that’s forever the real problem.

People in positions of authority who act dishonestly and arrogantly in covering up the truth, and happily sacrificing others, need to be firmly held to account. There has to be an end to the swaggering culture of impunity that gives these people the confidence to tell bare faced lies and get away with it time and time again. Stop giving them fucking honours  and send them to jail.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/jan/10/the-guardian-view-on-justice-for-the-sub-postmasters-the-reckoning-has-only-just-begun?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

[Nobby Reserve]

Scouse twat Bradshaw. Grrrrrrrr Typical!

An absolute c*nt.

Luckily, he's not half as clever as he thinks he is and inadvertently gave away some key things.

As the summariser on R5L printed out, the Post Office, their investigators and their lawyers colluded to conceal facts and documents in criminal trials in order to protect the perception of the integrity of Horizon, and innocent people were just cannon fodder to be thrown under the bus.

For lawyers to do that goes against the whole legal code.

[Wabaloolah]

^ ^ ^
and it's a real shame that some people place their personal cynicism before the well-being of others and the necessity to urgently reverse an injustice.

Something obviously needs to be done, I just think this sets a precedent where the government with a large majority can simply introduce a new law that overrides a decision by the independent judiciary if they don't like a decision made by the court.

Clearly this is a miscarriage of justice, not sure what the answer is but would prefer it to be done through the courts themselves rather than an act of parliament.

Surely the Supreme Court could quickly set aside the cases for everybody involved

[Jiminy Cricket]

An absolute c*nt.

Luckily, he's not half as clever as he thinks he is and inadvertently gave away some key things.

As the summariser on R5L printed out, the Post Office, their investigators and their lawyers colluded to conceal facts and documents in criminal trials in order to protect the perception of the integrity of Horizon, and innocent people were just cannon fodder to be thrown under the bus.

For lawyers to do that goes against the whole legal code.

And if true - which seems highly likely - they also perverted the course of justice and/or committed perjury, and across hundreds of cases. This should result in very lengthy jail sentences.

[John C]

Nothing to do with that at all - not for me anyway.

The country has already moved into a less-open, less democratic, restricted society, over recent years - The Police and Crime Bill, for example.

A summary:

This post seems to contradict the post you agreed with and your own post. The summary you provided identifies why we shouldn't be uncomfortable with Parliaments actions.

[redtel]

Something obviously needs to be done, I just think this sets a precedent where the government with a large majority can simply introduce a new law that overrides a decision by the independent judiciary if they don't like a decision made by the court.

Clearly this is a miscarriage of justice, not sure what the answer is but would prefer it to be done through the courts themselves rather than an act of parliament.

Surely the Supreme Court could quickly set aside the cases for everybody involved

This Government of the day has recently overruled a Supreme Court decision that Rwanda was not a safe country. Sunak et al passed a law through Parliament that it was a safe country. This was seen as ridiculous but it still happened.

It’s how our constitution is set isn’t it?

Edit; If the population don’t approve of the laws passed they have a chance to vote them out every 5 years approximately. The Poll Tax springs to mind.

We can’t vote out Judges, so which is preferable.

[Wabaloolah]

This Government of the day has recently overruled a Supreme Court decision that Rwanda was not a safe country. Sunak et al passed a law through Parliament that it was a safe country. This was seen as ridiculous but it still happened.

It’s how our constitution is set isn’t it?

Edit; If the population don’t approve of the laws passed they have a chance to vote them out every 5 years approximately. The Poll Tax springs to mind.

We can’t vote out Judges, so which is preferable.

it gets very dangerous if you allow parliament to create a law because it disagrees with a court judgement.

The judiciary is independent of any political influence, unlike the US. That's how it should be.

Hopefully this is a one off and is done specifically for this one instance of a miscarriage of justice but there is already mechanisms in place to get the convictions overturned.

The Rwanda issue was due to the wording of the law I believe, it didn't overturn the decision of the court that this will do if I understand correctly what is happening.

I am all for these unsafe convictions overturned but would prefer them to be overturned enmasse by the Supreme Court rather than the government bringing in a law that does it

[redtel]

The Supreme Court ruled that Rwanda was an unsafe country and as such refugees should not be sent there.

The U.K. Parliament has the power to overrule them which was necessary if they were to send refugees there.

My point is that is how our constitution is set up. The elected Parliament makes the laws and if we disagree with them we can vote them out. If Parliament acts in a way that the public disapprove of as you do in this case then they can be voted out. It’s democracy.

[CHOPPER]

It’s almost like the law courts need a system that identifies a clear and obvious error. 🤔

[Wabaloolah]

The Supreme Court ruled that Rwanda was an unsafe country and as such refugees should not be sent there.

The U.K. Parliament has the power to overrule them which was necessary if they were to send refugees there.

My point is that is how our constitution is set up. The elected Parliament makes the laws and if we disagree with them we can vote them out. If Parliament acts in a way that the public disapprove of as you do in this case then they can be voted out. It’s democracy.

I don't agree, it's different to the situation with Rwanda, it's just not something I am comfortable with but we'll have to agree to disagree

[Red-Soldier]

This post seems to contradict the post you agreed with and your own post. The summary you provided identifies why we shouldn't be uncomfortable with Parliaments actions.

It doesn't contradict my view at all.

It explains that it shouldn't be a precedent and the current situation on why it was needed.

It recognises peoples concerns and why this is a special case.

[stara]

<a href="https://www.youtube.com/v/bBnQEoJoWKM" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" class="bbc_link bbc_flash_disabled new_win">https://www.youtube.com/v/bBnQEoJoWKM</a>

[killer-heels]

Davey and Mandelson blaming civil servants.

[BobPaisley3]

Was it the system that was faulty though or was it the Fujitsu guys being able to remotely access the subpostmasters systems and altering the figures?

Great question and one which doesn’t seem to have been answered yet.

[Wabaloolah]

Great question and one which doesn’t seem to have been answered yet.

remote access is common for all IT systems, in order for suppliers to fix bugs.

The biggest elephant in the room with the case for me is the denial by those in the Post Office that remote access was even possible.

It was bound to be possible. It shouldn't, however, have been possible for the user ID of the postmaster to have been used in order to update the actual transactions. It should have been stamped with the ID of the person that actually made the correction, i.e. someone from Fujitsu

[BobPaisley3]

remote access is common for all IT systems, in order for suppliers to fix bugs.

The biggest elephant in the room with the case for me is the denial by those in the Post Office that remote access was even possible.

It was bound to be possible. It shouldn't, however, have been possible for the user ID of the postmaster to have been used in order to update the actual transactions. It should have been stamped with the ID of the person that actually made the correction, i.e. someone from Fujitsu

It’s just odd, as others have alluded to, that the numbers always went down. Was it a bug or perhaps something more sinister?

[Wabaloolah]

It’s just odd, as others have alluded to, that the numbers always went down. Was it a bug or perhaps something more sinister?

there was definitely something really odd going on, the ones that went down will be the ones we've heard about as that's where the scandal is. It's possible I guess that others we haven't heard about went up?

Maybe that's why nobody noticed where the money went because the positives in other people's accounts balanced out the negatives.

Whatever happened hopefully it all comes out in the public enquiry.

It's weird as fuck though that they are still using the Horizon software today

[BobPaisley3]

there was definitely something really odd going on, the ones that went down will be the ones we've heard about as that's where the scandal is. It's possible I guess that others we haven't heard about went up?

Maybe that's why nobody noticed where the money went because the positives in other people's accounts balanced out the negatives.

Whatever happened hopefully it all comes out in the public enquiry.

It's weird as fuck though that they are still using the Horizon software today

Yes, that’s very strange.

[John C]

The discussion about if any went up is a really interesting one.
It might have been asked or established but just not reported yet.

My best mate worked on government IT systems from 2008 until about 2018 and he says thankfully never toughed the PO stuff, but he says he recalls those who did work alongside or close to Fujitsu saying that they were "litigious as fuck".

[Nick110581]

It’s just odd, as others have alluded to, that the numbers always went down. Was it a bug or perhaps something more sinister?

I just don’t understand how this was never picked up.

If there were so many errors, wouldn’t someone have said something to Senior Mamagement so it got picked up?

[Elmo!]

Came across this on Reddit, if you read this report and scroll down to section 7.3, there is a fairly damning example of some of the code in the system.

https://www.postofficehorizoninquiry.org.uk/sites/default/files/2022-11/FUJ00080690%20Report%20on%20the%20EPOSS%20PinICL%20Task%20Force%2014052001.pdf

Whoever wrote this code clearly has no understanding of elementary mathematics or the most basic rules of programming.

[Nobby Reserve]

This BBC article is astonishing - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-67884743

It's about their 2015 Panorama expose on the Post Office/Horizon, and how senior figures at the PO tried to bully and threaten both experts appearing on the programme and the programme makers themselves.

Both Ernst Young & Second Sight had assessed Horizon on behalf of the PO and, along with IT people connected to the system, warned them that Horizon was unsafe - yet the PO ignored all and simply doubled-down on the lie that Horizon was totally fine and it was postmasters thieving that was the problem, pressing ahead with prosecutions.

Even now, at the inquiry, the PO are focused mainly on protecting their own arses.

There MUST be prosecutions of senior PO figures in this.

And the government needs to claw back every penny paid to Fujitsu in connection with Horizon

[rob1966]

Just going to post this Nobby, that rat faced little c*nt is crowing in Parliament about how he's sorting it and the fucking c*nts knew over 9 years ago

<a href="https://www.youtube.com/v/F3by7G0VQ3A" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" class="bbc_link bbc_flash_disabled new_win">https://www.youtube.com/v/F3by7G0VQ3A</a>

[CowboyKangaroo]

It's awful what's happened, unbelievable too but I'm not sure the government introducing a law that simply wipes out all of the convictions is necessarily the right way to go.

I don't trust this government as far as I could throw them and now there will be a precedent in place where the government has overruled an independent court.

I suspect they have a hidden agenda here.

This should be resolved immediately by the Court of Appeal not by a hastily introduced Act of Parliament

Don't worry about the precedent as a) it's been well accepted that parliament can do this for a long time, and b)  it has happened quite a few times before (I'd say just under half of all finance acts for the last 20 years have some bit of retrospective legislation to overturn a decision of the tax courts).

This nothing new and has no precedent value

The real calculus here is whether it is worth the few guilty people being exonerated as a trade off for the innocent having their innocence recognized in a timely manner

[Jiminy Cricket]

Don't worry about the precedent as a) it's been well accepted that parliament can do this for a long time, and b)  it has happened quite a few times before (I'd say just under half of all finance acts for the last 20 years have some bit of retrospective legislation to overturn a decision of the tax courts).

This nothing new and has no precedent value

The real calculus here is whether it is worth the few guilty people being exonerated as a trade off for the innocent having their innocence recognized in a timely manner

Doesn't this potentially taint the 'exonerations' of the innocent?

[CowboyKangaroo]

Doesn't this potentially taint the 'exonerations' of the innocent?

To some extent - I don't think most people view them as a class as partially guilty though and I suspect mass exoneration won't move the needle substantially.

The courts have to do the cases in batches and it will take a few years. My view is that it is probably worth it to get it all done, less accurately (it's not like the guilty ones haven't already done their time anyway)

[Jiminy Cricket]

To some extent - I don't think most people view them as a class as partially guilty though and I suspect mass exoneration won't move the needle substantially.

The courts have to do the cases in batches and it will take a few years. My view is that it is probably worth it to get it all done, less accurately (it's not like the guilty ones haven't already done their time anyway)

So. Will the truly guilty be compensated too?