Mr Bates and the Post Office

Garry Edwards

Garry Edwards

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I've been following this for years, as a reader of Private Eye, which has been campaigning ever since Computer Weekly first took up the story. I think that, apart from Alan Bates, most of the credit belongs to Computer Weekly, but it took them four years from Bates' initial contact with them to do anything.

The Post Office has behaved disgracefully throughout, but the government is almost as much to blame in my view because they have known about it for many years but failed to take any meaningful action, and the case has also highlighted the incompetence and the inadequacies of the British legal system, which has moved incredibly slowly and which makes it virtually impossible for ordinary, poor people to access any form of justice.

Suddenly though, in an election year, the government sees this scandal as a problem that they need to resolve . . . Why does it take a TV drama to wake people up?
 
When you consider that the government owns The Post Office it is not surprising that they didn't want to sort it out before now.
We just need a program on the Infected Blood Scandal, on average one person infected is dying every 4 days.
 
It clear that no party in power comes out of this well but I found Priti Patel's comments quoted here -

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-67892045 2

- interesting. It says

Writing in the Sun, former Home Secretary Priti Patel, whose father was a sub-postmaster, said: "These pillars of the community were bullied and betrayed by the Post Office, courts and successive Labour and Lib Dem ministers."

You'd think there had never been a Conservative government at any time during this mess.


The government knows they are holding money which is not theirs and yet they have done very little about returning it until now.
It reminds me of consumer programmes where someone has lost out because of a company who continually refuses to accept responsibility until the programme gets involved, and then suddenly they compensate the person.

Perhaps I am expecting too much in thinking our government should behave better towards its citizens(who pay their wages) than a company trying it on.


Dave
 
My understanding is that this is Priti Patel's first pronouncement on the affair.
 
Deleted as I think that I misunderstood a reply :)
 
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Having worked in the Home Office and in Fujitsu as a software test manager, I am surprised that defence barristers failed to adequately challenge the PO/Fujitsu evidence. The British Computer Society has a host of highly experienced and qualified Fellows (like me) available to act as expert witnesses. Then again I've never looked into what evidence was presented or challenged in court as to the quality of testing of the software, but experience tells me that it would have been easily rubbished or at the very least shown to be lacking in specific areas.
 
The big question few seemed to ask was where did the money go? If they’d pinched multiple thousands then it’s gone somewhere but that doesn’t seem to have merited much investigation. That didn’t set off any alarm bells at all.
 
Garry Edwards said:
I've been following this for years, as a reader of Private Eye, which has been campaigning ever since Computer Weekly first took up the story. I think that, apart from Alan Bates, most of the credit belongs to Computer Weekly, but it took them four years from Bates' initial contact with them to do anything.

The Post Office has behaved disgracefully throughout, but the government is almost as much to blame in my view because they have known about it for many years but failed to take any meaningful action, and the case has also highlighted the incompetence and the inadequacies of the British legal system, which has moved incredibly slowly and which makes it virtually impossible for ordinary, poor people to access any form of justice.

Suddenly though, in an election year, the government sees this scandal as a problem that they need to resolve . . . Why does it take a TV drama to wake people up?
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I'm the same. Followed it for a very long time. The Governments of all three major colours are up to their necks in this and it basically sums up Britain. The rich and establishment are never punished while the workers get hammered regardless of guilt. Just like Grenfell, Banking Crisis, Hillsborough, Guildford, the multitude of police scandals no-one will end up seeing prison. It does show the power of TV though which is why our TV stations are so important in an election year and at other times and why The Tories have sewn up the BBC and have their sponsors paying for all the other channels time.

Handing back an honour which should never have been awarded and at the time it was she should have been facing serious criminal charges. Add to that Fujitsu have had billions in contracts since with those signing them fully aware of their part in this scandal. A scandal that is growing by the day
 
Tringa said:
It clear that no party in power comes out of this well but I found Priti Patel's comments quoted here -

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-67892045 2

- interesting. It says

Writing in the Sun, former Home Secretary Priti Patel, whose father was a sub-postmaster, said: "These pillars of the community were bullied and betrayed by the Post Office, courts and successive Labour and Lib Dem ministers."

You'd think there had never been a Conservative government at any time during this mess.


The government knows they are holding money which is not theirs and yet they have done very little about returning it until now.
It reminds me of consumer programmes where someone has lost out because of a company who continually refuses to accept responsibility until the programme gets involved, and then suddenly they compensate the person.

Perhaps I am expecting too much in thinking our government should behave better towards its citizens(who pay their wages) than a company trying it on.


Dave
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My bold. The problem is that the government can't give money to a convicted person and that's one reason why they're trying to find a way of exonerating them all. First they have to clear that conviction. The other problem is that in the UK the judiciary is separate from government so the government can't tell a judge to squash a conviction and to squash a conviction the judge needs to hear all the new evidence and, as someone, I heard on the radio, pointed out, it's possible that some of the convicted did steal. They don't know.. I think they'll just have to put that to one side and ignore that possibility for the greater good.
 
Simon Blagden's name has surfaced in relation to cronyism. He's the CEO of Fujitsu UK. Since 2005 he and the companies he's been associated with have donated £376,000 to the Conservative Party.

Some interesting reads.

www.bbc.co.uk

Fujitsu: How a Japanese firm became part of the Post Office scandal

The story of how a software firm based thousands of miles away became embroiled in the UK scandal.
www.bbc.co.uk

news.sky.com

May risks cronyism row as Tory donor eyes trade minister job

Former Fujitsu executive Simon Blagden has been in talks about becoming the next trade minister, Sky News can reveal.
news.sky.com news.sky.com

Blagden is mentioned halfway down the article.

www.theguardian.com

Two donors who gave Tories £1m between them handed public health jobs

Exclusive: Labour raises questions about probity of recent appointments to NHS England and UKHSA
www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com
 
lindsay said:
Having worked in the Home Office and in Fujitsu as a software test manager, I am surprised that defence barristers failed to adequately challenge the PO/Fujitsu evidence. The British Computer Society has a host of highly experienced and qualified Fellows (like me) available to act as expert witnesses. Then again I've never looked into what evidence was presented or challenged in court as to the quality of testing of the software, but experience tells me that it would have been easily rubbished or at the very least shown to be lacking in specific areas.
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My understanding is that the PO managers were urged to plead guitly so no evidence was heard. One PO manager said the lawyer for the PO telephoned him and urged him to plead guilty or they'll "destroy him and wreck his life.". Some of those charged were urged to plead guilty to 'false accounting'; rather than theft to avoid a prison sentence..so a plea-deal was done.

On the LBC Radio and Five Live phone-ins each day another piece in incriminating evidence is related. The lawyers for the PO must have, at best, mislead judges and at worst,lied.
 
JohnC6 said:
The lawyers for the PO must have, at best, mislead judges and at worst,lied.
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I think the phrase is "Perverting the course of justice"...... Some people at both the PO & Fujitsu need to hang for this, but I bet it will never happen....
 
Jelster said:
I think the phrase is "Perverting the course of justice"...... Some people at both the PO & Fujitsu need to hang for this, but I bet it will never happen....
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There's a lot of pressure to get to the bottom of this sort of thing and the police..The Met, I think..are investigating. Perverting the course of justice and perjury are very seriou offences and will almost inevitably attract a custodial sentence. There'll be some bums twiching, that's for sure.
 
srichards said:
The big question few seemed to ask was where did the money go? If they’d pinched multiple thousands then it’s gone somewhere but that doesn’t seem to have merited much investigation. That didn’t set off any alarm bells at all.
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This idiom comes to mind. "There are none so blind as those who will not see"
 
JohnC6 said:
There's a lot of pressure to get to the bottom of this sort of thing and the police..The Met, I think..are investigating. Perverting the course of justice and perjury are very seriou offences and will almost inevitably attract a custodial sentence. There'll be some bums twiching, that's for sure.
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I hope you are right I suspect it will be covered over because Tory donors will give the orders out and the Govt will pass that on to the Police. The Met investigating an injustice is a tad ironic. Might cost a knighthood or two for the Tories but well worth it to make it all go away as quietly as possible. This isn't really news as the OP says. It has been common knowledge for years and The Police have sat on their hands awaiting orders. There might be a token low level PO or Fujitsu employee sacrificed, even that I doubt, but the scum that caused this misery will never be charged.
 
lindsay said:
Having worked in the Home Office and in Fujitsu as a software test manager, I am surprised that defence barristers failed to adequately challenge the PO/Fujitsu evidence. The British Computer Society has a host of highly experienced and qualified Fellows (like me) available to act as expert witnesses. Then again I've never looked into what evidence was presented or challenged in court as to the quality of testing of the software, but experience tells me that it would have been easily rubbished or at the very least shown to be lacking in specific areas.
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I don't think that it was that simple.
JohnC6 said:
My understanding is that the PO managers were urged to plead guitly so no evidence was heard. One PO manager said the lawyer for the PO telephoned him and urged him to plead guilty or they'll "destroy him and wreck his life.". Some of those charged were urged to plead guilty to 'false accounting'; rather than theft to avoid a prison sentence..so a plea-deal was done.

On the LBC Radio and Five Live phone-ins each day another piece in incriminating evidence is related. The lawyers for the PO must have, at best, mislead judges and at worst,lied.
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Correct, but it goes much further. The majority pleaded guilty to false accounting, because they had been threatened with theft charges, even though there was zero actual evidence of theft, and pleading guilty to false accounting wouldn't necessarily lead to imprisonment.

There are several organisations, including the Post Office, which are a prosecuting authority, The CPS has its faults, but they do at least check that there is a strong prosecution case before approving charges, but with the Post Office as the prosecuting authority this backstop doesn't exist, so totally false charges can be brought.

And they pretty much had to plead guilty to false accounting because they had been told by the PO "helpline" that unless they ticked the "accept" box they wouldn't be able to continue trading ("Don't worry about it, just tick the box and we'll sort it out for you tomorrow". How could they plead not guilty after accepting that the figures displayed on their computer screen was correct?

Also, every one of them had been told that they were the only person who had a problem, they didn't know that the system was wrong. They had lost their businesses, often their homes, and were afraid of being sent to prison. They didn't have any money for legal defence and had to rely on public funding (legal aid) which is basic at best for relatively minor offences. Would legal aid have paid for expert witnesses in these circumstances? Very unlikely.
 
wookie6262 said:
@Garry Edwards Have you listened to teh BBC Podcast. I listened when it came out as I was already interested in the story. Imo it was better than the TV series which was excellent too. As a Union Rep the federation never came out well at all.
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I did, and I agree. The federation did little or nothing to help the victims. They simply accepted the post office statements that the postmasters were guilty.
 
Suvv said:
When you consider that the government owns The Post Office it is not surprising that they didn't want to sort it out before now.
We just need a program on the Infected Blood Scandal, on average one person infected is dying every 4 days.
Click to expand...
Any source for the number of people dying?
 
srichards said:
The big question few seemed to ask was where did the money go? If they’d pinched multiple thousands then it’s gone somewhere but that doesn’t seem to have merited much investigation. That didn’t set off any alarm bells at all.
Click to expand...

There never was any money to go missing, the errors/shortcomings were totally computer generated.
As far as I can tell, the Post Office "investigations" into the sub postmaster's cases, never included any forensic searches of their bank accounts.
 
Garry Edwards said:
I did, and I agree. The federation did little or nothing to help the victims. They simply accepted the post office statements that the postmasters were guilty.
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Like yourself and others Gary, I was aware of this a few years ago through Ian Hislop and Private Eye. As far as I can tell, the Federation had no interest in helping the sub postmasters, they were simply another barrier for the poor victims to push against.
 
Panorama investigated this a couple of years ago, still on iplayer, and it is just as shocking as the recent Mr Bates drama. The post office asked for tenders for the software, when the PO reviewed all the tenders Fujitsu where rated bottom in 8 of the 11 tests BUT they were the cheapest
 
andya700 said:
There never was any money to go missing, the errors/shortcomings were totally computer generated.
As far as I can tell, the Post Office "investigations" into the sub postmaster's cases, never included any forensic searches of their bank accounts.
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And when the Forensic Accountants of Second Sight found flaws in the Horizon system the PO put in place Operation Sparrow to find ways to shut them down. NB this was in the Panorama Report from 2022 repeated last night .......it 'ground my gears ' again :headbang: :mad:
 
jerry12953 said:
And for all those years the media (with the exception of Private Eye) just ignored this story; now they can't get enough of it.
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And where was Vince Cable in all of this?, I thought he had the power of foresight just like Mystic Smeg. As someone said I think this has only blown up in Westminster because of a small matter of a general election coming up...
 
jerry12953 said:
And for all those years the media (with the exception of Private Eye) just ignored this story; now they can't get enough of it.
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Computer Weekly started reporting on the mess in 2008...

Post Office Horizon scandal explained: Everything you need to know | Computer Weekly

Computer Weekly has investigated the Post Office Horizon scandal since 2008 and is, in fact, part of the story. This guide covers essential information about the scandal.
www.computerweekly.com www.computerweekly.com
 
welshwizard645 said:
And where was Vince Cable in all of this?, I thought he had the power of foresight just like Mystic Smeg. As someone said I think this has only blown up in Westminster because of a small matter of a general election coming up...
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Hmmm! and in the past 25 years how many ministers have there been of any/all parties who had oversight of the Post Office ???

Did the PO & Fujitsu Horizon scandal start & end during the coalition government ?
 
I don't think any of our government and legal systems come out well in this.

It's a shame party politics (even in this thread) are coming into it. All the 3 main parties bear some responsibility.

Lots of bad things happened - I find the fact that PO investigators were on bonuses to find and prosecute "offenders" reprehensible.

The legal system as a whole has been exposed as a bit of sham. Defence barristers advising their clients that unless they pleaded guilty they were likely to go to jail.
 
AndrewFlannigan said:
Computer Weekly started reporting on the mess in 2008...

Post Office Horizon scandal explained: Everything you need to know | Computer Weekly

Computer Weekly has investigated the Post Office Horizon scandal since 2008 and is, in fact, part of the story. This guide covers essential information about the scandal.
www.computerweekly.com www.computerweekly.com
Click to expand...
True, but it still took them 4 years to start reporting it
"In 2004, Alan Bates, a subpostmaster in north Wales, contacted Computer Weekly about the fact that he was getting unexplained shortfalls, which he was convinced were caused by Horizon errors.

Nothing was written, but in 2008, Lee Castleton also contacted Computer Weekly telling a similar story. This was enough to spark a wider investigation.

A year later, Computer Weekly told the story of seven subpostmasters who were experiencing unexplained losses. This stimulated Bates’ fight against the Post Office, which had already been going on for nearly 10 years. The article revealed to subpostmasters who were having Horizon problems that they were not alone and that the Post Office was lying to them."
 
Peter123 said:
I don't think any of our government and legal systems come out well in this.

It's a shame party politics (even in this thread) are coming into it. All the 3 main parties bear some responsibility.

Lots of bad things happened - I find the fact that PO investigators were on bonuses to find and prosecute "offenders" reprehensible.

The legal system as a whole has been exposed as a bit of sham. Defence barristers advising their clients that unless they pleaded guilty they were likely to go to jail.
Click to expand...
But in the repeat of last night's Panorama program, one lawyer was shown a document that if I understood correctly should have been in the disclosure docs by the prosecution but as it was not all she could do was advise her client based on the disclosed evidence.

The miscarriage of justice was entirely perpetrated by the prosecution parties :(

Edit ~ IIRC it was not in & of itself a guilty plea but to which offence. The PO investigation team and it's lawyers were saying/offering the lesser offence of "false accounting" compared to "theft" would affect the outcome of a guilty plea.
 
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Garry Edwards said:
True, but it still took them 4 years to start reporting it
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...and they admit it.

I suspect that, before taking on the 1,000lb gorilla called "Post Office", they would have wanted to gather sufficient evidence.
 
Ed Davy failed to attend PMQs yesterday,despite having a question allocated to him, because he knew a question would have been put to him re his role....or rather the lack of it.. in relation to the PO scandal. There's a 'Find Ed" campaign in progress.I see, of all people, it was 30p Lee who demanded his resignation. He said that ED Davey had,over time, called for the resignation of thirty MPs. for various reasons. This is quite damaging, especially in an election year.

There's a video on PMQs in the article.

www.express.co.uk

An Ed Davey-sized hole on Commons benches at PMQs is bad news for the Lib Dems

ANALYSIS: As repercussions of the Post Office scandal continue to rage in Parliament, Sir Ed Davey's Prime Minister's Questions (PMQs) absence became an issue.
www.express.co.uk www.express.co.uk

From the article:

"Davey's case has not helped that he has received £275,000 in payments from the legal company employed by the Post Office on the issue although the Lib Dems have stressed that they were for advice from a different ministerial portfolio he held in the Coalition government on energy and climate change"

"Sir Ed had been allocated a question today in PMQs which made his absence all the more notable and it followed his failure to turn up for a statement on the scandal earlier this week. TheTories have smelt blood since his role in the affair came up in ITV's biopic Mr Bates vs the Post Office.
 
Peter123 said:
I don't think any of our government and legal systems come out well in this.

It's a shame party politics (even in this thread) are coming into it. All the 3 main parties bear some responsibility.

Lots of bad things happened - I find the fact that PO investigators were on bonuses to find and prosecute "offenders" reprehensible.

The legal system as a whole has been exposed as a bit of sham. Defence barristers advising their clients that unless they pleaded guilty they were likely to go to jail.
Click to expand...

One major problem is that the PO is allowed to take prosecutions to court themselves. No CPS involved. Had they been involved the outcome would have been different. The TV Licensing authority have the same right and so does the RSPCA. However, re the latter, it's going to relinquish private prosecutions and put their cases to the CPS as a lot of animal crime involves criminal gangs. I can't establish if that has been enacted yet. Article dated January 2021. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...stop-taking-animal-abusers-to-court-privately
 
JohnC6 said:
One major problem is that the PO is allowed to take prosecutions to court themselves. No CPS involved. Had they been involved the outcome would have been different. The TV Licensing authority have the same right and so does the RSPCA. However, re the latter, it's going to relinquish private prosecutions and put their cases to the CPS as a lot of animal crime involves criminal gangs. I can't establish if that has been enacted yet. Article dated January 2021. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...stop-taking-animal-abusers-to-court-privately
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As I said in post 17, there are several prosecuting authorities, 18 in total I think, and most of them seem to have very different evidential and procedural standards to the CPS. I think that the same standards should be applied to all prosecutions, regardless of who initiates them. I also think that the Courts are partly to blame, the rules of natural justice require that judges should use their knowledge and experience and look at the evidence (including where someone has pleaded guilty) instead of just accepting prosecuting statements at face value. But most don't.

I don't even count the RSPCA, whose motives are often suspect, they are not a prosecuting authority and their prosecutions are private.
 
Fujitsu should have got fisted, no way proper testing was carried out
 
Garry Edwards said:
As I said in post 17, there are several prosecuting authorities, 18 in total I think, and most of them seem to have very different evidential and procedural standards to the CPS. I think that the same standards should be applied to all prosecutions, regardless of who initiates them. I also think that the Courts are partly to blame, the rules of natural justice require that judges should use their knowledge and experience and look at the evidence (including where someone has pleaded guilty) instead of just accepting prosecuting statements at face value. But most don't.

I don't even count the RSPCA, whose motives are often suspect, they are not a prosecuting authority and their prosecutions are private.
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Sorry..I forgot that paragraph in your post 17. I didn't realise there were as many as 18 prosecuting authorities. It's like having a parallel justice system.

Re the RSPCA and private prosecutions I did actually say that they were going to relinquish their private prosecutions and go through the police.
 
JohnC6 said:
Sorry..I forgot that paragraph in your post 17. I didn't realise there were as many as 18 prosecuting authorities. It's like having a parallel justice system.
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Anyone can bring a private prosecution, you don't have to be a prosecuting authority. The disclosure rules are the same, the courts are the same, the laws are the same whoever brings the prosecution. We've only had a CPS for about 40 years,
 
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