Police National Computer

Baroness Chakrabarti Excerpts

Monday 24th October 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

I agree with my noble friend. So far, to date, the Government and Post Office have made good progress on delivering compensation to postmasters through the scheme fairly and quickly—82% of eligible claimants have now received an offer, and £52 million has been offered in total. I accept that it is not enough, but it is being done.

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

My Lords, the Government have presided over the economy and vital sensitive infrastructure, including tech infrastructure, for 12 years. If, as the Minister suggests, there was no viable alternative, why not?

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

Unfortunately, as I said, this relates to the delay in the rollout of the new system. The new system was delayed because of unforeseen complexity. I should state for the record that statistics around the police national computer are mind-boggling in their complexity: 30 million people’s information; 68 million vehicle records; 61 million driving licence holder records; 1.34 million daily transactions; 114 million checks per annum. It has to work; therefore, there was no viable alternative.