Post Office Update

Lord Forsyth of Drumlean Excerpts

Monday 24th May 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I congratulate the Government on extending the remit of the inquiry, but I am afraid my sympathies are with my noble friend Lord Arbuthnot. I do not understand why all those affected cannot be compensated, nor why we are not asking Fujitsu to stump up. Has my noble friend seen the report in Computer Weekly of 19 February, in which a developer said that

“senior managers at Fujitsu were aware that an important element of the Horizon system did not function correctly and could not be fixed”

and that, when this product was launched,

“no design documents, no test documents, no peer reviews, no code reviews, no coding standards”

were issued?

Surely these people are victims of gross incompetence, both on the part of the Post Office and by a corporate organisation which is still working for the Government. Why it it not being properly held to account and stumping up, instead of relying on the taxpayer?

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

We are actively discussing the next steps with the Post Office, including the best process for ensuring that fair and swift compensation is provided. As I said, it will be for the Post Office to determine the next steps but, as I have said repeatedly, we want this to be done as quickly as possible. Regarding Fujitsu, I have considerable sympathy for the points the noble Lord made, but compensation from Fujitsu is a contractual matter between the Post Office and Fujitsu. I hope all options are being examined. It is for the Post Office to lead on the compensation process, but I assure my noble friend that Ministers are closely following this process.