Post Office Horizon Scandal

Andrew Bridgen Excerpts

Thursday 22nd February 2024 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Hollinrake]

I thank my hon. Friend for raising that important point. The inquiry is due to conclude by the end of this year and to report some time—early, I hope—next year. At that point, we will know more about Fujitsu’s exact role and the amount of the final compensation bill. I welcome the fact that at the Select Committee Fujitsu acknowledged its moral obligation to the victims and the taxpayer in contributing to the compensation bill, and we will hold it to its promises in that regard.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Ind)]

The Minister is a perceptive man: he must see the problem of his reassuring the House from the Dispatch Box on a Thursday, after the Secretary of State’s reassurances at the Dispatch Box on a Monday. The House and the country’s patience is wearing thin. Many of the sub-postmasters, who are the victims in all this, including my constituents, have had their lives blighted and scarred for well over a decade. The delays to the compensation scheme are only exacerbating the pain and the problem. The public can see a pattern, whether it is the Horizon compensation scheme, the infected blood compensation scheme or the vaccine harm compensation, and it does not reflect well on the Government.

[Kevin Hollinrake]

I will be the first to admit that we want to deliver compensation more quickly than has happened in the past. As I said, 74% of claimants have received full and final compensation. It is absolutely right that the remaining 26%— as well as any more who come forward, and I am pleased that more are coming forward—receive that compensation too. It has never been a case of our trying to delay compensation. I do not believe there is a pattern here. These issues are complex but we are doing much to accelerate the process.

We did much to accelerate compensation payments prior to the ITV series, which is critical. The £600,000 fixed-sum award, which has been very effective in delivering rapid compensation, was brought in last October. We were looking at a blanket overturn in convictions some months before that series. We are trying to deliver the scheme at pace. It is not always straightforward to do that, but the hon. Gentleman has my commitment that we will do everything we can to deliver that compensation as quickly as possible.