Post Office Court of Appeal Judgment

Lord Mackenzie of Framwellgate Excerpts

Wednesday 28th April 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

Fujitsu has been rightly and severely criticised in much of the judgment, but the noble Lord will understand that compensation from Fujitsu is a contractual matter between the Post Office and Fujitsu. I am pleased by and welcome the fact that Fujitsu continues to co-operate fully with Sir Wyn’s inquiry. The noble Lord is right to say that Fujitsu provides a range of services across government and, of course, many parts of the private sector. We are not at the moment aware of any other problems in its systems.

[Lord Mackenzie of Framwellgate (Non-Afl) [V]]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his update today, which is helpful. One of my passions throughout a long police career was the fight for justice and to put right miscarriages. This case has caused personal tragedy to hundreds of people through family breakup, bankruptcy and loss of liberty on an industrial scale. Some, of course, have since died. For example, why did nobody join the dots when deficits were occurring throughout the Post Office estate following the installation of the new Horizon IT system, and why was it kept secret? Does the Minister think it is now time for those who took the decisions at the top of the Post Office all those years ago to be called to account, so the matter can now be closed? Has Sir Wyn Williams got powers to summon witnesses and seize written evidence? If not, surely it requires nothing less than a full statutory inquiry, with powers to determine who knew what and when, so that fair compensation can be awarded to allow all the victims of this massive miscarriage of justice to get on with their lives.

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

As I said in previous answers, we are keen to see that all postmasters whose convictions are overturned are fairly compensated as quickly as possible, and we will work with the Post Office towards this goal. On the noble Lord’s comments about the inquiry, the problem with a full statutory inquiry is that it could take many years to report. The current inquiry is going well; everyone is co-operating and we should be able to get a report in the summer. I think it is better for all concerned that we have the report, so that we learn the lessons that have to be learned as quickly as possible, rather than waiting years—but, as I say, we are not ruling anything out. If there is any lack of co-operation that we need to address, we will not hesitate to go further.