Horizon: Compensation and Convictions

Debate between Sarah Edwards and Kevin Hollinrake

Monday 8th January 2024 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Hollinrake]

I thank my hon. Friend for being a constant contributor to these debates. He brings real-life experience of these matters, which we very much value and appreciate. I would be very happy to keep up our regular engagement on these issues. He is not shy of informing me of different things that I need to be aware of and I appreciate that engagement.

Of course, the back door into the sub-postmasters account seems to have been a key contributor to this scandal, and Fujitsu seems to have had that back door. We are yet to establish how much of that was Fujitsu doing it unilaterally or whether it was being done on the instruction of the Post Office. The inquiry is there to give us those kinds of answers. The inquiry is committed to concluding by the end of this year and reporting shortly after. At that point, we will know who was responsible for what, and we should then be able to identify who can be made responsible through potential financial contributions, rather than the taxpayer alone having to pick up the tab for this very significant compensation package. I am just as ambitious as my hon. Friend is to make sure that those who are responsible pay for what they have done.

[Sarah Edwards (Tamworth) (Lab)]

I, too, pay tribute to the ITV drama— many constituents have written to me about how powerful it was—and to the BBC’s podcast, “The Great Post Office Trial”, which I listened to a couple of years ago. Horizon is accounting software, yet at every turn it seemed that it lacked the very principles of accounting that those who study the fundamentals in accounting recognise. Where were the checks and balances in the system, and why did the governance of the Post Office also lack the same checks and balances? It appears that no reconciliations were done to cross-check the software, and the principles of integrity, objectivity, professional competence and due care were clearly not applied to this critical software in the way that accountants are held to them in the code of ethics. After many years, why are we only now hearing that there was a failed pilot and that that could have averted this disgraceful abuse of power and miscarriage of justice?

[Kevin Hollinrake]

I thank the hon. Member for her contribution. I, too, have had many constituents contacting me who are appalled by what they have seen on television. She is right to draw attention to the fact that this was not the first time that this had been publicised. There is Nick Wallis’s book, “The Great Post Office Scandal”, and his podcast, which is well worth listening to. He goes into these matters in even greater depth, and she is right to pay tribute to those broadcasts and publications.

All the questions that the hon. Member asks are valid. When was it established that this was going wrong? Where were the checks and balances? Where was the duty of care? That is what the inquiry is there for. The inquiry was established after the court case and there was vigorous debate in this House about the type of inquiry it should be. It was ultimately settled on that it should be a statutory inquiry because of the greater powers that a statutory inquiry has, so it should be able to get to the bottom of the questions she rightly asks. Once we have got to the bottom of those questions, we can start to identify who was responsible specifically for what and make sure that those people are held to account.