More than a dozen people may have taken their own lives over the Horizon scandal and many more who were wrongly accused also contemplated suicide, an inquiry has found.
Post Office bosses should have known Horizon was faulty but ‘maintained the fiction that its data was always accurate’ when prosecuting subpostmasters, the first tranche of a public inquiry’s final report has concluded.
Chairman Sir Wyn Williams said ‘a number of senior’ people at the organisation were aware the system, known as Legacy Horizon, was capable of error up until it was changed in 2010, with a number of employees also aware the updated system, Horizon Online, also had bugs and defects.
He added ‘it is hard to exaggerate’ the scale of the postmasters’ suffering.
Sir Wyn also said ministers must take urgent action to compensate Post Office branch managers who were wrongly accused of theft during the Horizon scandal.
‘I am persuaded that in the difficult and substantial claims, on too many occasions, the Post Office and its advisors have adopted an unnecessarily adversarial attitude towards making initial offers which have had the effect of depressing the level at which settlements have been achieved,’ he wrote.
Among the 19 recommendations made by inquiry chairman Sir Wyn Williams is a call for a new organisation to oversee redress for people wronged by all public bodies.
It is hoped that such a body may help to avoid another historic miscarriage of justice in future.
Former Post Office sub-postmasters celebrate after 42 of the victims were cleared in April 2021
Former sub-postmaster Sir Alan Bates, who has long led the campaign for justice for victims of the Post Office scandal
The Horizon scandal was vividly brought to life last year by the award-winning ITV drama Mr Bates vs The Post Office.
More than 10,000 people are currently eligible for compensation, according to the 162-page Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry report published today.
It adds that 59 postmasters contemplated or attempted suicide as a result of the scandal, and at least 13 people took their own lives.
Last year, the Government vowed to provide victims with ‘full and fair financial redress’.
However, Sir Wyn said the phrase is unclear and ordered the government to explain what it means.
Either way, it should pay victims damages ‘at the top end’ of what they could receive from a judge in the civil court, he said.
And Sir Wyn has demanded a quick response from the government – by October 10 at the latest.
His 19 recommendations include:
- The Government and Post Office should agree on a definition of ‘full and fair’ compensation, and this should be followed when deciding the level of compensation to offer.
- Horizon victims should receive legal advice, funded by the Government.
- Close family members of people affected by the Horizon scandal should receive compensation.
- The Government should create a standing public body that will oversee financial redress for people who have been wronged by public bodies ‘as soon as is reasonably practicable’.
- The Post Office, Government and Fujitsu – maker of the Horizon IT system – should outline a programme for ‘restorative justice’, which could allow victims to meet executives face-to-face.
More than 700 sub-postmasters and mistresses were prosecuted between 2000 and 2015 for supposed shortfalls reported by the Horizon software, developed by Fujitsu.
Thousands repaid accounting shortfalls that appeared in their accounts under threat of legal action. It was later proved in the High Court that the shortfalls were actually computer errors.
Martin Griffiths, 59, took his own life in 2013 after he was falsely suspected of stealing money from a Post Office in Ellesmere Port
Many victims were forced into bankruptcy and 236 were wrongly jailed. Others became seriously ill as a result of the stress and some died with the case hanging over them.
Sir Wyn wrote: ‘I cannot make a definitive connection finding that there is a causal link between the deaths of all 13 persons and Horizon, I do not rule it out as a real possibility.’
One of those who died by his own hand was Martin Griffiths, 59, who ran a Post Office branch in Ellesmere Port, Cheshire.
Shortfalls caused by Horizon started mounting up in 2009.
The report says: ‘He was made to feel that he was the only person who was having balancing problems.’
Mr Griffiths was quizzed about the shortfalls at least twice by Post Office investigators, before being suspended without pay in 2011 and sacked in July 2013. Three months later, the took his own life.
The report says: ‘By the date of his death, Mr Griffiths had made very substantial repayments to the Post Office for alleged shortfalls. His parents contributed their life savings of £62,000.’
Sir Wyn said that, despite the Government and Post Office appearing to show a genuine desire to give victims compensation, there have been ‘formidable difficulties in the way of achieving those aims’.
He said claimants to each of the four different compensation schemes did not receive full and fair redress.
‘I am persuaded that in the difficult and substantial claims, on too many occasions, the Post Office and its advisors have adopted an unnecessarily adversarial attitude towards making initial offers which have had the effect of depressing the level at which settlements have been achieved,’ he wrote.
However, Sir Wyn rejected claims that Sarah Munby, a former permanent secretary at the Department for Business, had privately said the Government wanted to ‘go slow’ on delivering redress to postmasters.
As of the end of April, 447 people had received preliminary payments, and 360 had opted for a fixed sum offer
The report criticises the lack of legal advice available to Horizon applicants.
Sir Wyn said: ‘I regard it as unconscionable and wholly unfair that claimants are unable to obtain legal advice, paid for by the [Government]. Yet the Department [of Business and Trade] continues to resist this as if its life depended upon it.’
The report published today is only the first part. Others will scrutinise how much the Post Office and Fujitsu knew about the faulty Horizon system while postmasters were being wrongly accused.
Sir Wyn said: ‘No purpose would be served by HM Government or the Department delaying consideration of my recommendations until the remainder of my Report is delivered.
‘The whole reason for delivering this volume of my report in advance of the remaining volume is that appropriate action in relation to the schemes for redress can be taken as soon as reasonably possible.’
