Government Introduces New Post Office Compensation Bill For The Biggest Miscarriage Of Justice Ever In UK

30th November 2023

The government has today introduced the Post Office (Horizon System) Compensation Bill to the House of Commons.

New legislation will ensure all those exposed to the IT scandal do not miss out on compensation.

Following feedback from the Horizon IT Inquiry, government takes action to enable paying back claimants past arbitrary deadline.

The Post Office scandal is one of the biggest miscarriages of justice in history and new law will ensure victims get the compensation they deserve.

The government has today [29 November 2023] introduced the Post Office (Horizon System) Compensation Bill to the House of Commons to ensure that the trailblazers who exposed the scandal do not miss out on compensation because of an arbitrary deadline.

The Horizon IT Inquiry, chaired by Sir Wyn Williams, is responsible for ensuring there is a public summary of the failings which occurred with the Horizon IT system at the Post Office leading to the wrongful suspension, termination of postmasters' contracts, prosecution and conviction of postmasters.

Following recommendations from Sir Wyn, Ministers have brought forward legislation to allow compensation to be paid under the Group Litigation Order (GLO) scheme past the 7 August 2024 deadline if needed.

Minister for Postal Affairs Kevin Hollinrake said, "The Post Office Scandal is widely described as the biggest miscarriage of justice in our history, and it is imperative that the victims get the justice and compensation they deserve.

I am determined that lessons are learnt from this scandal to prevent anything like this ever happening again. This Bill will ensure postmasters aren't tied to an arbitrary deadline when making their claims or unnecessarily pressurised.

The government is determined to make compensation claims as soon as possible, and by the current deadline of August 2024. However, time needs to be taken to assess more complex claims, so postmasters receive full and fair compensation and are not unduly rushed into making a decision on their claims.

The GLO Scheme was launched in March 2023 and was designed to compensate postmasters who exposed the Post Office Horizon Scandal from the 1990s.

Lord Arbuthnot, Member of the Horizon Compensation Advisory Board, said, "I welcome the principle of the Government's Bill lifting the deadline on compensation payments under the Group Litigation Scheme.

We shall have to look at the precise details, but the Bill confirms that the Government does intend to provide full and fair compensation to the sub-postmasters and will not be deflected from that by arbitrary timescales.

Nevertheless, speed of payment is of the essence, and the Advisory Board will do all we can to ensure that payments are made as early as possible.

Today’s update builds on this government’s action to seek to right the wrongs of the past, including our announcement in September 2023 in supporting the Post Office to make an upfront offer of £600,000 to postmasters whose Horizon-related conviction has been overturned.

In total, £132 million has been paid to over 2,700 claimants across the Horizon Shortfall Scheme, Overturned Convictions Scheme and Group Litigation Order scheme.

The Horizon Inquiry into the Post Office and ruining of sub-postmasters lives based on false readings from the Horizon system supplied by Fujitsu.

The Inquiry is costing millions of pounds of taxpayers money. The Inquiry is looking in great detail at the biggest miscarriage of justice in British History. Hundreds of sub-postmasters were wrongly charged with fraud. Some went to prison based on wrong information from the computer programme.

It all reads like fiction but it is a true story of how trusting computers is not they way we should go forward if we think they don't go wrong. Managers and board directors unwilling to face the truth that Fujitsu covered up and things made worse by a board accepting what they said.

[url=https://www.youtube.com/@postofficehorizonitinquiry947]You can watch the unfolding Inquiry live on Youtube HERE[/url]

For a very good series on the subject in 14 minute episodes go HERE
It is live every day this week at 1:45pm
https://www.bbc.co.uk/schedules/p00fzl7j
The earlier episodes can e found at https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/brand/m000jf7j

The Post Office Scandal Is Possibly The Largest Miscarriage Of Justice In UK History

Earlier
Read more details in the Private Eye report

Justice for Sub Postmasters Alliance

Horizon Explained at Wikipedia

You can Help By Donating To Crowd funding For Justice £98,000 is needed by 1 July 2020. Every donation will help.

Computer Weekly - 28 April 2020 - Met Police assessing evidence of potential perjury in Post Office IT trials - A very good timeline of the last few years in this article.

The Register 18 December 2019 - Post Office faces potential criminal probe over Fujitsu IT system's accounting failures