Talk:British Post Office scandal

Image

I think the article could use a Horizon screenshot that gives the reader an idea about the kind of software that was used. But I have no idea what kind of screenshot is the best option here. Suggestions? I removed the picture from the post office, it is not relevant here. PhotographyEdits (talk) 09:59, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Any generic of Horizon's software seems to be appropriate, as well as potentially a Wikilink to Fujitsu services offerings, if that seems appropriate and not beyond the scope of the article.Wzrd1 (talk) 05:01, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

First sentence(s) - why exacerbated is wrong

The word “exacerbated” means “made worse”. So the sentence “It was exacerbated by Post Office management who, for years, ignored concerns expressed by hundreds of subpostmasters, instead threatening and pursuing them with legal action over the shortfalls” implies that there was already a scandal, and it was just made worse by persecuting/prosecuting the subpostmasters. In fact, the scandal itself was the persecution/prosecution of subpostmasters. Southdevonian (talk) 11:39, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Yes. The syntax was not acceptable and you are quite right. Your current edit come much closer to a succinct definition of the scandal. You correctly go for the prosecutions as the scandal. The concept of management mendacity, which is what I think @Kiwimanic wanted to get into that opening paragraph, is not yet there but is needed. Jacksoncowes (talk) 18:55, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Summary of Hamilton in intro

It is not correct to say "The Post Office opposed thirty-eight of those appeals and fought the cases vigorously but unsuccessfully." They in fact conceded (that is, no fight) 39 appeals on Ground 1 (unfair trial) and successfully opposed 3. They conceded 4 appeals on Ground 2 (improper prosecution) as well as Ground 1 and unsuccessfully opposed 35. Ground 2 was not relevant to those 3 appeals which failed on Ground 1. Too confusing to talk about Grounds 1 and 2 in the intro but hopefully the summary is now accurate. The intro is getting rather long - I think it would be sufficient to say that convictions were overturned, but since an editor added more detail I have corrected it. Southdevonian (talk) 16:34, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

@Southdevonian The Post Office opposed aspects of all 42 cases and lost on all aspects that it opposed in 38. It opposed applications that the court grant leave for the cases in which it opposed ground 2 to make submissions concerning ground 2, i.e. 42- the 4 in which it conceded grounds 1&2. When it lost that submission it opposed the submissions that were made in respect of all 38 cases, i.e 42 - 4 again. Read Moorhead again. Your notion that ground 2 was not relevant in the 3 unsuccessful appeals is simply wrong. It was relevant, was argued and the PO opposition was overcome. The PO opposed disclosure of the Clarke advice and lost. The Post Office most definitely fought the case vigorously and this is well referenced in the article. I won't argue about my use of 'unsuccessfully', I accept that it depends what one means by unsuccessfully.

The unsuccessful fight that Altman, for the Post Office, put up first to keep the court away from ground 2 and then unsuccessfully to keep the number of ground 2 acquittals small goes to the heart of the subsequent problems re size and speed of compensation/redress, and the slowness of further successful appeals. It is why there are calls for the PO to be removed from the appeals and compensation processes and at the root of the government plan to grant blanket exoneration. You may remember an earlier 'discussion' we had about exoneration. The paragraph we are discussing is as confusing now as it was, but in a slightly different way, and it is now less correct that it was, but in a relatively unimportant way. Your sentence "Thirty-nine subpostmasters' convictions were found by the Court of Appeal to be unsafe and each prosecution to have been improper, the latter ground having been opposed by the Post Office except in four cases." is factually correct but passively plays down the actuality of the fight put up by Altman which has been described as improper and recommended to the Horizon for examination. Two barristers were wrongly forced to withdraw from the appeal. Altman's conflict of interest was and is questioned. This will come in the next week or so. complexity can be confusing but it has to be tackled, surely? Jacksoncowes (talk) 20:16, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

IMO this is far too detailed to be in the lede - which, IMO is already far too long Kiwimanic (talk) 22:55, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Its not in the lede and I sorry if I appeared to imply that I thought it should be. It is all in the article. My purpose was to try to show that 'vigorously' properly summarised the way the Post Office, as respondent, fought the appellant Subpostmasters in the Hamilton case. I am happy with the paragraph in the lede as @Southdevonian left it, apart from the absence of vigorously. Jacksoncowes (talk) 07:10, 9 April 2024 (UTC)

LEADLENGTH

MOS:LEADLENGTH says three to four paragraphs as a guideline which seems to be the approach of other articles even very long ones. Roger 8 Roger (talk) 10:20, 9 April 2024 (UTC)

Agree. It had been got down to four or five paragraphs but then a random editor (not someone who had been involved in the article) split the paragraphs complaining it looked like "a wall of text" (isn't that what reading is about?). And other editors have added text which isn't really necessary for introduction, which should summarize the article in a clear and concise way. I will take out a bit more. Southdevonian (talk) 10:31, 9 April 2024 (UTC)

A "wall of text" puts people off. Cursory readers are far more likely to read short paragraphs than long ones. IMO the lede is still far too long. MOS:LEADLENGTH says "a lead that is too long is intimidating, difficult to read, and may cause the reader to lose interest halfway." Kiwimanic (talk) 20:06, 10 April 2024 (UTC)

WP:paragraph says that "All the sentences within a paragraph should revolve around the same topic. When the topic changes, a new paragraph should be started. Overly long paragraphs should be split up." The third para in the lede currently covers at least five different aspects of the scandal.

• 2017 the Bates case vs PO
• 2021 the Hamilton case and the PO appeal of that case
• Announcement by Govt of statutory public inquiry.
• 2024 government plans for a blanket exoneration
• Costs of legal action etc

We need to break this into smaller paras and remove unnecessary detail - currently, this is "intimidating and difficult to read". Kiwimanic (talk) 20:38, 10 April 2024 (UTC)

The two guidelines are not mutually exclusive. All that is required is to compose better text in order to bring together topics that at first sight seem not to be related. The guideline to follow here is LEADLENGTH, not PARAGRAPH. Roger 8 Roger (talk) 01:22, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

Bates & Others v Post Office Ltd

Perhaps we could usefully split the "Bates & Others v Post Office Ltd" section into a stand-alone article (or, better, merge with Bates v Post Office Ltd (No 3))? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 20:25, 10 April 2024 (UTC)

It would make sense to replace the judgment 3 article with an article about the whole case. And the Horizon inquiry could support a separate article. This article is very long - over 11,000 words. The guidance WP:Size says articles over 9,000 words "probably should be divided or trimmed". Southdevonian (talk) 21:42, 10 April 2024 (UTC)

I support replacing Bates v Post Office Ltd (No 3) with a comprehensive article merged with the "Bates & Others v Post Office Ltd" section of this article. And given that the Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry section will grow significantly in length as the inquiry proceeds, I also support a separate article for that topic. -- Jmc (talk) 23:00, 10 April 2024 (UTC)

Is the scandal too big for wikipedia? Or is it that there is insufficient consensus about the fundamental causes of the scandal. Paul Marshall said a long time ago:

Legal – legislative failure.

Legal – court/judicial failure.

Post Office mendacity/opportunism.

Failure in Post Office corporate governance.

Alan Bates said a long time ago "it is not purely the software that we are talking about. Everyone seems to homing in on the computer system. It is about the support package that works with it. It is the training and the lack of investigation." Jacksoncowes (talk) 12:37, 12 April 2024 (UTC)

It is not the purpose of Wikipedia to ascertain the scope of a scandal or even if a scandal has occurred, only to document it. That said, it's beyond a simple flawed software system and generally an entire systemic failure from the Crown down to the Post Office and every step in between, which has been documented within the article with citations.Wzrd1 (talk) 05:04, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

No, of course its not. Nor is it for the article to identify culpability. But it is, as I think you might agree, for Wikipedia to document properly reported events and activities that point towards culpability. That has been easier said than done, both in terms the RSs reporting and the article documenting reports. That is why the scandal has continued for two decades, why every legitimate opportunity that pointed towards who did what, when and why needed documenting and why the article became over full and poorly structured. The scandal continues. There is now a plethora of well reported allegation/accusations. They need to be marshalled. Accusations as to the systemic causes of the scandal under the headings that I quoted above in items 1, 3 & 4 have largely been identified. It is now openly alleged that there has been a conspiracy. Item 2, Legal – court/judicial failure, is partially identified and partially remains in the 'pointed towards' category. Jacksoncowes (talk) 12:03, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

One civil case

I think there were hundreds of civil cases, but the article mentions only one -Post Office ltd v Castleton in 2006. This case could be moved into the section on Protecting the brand - or we need to add more info about other civil cases. Kiwimanic (talk) 06:11, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

The only relevance now of the Castleton case is that it was used to set a legal strategy in which the PO could protect, in court proceeding, horizon from being scrutinised. This is dealt with by Moorhead (the flat earther was his phrase if I remember correctly), by Exeter Lab, and by the Inquiry examination of the barrister (nice legal point was the phrase used to mock). The PO mendacity in the case is awesome; the huge legal cost (PO's) to "recover" small amount should have alerted senior management to question what was going on (loads of stuff in Inquiry past and current support that view). It set the marker to show the PO would fight any legal attack on Horizon, again well supported. Within the Scandal Castleton is the civil case equivalent of the criminal case of Misra.

The only relevance now of the Bates six cases (rightly exiled) are, the judges findings (contracts unlawful, Horizon unreliability), the improper non-disclosure, the covert plan to out-spend (improper case management, aggressive time wasting, misleading the court), The cost to the public purse of £100m defending a case known to be wrong showed that senior management and government knew and conspired. Jacksoncowes (talk) 09:26, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

That reasonably summarizes things. There's a saying, "one can sue a ham sandwich", that doesn't mean we add all litigation against ham sandwiches in an article on ham sandwiches, only appropriate and concluded litigation actions and decisions. That said, I do believe that the cost to the public exceeded that £100m and as mentioned in the article, is likely to exceed £1b - plus the initial £775m in wasted funding on the failed software development, which despite being unfit for its original purpose, was repurposed for other uses for which it was utterly unfit for. In some countries, one could make a fortune selling pitchforks and torches... Wzrd1 (talk) 05:17, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

With reference to the edit and moving Castleton, good stuff, but removing "Richard Morgan KC, who had designed the strategy of the Post Office case against Castleton and represented the Post Office at trial denied that he had been given instruction to establish a legal point. He said "he would have told Post Office he would not do it if those instructions had been given." wrongly implies that Dilley designed the strategy. He didn't. More importantly removing it unfairly hides Morgan's defence that he had no intention of doing what he was implicitly accused of doing. Beer's implication of ethical impropriety was made repeatedly with the phrase "nice legal point". That, together with Moorhead's comments make this a potentially serious matter for Morgan. I think that balance, point of view, etc requires that sentence to be left in.

With reference again to Bates £100m. That's just the legal fees in the Bates case. Those should have allerted the PO Board and government that the in-house lawyers were acting improperly. I believe it did and has been shown that the board knew and that government knew. That's the conspiracy. The other monies are a different part of the scandal - Post Office mendacity/opportunism.

Failure in Post Office corporate governance. Legal – court/judicial failure. Jacksoncowes (talk) 08:36, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

I still don't think this one case deserves its own heading when presumably there were hundreds of civil cases. As you say: "it was used to set a legal strategy in which the PO could protect, in court proceeding, horizon from being scrutinised." That's part of protecting the brand, so that's the heading it should be under. Kiwimanic (talk) 20:04, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

I agree and I support the restructuring you have been doing. The phrase 'Protecting the brand' captures all(?) important aspects of the scandal - who did what when and and why. Protecting the brand is the why at the heart of the relevant things that were done by POL and its agents. The problem with using it as a section heading is that all or most of the bits that should be documented could come under that heading. Take the Marina Hyde quote. Hyse's whole article dealt with government and management mendacity, with delay, lack of media coverage and coverup. It went in the section dealing with management. You moved it to Protecting the the brand. Good move. Its not in now. Because the phrase "protecting the brand" isn't in it?.

I am trying to make two points. First is that any improper activity by POL and its agents was probably done to protect the brand, and should be somewhere in the article, (subject to all the wiki disciplines etc). But if all are marshalled under protecting the brand the section will be huge. The second point is that a style of editing that either can't or won't see relevance of material, commentary etc is damaging. What part of the multiple rational "removed lengthy quote which doesn't mention "protecting the brand" and is an opinion piece by someone with no particular expertise - too many quotes in article" is valid? To my mind the relevance is clear. The fact that it was written almost a year ago shows both its pertinence and its prescience. Referring to the Media Freedom Awards commentator of the year as it does is akin to the reference earlier on this Talk page (by a different editor) to Nick Wallis as a self publicist blowing his own trumpet. Too many quotes. What's the metric. Jacksoncowes (talk) 12:53, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

Post Office IT systems

In this section, the first para is a quote from Private Eye about problems that occured in the software as early as 1996. The final para under this section describes complaints that a computer system named Capture, which had been rolled out to 300 post offices in 1995. Does anyone know if these are referring to the same system... Kiwimanic (talk) 06:09, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

You raise a most important point. See first the section Criticism of Hamilton. The PO worked hard to keep all its secrets, including its problems with IT accounting systems. From the early days of the scandal, i.e when it broke into the public awareness, the coverup has been aided and abetted by the use of the word Horizon. The Post Office has had problems with all its software from early 1900;, that's the nature of large software systems. Businesses universally recognise that and address them. Post Office ignored, covered up, denied them and, scandalously shipped the responsibility for the resulting effects onto others (SPMs). Capture and other named systems preceded Horizon (itself under a variety of names). Marshall identified all this in what he labelled "dichotomy/taxonomy". Moorhead also addresses this Horizon name point, and the timeframe aspect. Offences before a certain date not overturned etc. The scandal is that the Post Office prosecuted SPM for computer identified financial losses but kept secret wha it knew about the defects in its accounting systems. So has the Horizon Compensation Advisory Board. Jacksoncowes (talk) 10:31, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

Post Office's right to prosecute.

The relevant point under this heading is that the Post Office had no more right to prosecute than you or me. It had ceased to be a public authority and was simply using the rights that we all have to bring a private prosecution. BUT (a huge but), none of the safeguards that exist around private prosecutions were applied because everyone, including itself, were so used to the Post Office acting as 'state' (for want of brevity) prosecutor that those safeguards didn't operate. A second but is that only about 60% were Post Office, i.e. private prosecutions. To my mind the material point is that we, the nation, everyone were so culturally used to the Post Office as prosecutor that none of these prosecutions were applied, either in the PO's cases or in the rest. None were treated to the scrutiny that private prosecutions are, should, must be subjected to. The heading bothers me only because it implies a right that didn't exist. In a way the heading falls into the trap I have just tried to describe. Would Post Office's rights and duties as private procecutor be better?. Jacksoncowes (talk) 06:38, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

Good point. But 'rights and duties' is probably a bit long. How about Post Office's rights as private procecutor Kiwimanic (talk) 10:42, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

Much much better woops, sorry, re read. Dare I now say 'No'? They don't have any rights - thats the point. They have loads of duties. How about Post Office's duties as private prosecutor or perhaps Post Office's as private procecutor.

All this has a part in your management section. Post Office Ltd were, by habit, treated by the courts and by barristers as they had treated Royal Mail, as a pukka state prosecutor. But whilst Royal Mail/GPO had all the regulatory management structures for their investigations and their prosecutions POL didn't. When POL was carved off it had no investigators, no investigation department. The prosecutions were not overseen at Board level. There was no responsible director on the POL board. POL shared its general counsel with Royal Mail. All this came out shockingly in the Inquiry on Friday. The Chairs did not know that the prosecutions were Post Office prosecutions. Alan Cook - former Independent Non-Executive Director and Managing Director of Post Office Ltd and, Adam Crozier - former CEO of Royal Mail Group Ltd and former director of Royal Mail told the inquiry that they did not know the post office prosecuted. Cook thought it was all done by police and CPS! Jacksoncowes (talk) 14:13, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

Separate article on the public inquiry

User:Jmc suggested splitting out the details of the inquiry to another article. Karl Flinders has an item in today's Computer Weekly "Alan Bates and JFSA won't back down... which summarises the difficult birth of the inquiry from 2019 onwards, and the 2021 change from statutory to public. Wire723 (talk) 12:03, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

Agree MapReader (talk) 18:17, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

Appeals against convictions

This section should be about actual appeals and actual overturning of convictions. I have removed various opinions about this which are speculative and not really relevant to this section. Kiwimanic (talk) 20:06, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

This goes to the nub of the scope of the scandal. The scope is not to be determined by POL alone. Its attempts to define the scope is an important aspect of the scandal. Having been judicially proven to have unlawfully prosecuted a huge number its legally protected place in the appeal process is being challenged. Four legal experts (not including Moorhead) went before the Justice Committee yesterday. arguing that point. The scandal is that POL flouted its obligations as a private prosecutor and unlawfully obtained a huge but as yet unknown number of unlawful convictions. The fact that our legal system demands that POL must have a place in each and every appeal against any conviction it obtained has led to the proposing legislation to bypass the appeal process. The section should primarily be about this rather than cases

This section of the article should not just be randomly selected list of successful appeals. It should address that ways in which the system was used, abused. Individual cases documented should illustrate and identify the particular aspects that show. The Wolstenholme case has some but not identified in its documentation here. Jacksoncowes (talk) 06:22, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

The fact that Casleton & Wolstenholme are civil put them under a different heading in the way the article is currently structured but the point I have tried to elucidate remains. Jacksoncowes (talk) 06:30, 17 April 2024 (UTC)