A campaign group set up by the children of subpostmasters who had their lives ruined by the Post Office scandal are still waiting for Fujitsu to meet promises it made nine months ago.
The group feels it’s become a “box-ticking exercise” for the Japanese IT giant as it attempts to restore its reputation amid the exposure of its role in the UK’s widest ever miscarriage of justice.
The Lost Chances for Subpostmasters’ Children group, which has about 160 members, is made up of the children of subpostmasters who were affected by the Post Office scandal. It was set up in the wake of ITV’s dramatisation of the Post Office scandal and its impact on subpostmasters, to highlight the issues that children and wider families have suffered as a result of Post Office and Fujitsu malevolence.
The Post Office blames subpostmasters for unexplained losses and hundreds were convicted of financial crimes based on flawed evidence from Fujitsu’s Horizon software used in Post Office branches. It provided witness statements that led to people being wrongly sent to prison and financially ruined.
Fujitsu was quick to admit its culpability, and tell the world it was sorry and “morally obligated” to help subpostmasters and their families beyond financial redress, which it also promised to contribute to.
During his January appearance at a Post Office Horizon scandal public inquiry hearing, Paul Patterson, Fujitsu’s European boss, was asked by KC Sam Stein, representing victims, whether, beyond financial redress, Fujitsu would consider what else it could do to support victims and their families in the future. “You may want to think that what could be done by Fujitsu is supporting people in the future, subpostmasters in future, [the] entrepreneurial endeavours [of] their families or in education,” he said. “Will Fujitsu consider that type of support?”
Patterson responded: “If I was to be able to engage in that with subpostmasters and their representatives, [that] would be absolutely something we would like to consider. I think skills in our country, without jumping too far, is very important, and I think there are things that we can do in our technology world that may or may not be of help to subpostmasters and their associated families. So, I would engage in that conversation, Mr Stein.”
Lost Chances
In March, children of Post Office victims established the Lost Chances group to hold the Fujitsu boss to his word. It now has 160 members, but is yet to receive anything from Fujitsu apart from an offer of counselling.
Rebekah Foot, who chairs the group, had her family life ruined when her mother, at one time the youngest ever subpostmaster, began experiencing serious problems due to unexplained losses in her branch in 2006, and was eventually made bankrupt in 2014. She said life has been a struggle for her family.
Fujitsu has made grand gestures since the scandal became mainstream news, including a self-imposed ban on bidding for public sector contracts. Fujitsu’s UK business is heavily dependent on taxpayers’ money, with billions of pounds worth of IT services contracts in the UK public sector.
But this was also questioned after Computer Weekly exposed that Fujitsu was in fact still targeting £1.3bn worth of government contracts and even instructed its own staff how to get around its self-imposed ban.
There is a lack of trust, and some Fujitsu staff are unhappy about how the company is dealing with subpostmasters and their families. One told Computer Weekly recently that the company “only cares about shareholders, not the subpostmasters, not employees and not customers”.
No platform for redress
Campaigners question why support is being put back when the IT giant knows it’s culpable. One said: “[Fujitsu] knows the landscape, it knows the kids have understandable needs and knows they have no platform for redress.”
Lost Chances members met with Patterson in August, and while he said he was moved by their stories, there has been no detail given on what Fujitsu might do to help.
Foot said: “I do feel like it is a bit of a tick-box exercise. It took us seven months to get an initial meeting with Fujitsu, and when we asked Paul Patterson straight up about what he was going to do to put things right, we were told we would have an outcome in two weeks, but that was six weeks ago and we have heard absolutely nothing.”
Foot wrote to Patterson to request why the group had not heard anything weeks after their meeting. Patterson said in an email: “I recognised at the time and now the bravery of those that participated in our meeting and their openness in sharing their experiences with me and colleagues. You explained the need for help and support with a number of suggested potential proposals. These are complex matters, the range of proposals you raised require more time for us to consider and we also need to understand the approach that is going to be taken by both the Post Office and also government.
“Realistically, I do not feel we will be able to substantively respond until after Phase 7 [of the public inquiry] has completed,” the email continued. “I will then revert with a timetable around engagement towards the end of this year.”
PR exercise
Neil Hudgell, a lawyer working with the group on a pro-bono basis, said: “It is starting to feel like a PR exercise, kicking the can down the road. I am unsure what more Fujitsu need to learn and reflect on, given that the impact of this scandal has long since been known, and indeed reflected in Patterson’s own words back in January of having a ‘moral obligation’ to make amends. What could be a better way of righting wrongs than making some good to the children of the subpostmasters for their lost/blighted childhoods?”
The UK government is still waiting for Fujitsu’s contribution to covering costs of the Post Office Horizon scandal. UK taxpayers will pay billions of pounds covering financial redress of scandal victims.
Fujitsu was contacted by Computer Weekly for comment, but it declined the opportunity.
The Post Office scandal was first exposed by Computer Weekly in 2009, revealing the stories of seven subpostmasters and the problems they suffered due to Horizon accounting software, which led to the most widespread miscarriage of justice in British history (see below timeline of Computer Weekly articles about the scandal since 2009).
• Also read: What you need to know about the Horizon scandal •
• Also watch: ITV’s documentary – Mr Bates vs The Post Office: The real story •
• Also read: Post Office and Fujitsu malevolence and incompetence means huge taxpayers’ bill •