The government has fallen short in its response to recommendations made to speed up financial redress for subpostmasters affected by the Horizon scandal, say MPs.
Sir Alan Bates said the subpostmasters are “up against the government spin machine”.
MPs on the business and trade select committee took what they describe as an “unusual step” and asked the government to “reflect” on and “revise” its response to the committee’s report on subpostmaster redress, published in January.
While the committee welcomes an acceleration in payments made to scandal victims, which has reached £768m, it is disappointed that key recommendations were ignored.
But the committee has found that government’s response fell short of what is needed to put this right. It has therefore asked the government to re-think its response and re-submit its response to the committee. “The human cost of the unacceptable delay in making these redress payments is considerable and starkly illustrated by the mounting number of former subpostmasters who are dying before they receive an offer of redress,” said the committee’s statement.
MPs had recommended changes that would give claimants greater benefit of the doubt when applying for redress, but these were rejected. They also said the Horizon Shortfall Scheme (HSS) should be run by the Department of Business and Trade rather than the Post Office, but this change was not agreed by government despite the Post Office itself agreeing with the committee. The government said there has been no decision on transferring responsibility for the HSS.
The committee also said claimants must have upfront legal advice as they commence their claim, which the government also rejected.
Justice taking too long
Liam Byrne MP, chair of the committee, said: “The new government has made extremely important progress in accelerating redress payment to the victims of the biggest miscarriage of justice in British legal history. But too many are still waiting too long, and former subpostmasters are still dying before they receive justice. That is wrong.
“People who were, over years and years, disbelieved, bankrupt, criminalised, sent to prison, had their lives completely upended for wrongs that they did not commit, have experienced something akin to a second trial as they sought to clear their names and receive redress,” he said. “The government’s response to our recommendations is a start. But we respectfully ask ministers to listen harder to what the committee has recommended, reflect again on what we proposed and re-submit its response to the committee.”
Government spin
Sir Alan Bates told Computer Weekly: “The government is the last place these schemes should be run from. It has been a disaster from start to finish with them, and all we are really getting from them is spin.
“The government is behaving in much the same way as the Post Office, with its head down regardless,” he said. “They are taking the same approach, denying there are problems.”
A government spokesperson added: “We share the committee’s commitment to delivering the redress postmasters across the UK deserve, which is why we’ve tripled the total amount of compensation paid since entering government and are settling claims at a faster rate than ever.”
The government is also in the process of establishing a financial redress scheme for subpostmasters that suffered unexplained losses using Horizon’s predecessor, Capture, and has said it is also considering a redress scheme for families of subpostmasters affected.
The government recently met Fujitsu to start talks on what contribution the Japanese supplier will make to the financial bill of the scandal, which UK taxpayers are picking up.
Computer Weekly first exposed the scandal 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).
