Independent inquiry launched into Post Office Horizon scandal

The government has announced retired High Court judge Sir Wyn Williams as the chair of an independent inquiry into the Horizon accounting scandal at Post Office.

The non-statutory inquiry, announced in June, follows a settlement of £57.75 million in December 2019 between Post Office and over 550 sub-postmasters who took the network to the court over the Horizon IT system.

The government said the inquiry will establish a clear account of the implementation and failings of Horizon over its lifetime.

“It is essential that we determine precisely what went wrong at the Post Office during this period, so we can ensure the right lessons have been learnt, and establish what must change to make sure this cannot happen again,” Postal Affairs Minister Paul Scully said.

Scully added that the terms of reference for the inquiry have been expanded following feedback from former postmasters since they were first published in June and will ensure it gathers evidence to build on the findings of the High Court judgment.

A week after the settlement, the High Court has ruled in favour of the postmasters. The long-running case dealt with the Post Office’s accusations of stealing by postmasters from their branches which the litigants say are caused by discrepancies in the Horizon system.

In the judgement, Justice Fraser said the Legacy Horizon, which was in use between 2000 and 2010, “was not robust.” On the HNG-X, the earlier version of the Modern Horizon Online, he said its “robustness was questionable, and did not justify the confidence placed in it by the Post Office in terms of its accuracy.”

Sir Wyn, who has over 28 years’ judicial experience, said: “I am determined that the inquiry will provide the forum for a thorough and rigorous examination of all the evidence presented and that a report will be produced which all participants in the Inquiry and the wider public will recognise as having addressed the terms of reference constructively and in detail.”

The inquiry is expected to obtain evidence from Post Office, Horizon developer Fujitsu and the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, which is the sponsoring department of Post Office.