The All New Megathread

[Ruffy]

Originally Posted by redtrummy

I hope a good few of you watched The P O vs Mr Bates, ...
...to get the then CEO stripped of her CBE

I've not watched the drama series but yesterday I did make a point of watching the associated 1 hour ITV documentary on the issue.

A quite staggering and tragic story!

Two key residual thoughts sprung to mind:

1. Where did the 'stolen' (or 'false accounted') surplus money go? At no point does it seem anyone on the Post Office side has been able to demonstrate that there has been any real money moved away from the business and into a beneficial place for the alleged thieves/fraudsters. Does 'money out' not 'equal money' in anymore - whatever happened to 'follow the money' principle for proving these allegations? Have modern accounting methods become so 'smoke and mirrors' that it's impossible to replicate what the IT system was doing by carryng out a comparative examination using simple manual transaction logs for the periods where money was allegedly lost? (Presumably a similar methodology to how balancing was done by postmasters before Horizon?)
2. How can a large scale, long duration, geographically widespread extraction of money from the Post Office company not be a matter for the highest level attention? So, either the CEO was knowledgeably directing the Post Office's [inappropriate] handling strategy (complicit), or the CEO was unaware of what was happening in their organisation (incompetent), or the CEO position had no effect on the function of the operation (irrelevant). None of those seem to me to merit the post-holder receiving a Royal Honour of any sort.

[Craig380]

Originally Posted by Ruffy

[*]How can a large scale, long duration, geographically widespread extraction of money from the Post Office company not be a matter for the highest level attention? So, either the CEO was knowledgeably directing the Post Office's [inappropriate] handling strategy (complicit), or the CEO was unaware of what was happening in their organisation (incompetent), or the CEO position had no effect on the function of the operation (irrelevant). None of those seem to me to merit the post-holder receiving a Royal Honour of any sort.[/LIST]

In a 2015 inquiry session, Vennels stated that she was making it her priority to find out what was happening re. the issues with Horizon, as "the PO was a brand that people should trust."

So I would say she found out, and was subsequently complicit in the cover-up strategy. In which case it's PCoJ.

[garynortheast]

Morning orgers. Feels like winter here at the moment, with a cold northerly wind blowing. About time too, I'm not sorry to have some cold weather now. A bit of snow would be good!

The 38 Degrees petition to get Paula Vennels stripped of her CBE has now reached almost 1.2 million signatures.

[Luckypants]

We started watching the dramatisation yesterday, some of the details are horrendous. We've been following the story for a while (mainly from Radio 4) but the personal details of the individual's stories had not been so well known to us. There must surely be criminal wrongdoing behind some of the decisions taken.

[Bibio]

Originally Posted by garynortheast

I seem to recall (possibly incorrectly) that Fujitsu were also involved in the failed NHS IT system of the first decade of the 2000s.

iir my sister worked on that and the failing was that they could not get a bit of middleware to talk between the software and database as it was both different houses. she also told me that there was containers full of custom built "pads" which were not fit for purpose. also the networking infrastructure in the NHS was abysmal at the time. i'm pretty sure one of the mates part owned the company. i do know he done a looooot of IT software for the NHS as well as the system that the police use.

[garynortheast]

Took her long enough. Some legal action and criminal proceedings against those involved and responsible should be next.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/...orizon-scandal

[Ruffy]

Originally Posted by Craig380

In a 2015 inquiry session, Vennels stated that she was making it her priority to find out what was happening re. the issues with Horizon, as "the PO was a brand that people should trust."

So I would say she found out, and was subsequently complicit in the cover-up strategy. In which case it's PCoJ.

I can imagine that it's possible it was genuinely her priority to find out, that she asked the right questions but in fact was lied to by her sub-ordinates and/or suppliers. Sadly, my experience of large organisations is that there's usually significant politics involved and implicit hierarchical pressure to downplay problems and to tell seniors what they'd like to hear instead of the real answers to their questions - gotta 'be positive' and not upset the apple cart etc.

You could be right and I might be being too generous. But I have no evidence either way to be able to judge to that level of detail so (unlike some involved in this Post Office debacle it seems) I'm not about to specifically accuse individuals based on vague speculation. It needs proper investigation and sound facts.

However, if she wasn't able to get past the internal political and cultural hurdles to expose the truth that we're discovering now then I think one of the other options I previously suggested will apply (i.e. incompetent or irrelevant), so I think my logical conclusion still stands that there is still no merit in being honoured.

(And that's not to take away credit for any other positive accomplishments she may have that resulted in her nomination and award. It's just that I think a CBE recipient ought to be someone of demonstrably consistent high character and behaviour, and this blot is such a massive discredit that it can't be ignored in that context.)

[Ruffy]

Originally Posted by garynortheast

Took her long enough. Some legal action and criminal proceedings against those involved and responsible should be next.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/...orizon-scandal

Will certainly be interesting to see how it develops. It seems to have gathered significant momentum now. Shame it took so long.

[Craig380]

Originally Posted by Ruffy

Sadly, my experience of large organisations is that there's usually significant politics involved and implicit hierarchical pressure to downplay problems and to tell seniors what they'd like to hear instead of the real answers to their questions - gotta 'be positive' and not upset the apple cart etc.

My experience of large corporates is that the board invariably know about big problems of this nature and apply the pressure downwards for secrecy ...

[garynortheast]

Morning all. Wet and grey here again. Bring back the frost and blue skies!