Listened to some of their stories on the radio yesterday - it made me so fucking angry and so fucking sad at the same time that in the end I had to turn it off - I could kinda do without any more Impotent Rage in my life…
Innocent people did Time, innocent people lost every penny they had (and some of them had a lot), and many innocent people killed themselves or died of stress-related illnesses - for nothing more than the grotesque incompetence of the Post Office.
Most of them haven’t even had the full amount they were forced to “repay” returned to them, there’s not even been a meaningful apology - just mealy-mouthed weasel words. And now they’re putting a lid on it.
Don’t leave Fujitsu out of that hatred, those cunts took the money and delivered an absolutely shite, not fit for purpose software application.
They have walked away with zero liability while those wrongly convicted are getting around £20k each in compensation once legal fees are paid.
Computer Weekly have been doing some great reporting and investigation on this and were reporting 20 years ago (along with Frank Field) that the system wasn’t working.
The thing is there will have been hundreds of people who worked really hard to do a good job, and a very small group who either didn’t care, or (from what I’ve read) actively ignored the issues that were raised and opted to go after the people rather than admit mistakes.
It’s a really awful story of corporate criminal behaviour.
Given how bad this pay-off makes Prince Andrew look, you do wonder what the court case might’ve brought up that the pay-off & ignominy of it looks the better option.
Randy Andy is a complete liability in the witness stand and I’m pretty sure that was a factor as much as what evidence Guiffre’s team had ready for court about the 3 specific assaults she has alleged, in him finally capitulating and having to pay her off.
We really need to put people behind bars more for this. They’re getting loads of money for no risk; if they’re going to take the cash they need to deliver high quality service and take the rap when they fuck up.
Fining firms just hits the lowest paid staff as they get sacked or refused rises/money whilst the arseholes in charge take the cash
Start with the CEO and work through the board and execs until sufficient ‘justice’ is achieved. Of course there will then be a reluctance to take those jobs which means greedy little shits will be less inclined to take the roles.
I suspect the boardrooms of Pepsi, nestle, bp, DuPont, Wall Street, post office, water companies etc would all be much emptier (with correspondingly reduced salary bills) if this was applied appropriately. It goes without saying that any stock options and bonuses from the time of infringement onwards would be confiscated to compensate the victims….
I agree with your sentiments about rebalancing risk, reward and liability. I’m just very pessimistic that anything meaningful is ever likely to change.
I’ve not followed the case in even superficial detail - I frankly find the whole thing immensely distasteful, and always assumed he’d weasel out somehow - so I don’t know if an actual statutory crime is alleged - i.e. was she legally underage? Drugged? Assaulted?* Or if her story could be reliably corroborated - so I don’t actually have a clue if we’re looking at perverted and depraved behaviour - but non-criminal - or if he really should be doing time. I’ve been caught-up in the whole trial-by-media thing, and ended-up assuming the worst…
Of course, now he’s bought his way out of it, it seems as good as a conviction in establishing guilt, but if there’s one thing that unites the royal family, it’s an incredible naivety and unworldliness resulting from their strange, hot-house, distorting-mirror upbringings - his very choice of ‘friends’ and all of his subsequent actions are universally stupid and delusional, bordering on madness. Of course the way that plaintiffs suddenly emerge from the woodwork 20 years after the event when the smell of money is in the air is also highly ambiguous: as I depict it there - it looks bad, but of course the flipside is victims of abuse tend to feel powerless against their abusers, especially when those abusers are wealthy and powerful, and tend to turn blame inwards upon themselves until such time as other victims come forwards…
It crossed my mind that at one time, high-profile scum like him used to off themselves and save everyone else from the pain they’d caused, that evolved into doing a bunk to some obscure banana-republic or dreary insignificant shithole no-one can find on a map, where they could keep their worthless heads down and be forgotten for good - and then I realised he already lives there…
I don’t think there’s a cat in hells chance - those that would have to make the rule are at risk of falling most foul of it
But it’s so unbalanced that these arseholes get all the rewards but take no real risk (even losing their jobs comes with nice golden parachutes and pensions)
And that’s hardly likely to improve as we drift ever westward in our ‘governance’ approach
I was working for Fujitsu at the time and was interviewed for a role on the Horizon team. I’m really glad I didn’t get it and I’m sure some of my ex-colleagues who did are feeling pretty guilty now. It was a huge hardware and software roll-out and most of the people who worked on it will be totally blameless but there must have been massively insufficient testing or a deliberate attempt to ignore test results. Either way some senior managers have some questions to answer, although I suspect most of them are no longer around.
It’s true, but the Post Office should have been blaming Fujitsu, not the users. The Post Office is by far the biggest villain in this. Individuals need to be held accountable and not allowed to hide behind corporate protections.
i think i read that fujitsu told senior PO people there were issues but were ignored - so its all on them. They are ultimately responsible - i bet they pocketed to the ‘go live’ bonus happily…
The fuijitsu staff providing the training at the time new of the faults and reported it up. Senior managers knew about this and would rather let innocent people go to jail than admit fault. I so hope the inquiry names then and prosecutions follow.
