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Fujitsu has said information it disclosed to the Post Office about bugs in the Horizon accounting software was hidden from the courts as the Japanese company admitted problems with its IT system were known from the start.
Paul Patterson, Fujitsu’s Europe chief executive, told a public inquiry into the sub-postmasters scandal that staff at both businesses knew of issues from at least November 1999 when Horizon was introduced.
He said in some cases where the Post Office prosecuted sub-postmasters on the basis of flawed data from Horizon, witness statements from Fujitsu staff given to the Post Office were edited in a “shameful” and “appalling” fashion to remove details of “integrity problems”.
“I have seen some evidence of editing of witness statements by others,” he said. Patterson added that in some witness statements Fujitsu did not include details of bugs, errors and defects.
The public inquiry heard in December last year that the Post Office’s lawyers had rewritten Fujitsu witness statements.
Patterson was the first Fujitsu executive to give evidence to the public inquiry since it commenced hearings two years ago. His appearance came as the business faced pressure to contribute to the £1bn UK ministers have allocated to compensate victims.
“All bugs and errors have been known at one level or not, for many, many years. Right from the very start of deployment of the system, there were bugs, errors and defects, which were well known. To all parties,” Patterson said.
He added: “All of the evidence should have been put in front of the sub-postmasters that the Post Office was relying on to prosecute them.”
Fujitsu developed the faulty accounting software at the heart of the scandal that resulted in more than 900 sub-postmasters being convicted of charges including theft, fraud and false accounting.
The Post Office was responsible for 700 of the convictions between 1999 and 2015, with the bulk of the remaining cases brought by Scottish prosecutors.
Harriett Baldwin, the Conservative chair of the House of Commons’ Treasury select committee, wrote to 21 government bodies on Friday seeking details and their justification for awarding any public contracts to Fujitsu following a landmark court case five years ago.
The High Court ruled in 2019 that several “bugs, errors and defects” had meant there was a “material risk” that Horizon was to blame for the faulty data used in the Post Office prosecutions.
“The public outcry regarding the Post Office sub-postmaster scandal is entirely justified, and I know I speak for the whole committee when I express my horror at the injustices the victims faced,” Baldwin said. “It’s clear that Fujitsu has questions to answer over its conduct.”
Fujitsu remained a leading software supplier to the UK government following the ruling and was involved in solo and joint public-sector contracts worth £4.9bn.
The company has agreed to suspend all bids for new public contracts pending the inquiry’s conclusion, though it remains eligible for extensions and is party to several ongoing agreements.
Earlier this week, Patterson told a committee of MPs that Fujitsu would also contribute to the redress fund for sub-postmasters.
Two Fujitsu employees who acted as witnesses have been interviewed under caution by the Metropolitan Police. Neither has been arrested.
Patterson acknowledged on Friday that the company failed to disclose “known error logs” in prosecutions, instead offering audit trail data. He said the company could edit these data sets and make “any adjustments” that were “agreed with the Post Office”.
The Solicitors Regulation Authority in a statement on Friday said that it would await the conclusion of the inquiry before taking action.
The Post Office said: “It’s for the inquiry to reach its own independent conclusions after consideration of all the evidence on the issues it is examining.”
This article has been amended since first publication to clarify the remarks made by Paul Patterson about alleged editing of witness statements
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