Reparation plans for victims of the Post Office Horizon scandal suffer from “serious structural flaws”, a parliamentary committee has found.
Thousands of postal operators are still waiting for the compensation they are owed and face “unacceptable delays, inadequate offers and administrative processes that ‘retraumatise’ those who have already been harmed”, according to a report by the enterprise and trade committee.
The scandal, in which more than 1,000 people were unfairly prosecuted over discrepancies in their branch accounts linked to faulty software developed by Fujitsu, has been called the worst miscarriage of justice in UK history.
There are three Horizon-related victim redress schemes: the Horizon Shortfall Scheme (HSS), the Group Litigation Order (GLO) and the Horizon Conviction Redress Scheme (HCRS).
The HSS, the largest, is administered by the Post Office. Under the scheme, post office operators with a successful claim can receive a lump sum of £75,000 or choose to claim a higher amount.
The business and trade committee concluded that the scheme’s redress offers were routinely overturned and increased after an appeal. Liam Byrne, the MP who chairs the committee, said justice had come “too slowly” for hundreds of postal operators.
“Many have waited years for the truth to be recognized and the compensation they are owed. However, today we find serious structural failures that still block the path to justice,” he said.
Some 3,500 branch owner-operators were wrongly accused and more than 900 were prosecuted. Across all redress schemes, more than 11,500 claimants have so far received a collective refund of £1.48 billion.
Byrne noted that Fujitsu “had yet to contribute a penny to the almost £2bn repair bill”, even as it continued to “benefit from public contracts”.
He said: “That cannot continue. It is simply wrong that taxpayers are covering the costs of Fujitsu’s sins while Fujitsu still profits from taxpayer-funded contracts.”
In 2024, Fujitsu acknowledged that it had a “moral obligation” to pay financial compensation to Horizon victims and said it had known the computer accounting system was defective since the 1990s. However, the company has not made any interim payments or agreed on any figures.
Byrne added that the committee heard evidence suggesting “unsafe convictions linked to previous systems such as Capture”, the Post Office’s former accounting system, which “may be just the tip of another iceberg”.
A Fujitsu spokesperson said: “We continue to work with the UK government to ensure we comply with the voluntary restrictions we put in place regarding the tendering of new contracts while the Post Office investigation is ongoing, and we are engaged with the government regarding Fujitsu’s contribution to compensation.”
A Post Office spokesperson said: “We welcome the committee’s scrutiny and its commitment to ensuring that full, fair and timely compensation is paid to those harmed during the Horizon scandal.
“Progress has been made – 87% of eligible applications for the Horizon deficit scheme have received an offer and £882 million has been paid through the scheme. “We are processing applications as quickly as possible to provide a solution to those who have applied.
“We will review the committee’s recommendations and continue to work closely with the Department of Business and Commerce.”
A government spokesperson said: “We must never lose sight of the human impact of the Horizon scandal on postmasters and their families. The amount we have paid out has increased more than six-fold as part of our ongoing commitment to bringing justice to victims as quickly as possible.
“We welcome today’s report and agree that it is crucial that Fujitsu meets its moral obligation to contribute to the full costs of the scandal, and we will publish our response to its recommendations shortly.”
