Sir Ed Davey and the Post Office scandal
Discussion
Southerner said:
A Yahoo news article popped up yesterday, suggesting that the petition for Vennells to lose her gong has been swelled (not surprisingly) by the TV drama. Now surging towards half a million and well worth adding to, in my opinion. Admittedly it isn’t quite the guilty PO and Fujitsu criminals rotting in prison where they belong, but it’s a start.
News article here:
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/petition-to-strip-ex-pos...
Petition here:
https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/strip-paula...
Just signed that, as this scandal is nothing short of disgusting.News article here:
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/petition-to-strip-ex-pos...
Petition here:
https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/strip-paula...
What I found amazing on the petition is just how fast the numbers are going up. I thought it might be a few signatures every minute, but it was going up 20-30 every refresh! Its thousands more than when I signed, only about 10 minutes ago!
Wing Commander said:
Southerner said:
A Yahoo news article popped up yesterday, suggesting that the petition for Vennells to lose her gong has been swelled (not surprisingly) by the TV drama. Now surging towards half a million and well worth adding to, in my opinion. Admittedly it isn’t quite the guilty PO and Fujitsu criminals rotting in prison where they belong, but it’s a start.
News article here:
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/petition-to-strip-ex-pos...
Petition here:
https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/strip-paula...
Just signed that, as this scandal is nothing short of disgusting.News article here:
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/petition-to-strip-ex-pos...
Petition here:
https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/strip-paula...
What I found amazing on the petition is just how fast the numbers are going up. I thought it might be a few signatures every minute, but it was going up 20-30 every refresh! Its thousands more than when I signed, only about 10 minutes ago!
biggles330d said:
It would be interesting to see the list of post office ministers through the period 1999 to 2015. Sure, Ed Davey was one, but there must have been several who were less than diligent.
I agree. This spans all 3 governments doesnt it? Labour, ConLib, Con from the inception right the way through. Neither one should be blamed indivisually they were all on watch at varying times during this, with ministers in charge from all colours.Maybe this will be the start of the revolution?
Re the Vennells petition there's several. I signed the 38degrees one, but saw links to many others from change.org and etc, all quite high. Wonder what the total of all the seperate ones because no one ever checks before blurting crap on the internet anymore would be...
Southerner said:
A Yahoo news article popped up yesterday, suggesting that the petition for Vennells to lose her gong has been swelled (not surprisingly) by the TV drama. Now surging towards half a million and well worth adding to, in my opinion. Admittedly it isn’t quite the guilty PO and Fujitsu criminals rotting in prison where they belong, but it’s a start.
News article here:
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/petition-to-strip-ex-pos...
Petition here:
https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/strip-paula...
Why put the petition there? If it was on the govt website they might be forced to actually do something, as it's on 38 it can be safely ignored.News article here:
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/petition-to-strip-ex-pos...
Petition here:
https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/strip-paula...
I thought there is a .gov.uk site for petitions to be created
The 38 degree one seemed more interested in spamming and donations.
But anyway,
The singling out of the lib dem leader snacks of political bias.
There is no defending him, or anyone else involved, but let's at least be honest that this was a profound failure across the British state aparatues.and political flavours.
As someone above said, it is also the failure of checks and balances to work, but when you control "the truth" (as Fujitsu effectively did) things become much much easier. A judge (and jury?) we're convinced, which is usually enough.
It is inconceivable now that senior PO executives didn't join up the dots on potential system error, but again it depends what they were told by whom to see if they were acting in gold faith or not. The unknown unknowns phrase didn't come along until later.
Computerised systems took such a leap forward through the 70s and 80s that the mindset of the computer being wrong would have been hard to imagine I think.
There no doubt were it bods who knew, but then it becomes the rising balloon issue - when do you let go? As holding on always seems to be the better option, and like the post office bods they probably had mortgages to pay too.
A statutory public inquiry is needed imo - far better use of money than the COVID one. But it needs power to compel testimony, and not the wishy washy sort of inquiry that's just a talking shop.
The 38 degree one seemed more interested in spamming and donations.
But anyway,
The singling out of the lib dem leader snacks of political bias.
There is no defending him, or anyone else involved, but let's at least be honest that this was a profound failure across the British state aparatues.and political flavours.
As someone above said, it is also the failure of checks and balances to work, but when you control "the truth" (as Fujitsu effectively did) things become much much easier. A judge (and jury?) we're convinced, which is usually enough.
It is inconceivable now that senior PO executives didn't join up the dots on potential system error, but again it depends what they were told by whom to see if they were acting in gold faith or not. The unknown unknowns phrase didn't come along until later.
Computerised systems took such a leap forward through the 70s and 80s that the mindset of the computer being wrong would have been hard to imagine I think.
There no doubt were it bods who knew, but then it becomes the rising balloon issue - when do you let go? As holding on always seems to be the better option, and like the post office bods they probably had mortgages to pay too.
A statutory public inquiry is needed imo - far better use of money than the COVID one. But it needs power to compel testimony, and not the wishy washy sort of inquiry that's just a talking shop.
hidetheelephants said:
Southerner said:
A Yahoo news article popped up yesterday, suggesting that the petition for Vennells to lose her gong has been swelled (not surprisingly) by the TV drama. Now surging towards half a million and well worth adding to, in my opinion. Admittedly it isn’t quite the guilty PO and Fujitsu criminals rotting in prison where they belong, but it’s a start.
News article here:
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/petition-to-strip-ex-pos...
Petition here:
https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/strip-paula...
Why put the petition there? If it was on the govt website they might be forced to actually do something, as it's on 38 it can be safely ignored.News article here:
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/petition-to-strip-ex-pos...
Petition here:
https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/strip-paula...
anonymoususer said:
Personally I think that Tony Blair, Gordon Brown and any surviving person who was a Labour MP in any of the Blair Brown governments holds a degree of responsibility.
Any and all of the above should say sorry
Giving the dead ones a pass seems a bit limpwristed. Alan Johnson was a postman, he must be to blame. Any and all of the above should say sorry
I think you can blame Anthony Wedgwood Benn if you want.
He had some involvement with the founding of ICL or its predecessors.
Which a few takeovers later became part of Funjitsu.
I have an unprovable recollection that 'everyone in the industry' 'knew' there were huge fundamental problems with the Post Office's IT long before Fujitsu were even associated with ICL. I'm talking about the 1980s.
Wasn't this part of what nearly broke STC?
When the IT trade press was printed on dead trees and there wasn't internet.
Back when 'Freelance Informer' looked like today's 'Big Issue' or even befrore that...
Dinosaurs, Mainframes and Cortinas roamed the earth etc.
It's a bit sobering how 'information' from that era is just gone.
He had some involvement with the founding of ICL or its predecessors.
Which a few takeovers later became part of Funjitsu.
I have an unprovable recollection that 'everyone in the industry' 'knew' there were huge fundamental problems with the Post Office's IT long before Fujitsu were even associated with ICL. I'm talking about the 1980s.
Wasn't this part of what nearly broke STC?
When the IT trade press was printed on dead trees and there wasn't internet.
Back when 'Freelance Informer' looked like today's 'Big Issue' or even befrore that...
Dinosaurs, Mainframes and Cortinas roamed the earth etc.
It's a bit sobering how 'information' from that era is just gone.
OutInTheShed said:
I think you can blame Anthony Wedgwood Benn if you want.
He had some involvement with the founding of ICL or its predecessors.
Which a few takeovers later became part of Funjitsu.
I have an unprovable recollection that 'everyone in the industry' 'knew' there were huge fundamental problems with the Post Office's IT long before Fujitsu were even associated with ICL. I'm talking about the 1980s.
Wasn't this part of what nearly broke STC?
When the IT trade press was printed on dead trees and there wasn't internet.
Back when 'Freelance Informer' looked like today's 'Big Issue' or even befrore that...
Dinosaurs, Mainframes and Cortinas roamed the earth etc.
It's a bit sobering how 'information' from that era is just gone.
I’d forgotten all about Freelance Informer, thank you! He had some involvement with the founding of ICL or its predecessors.
Which a few takeovers later became part of Funjitsu.
I have an unprovable recollection that 'everyone in the industry' 'knew' there were huge fundamental problems with the Post Office's IT long before Fujitsu were even associated with ICL. I'm talking about the 1980s.
Wasn't this part of what nearly broke STC?
When the IT trade press was printed on dead trees and there wasn't internet.
Back when 'Freelance Informer' looked like today's 'Big Issue' or even befrore that...
Dinosaurs, Mainframes and Cortinas roamed the earth etc.
It's a bit sobering how 'information' from that era is just gone.
As others have said, there’s a potential case for corporate manslaughter here, Vennells is nothing short of a monster, but let’s start a thread about Ed Davey! Funnily enough I was listening to LBC this morning in the car, Ferrari was interviewing Starmer and a female listener emailed the very same question this pathetic thread is asking, surely a coincidence!
Blue62 said:
OutInTheShed said:
I think you can blame Anthony Wedgwood Benn if you want.
He had some involvement with the founding of ICL or its predecessors.
Which a few takeovers later became part of Funjitsu.
I have an unprovable recollection that 'everyone in the industry' 'knew' there were huge fundamental problems with the Post Office's IT long before Fujitsu were even associated with ICL. I'm talking about the 1980s.
Wasn't this part of what nearly broke STC?
When the IT trade press was printed on dead trees and there wasn't internet.
Back when 'Freelance Informer' looked like today's 'Big Issue' or even befrore that...
Dinosaurs, Mainframes and Cortinas roamed the earth etc.
It's a bit sobering how 'information' from that era is just gone.
I’d forgotten all about Freelance Informer, thank you! He had some involvement with the founding of ICL or its predecessors.
Which a few takeovers later became part of Funjitsu.
I have an unprovable recollection that 'everyone in the industry' 'knew' there were huge fundamental problems with the Post Office's IT long before Fujitsu were even associated with ICL. I'm talking about the 1980s.
Wasn't this part of what nearly broke STC?
When the IT trade press was printed on dead trees and there wasn't internet.
Back when 'Freelance Informer' looked like today's 'Big Issue' or even befrore that...
Dinosaurs, Mainframes and Cortinas roamed the earth etc.
It's a bit sobering how 'information' from that era is just gone.
As others have said, there’s a potential case for corporate manslaughter here, Vennells is nothing short of a monster, but let’s start a thread about Ed Davey! Funnily enough I was listening to LBC this morning in the car, Ferrari was interviewing Starmer and a female listener emailed the very same question this pathetic thread is asking, surely a coincidence!
Nobody had heard of Vennells until the tv show.
Ed is the leader of a national political party.
I must have missed Vennells running for Parliament or Downing Street.
Hence the topic being on Ed rather than some other person none of you had heard about or cared before last week. And no, you hadn’t or didn’t care about them because none of you had mentioned them before.
I think however, you may take it as read that Vennells is quite probably public enemy no1 in the UK atm. Ed D - as per normal - is generally ignored.
Ed is the leader of a national political party.
I must have missed Vennells running for Parliament or Downing Street.
Hence the topic being on Ed rather than some other person none of you had heard about or cared before last week. And no, you hadn’t or didn’t care about them because none of you had mentioned them before.
I think however, you may take it as read that Vennells is quite probably public enemy no1 in the UK atm. Ed D - as per normal - is generally ignored.
Blue62 said:
I’d forgotten all about Freelance Informer, thank you!
As others have said, there’s a potential case for corporate manslaughter here, Vennells is nothing short of a monster, but let’s start a thread about Ed Davey! Funnily enough I was listening to LBC this morning in the car, Ferrari was interviewing Starmer and a female listener emailed the very same question this pathetic thread is asking, surely a coincidence!
Interesting..As others have said, there’s a potential case for corporate manslaughter here, Vennells is nothing short of a monster, but let’s start a thread about Ed Davey! Funnily enough I was listening to LBC this morning in the car, Ferrari was interviewing Starmer and a female listener emailed the very same question this pathetic thread is asking, surely a coincidence!
Ian Geary said:
...
It is inconceivable now that senior PO executives didn't join up the dots on potential system error, but again it depends what they were told by whom to see if they were acting in gold faith or not. The unknown unknowns phrase didn't come along until later.
Computerised systems took such a leap forward through the 70s and 80s that the mindset of the computer being wrong would have been hard to imagine I think.
There no doubt were it bods who knew, but then it becomes the rising balloon issue - when do you let go? As holding on always seems to be the better option, and like the post office bods they probably had mortgages to pay too.
...
I think someone wrote a really good explanation on the Post Office thread, but I don't think it was quite as simple as an obvious bug (collection) but was down to interaction between the software and the infrastructure together with bad processes (and then lying about those processes). It was supposed to cope with flaky internet connections in a time before ubiquitous broadband, and I *think* part of the issue was that it didn't properly reconcile messages (i.e. you could debit twice and the system did not correctly identify it was the same transaction twice). Given that GUIDs were a thing, I am not sure why they were not able to generate unique Message IDs, but I have not dug that deeply into it (and even today I see systems where people generate numbers for identifiers instead of using a proven unique ID). It is inconceivable now that senior PO executives didn't join up the dots on potential system error, but again it depends what they were told by whom to see if they were acting in gold faith or not. The unknown unknowns phrase didn't come along until later.
Computerised systems took such a leap forward through the 70s and 80s that the mindset of the computer being wrong would have been hard to imagine I think.
There no doubt were it bods who knew, but then it becomes the rising balloon issue - when do you let go? As holding on always seems to be the better option, and like the post office bods they probably had mortgages to pay too.
...
However, my long-winded point is that I am not sure that anyone at the coalface (i.e. the core IT bods) would necessarily have known The developers tests pass (too many assumptions about the quality of connection perhaps). The infrastructure guys are told that the system is fault tolerant. The people on the helpdesk are told "if you see this, do this" and do so, without necessarily understanding what or why they are doing. None of them being accountants, they don't necessarily have any idea that the numbers here should match the numbers there, or that an entry in this ledger should match an entry in that ledger. They just have their view through a straw.
I think the main culpability lies with the people at the next level up, who could not only see that e.g. there were 100 tickets about missing/duplicate transactions, but also that the helpdesk were dialling in to fix stuff when that was apparently impossible (it would take someone at a higher level to realise that the design said you couldn't remotely fix things, but the helpdesk were doing so. Neither the designers on one side of the wall or the helpdesk on the other side would necessarily be aware of each other).
DeejRC said:
Nobody had heard of Vennells until the tv show.
Ed is the leader of a national political party.
I must have missed Vennells running for Parliament or Downing Street.
Hence the topic being on Ed rather than some other person none of you had heard about or cared before last week. And no, you hadn’t or didn’t care about them because none of you had mentioned them before.
I think however, you may take it as read that Vennells is quite probably public enemy no1 in the UK atm. Ed D - as per normal - is generally ignored.
Speak for yourself, plenty of people were aware of the Horizon project and it’s been in the news on and off for a few years now. I worked in the IT sector so maybe had more awareness, but there have been calls for Vennells to be investigated for some time, leading to her standing down in 2019. Davey was minister for two years on a scandal that started in 1999, this thread is as ridiculous as your post. Ed is the leader of a national political party.
I must have missed Vennells running for Parliament or Downing Street.
Hence the topic being on Ed rather than some other person none of you had heard about or cared before last week. And no, you hadn’t or didn’t care about them because none of you had mentioned them before.
I think however, you may take it as read that Vennells is quite probably public enemy no1 in the UK atm. Ed D - as per normal - is generally ignored.
Blue62 said:
86 said:
Sir Ed one of your mates?
Yes we are really close, it’s the only possible explanation. It's for a friend and he would be very grateful.
Thanks
anonymoususer said:
Blue62 said:
86 said:
Sir Ed one of your mates?
Yes we are really close, it’s the only possible explanation. It's for a friend and he would be very grateful.
Thanks
Southerner said:
A Yahoo news article popped up yesterday, suggesting that the petition for Vennells to lose her gong has been swelled (not surprisingly) by the TV drama. Now surging towards half a million and well worth adding to, in my opinion. Admittedly it isn’t quite the guilty PO and Fujitsu criminals rotting in prison where they belong, but it’s a start.
News article here:
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/petition-to-strip-ex-pos...
Petition here:
https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/strip-paula...
Signed.News article here:
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/petition-to-strip-ex-pos...
Petition here:
https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/strip-paula...
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