Postmasters who fell victim to a second faulty accounting system will be offered compensation.
The Government has committed to “redress and justice” for those who suffered losses due to errors with the Capture system, which predates the scandal-hit Horizon software at the heart of the Post Office scandal. Capture was rolled out in around 13.5% of branches between 1992 and 1999, when it was replaced by Fujitsu’s Horizon software.
More than 900 subpostmasters were convicted for theft and fraud between 1999 and 2015 due to glitches with the Horizon system which made it look like they were stealing cash. Some £500 million has been paid out to 3,300 victims across several compensation schemes, as many lost their livelihoods and reputations in the scandal, which was dramatised in ITV’s ‘Mr Bates vs the Post Office‘.
The Government has now accepted that the scandal could be wider than first believed – and there may be more victims of the earlier Capture system. An independent report commissioned by ministers earlier this year concluded the older software may have created shortfalls.
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But the Kroll report didn’t make any conclusions about the safety of criminal convictions. The Government is now scrambling to work out the scale and scope of financial redress for those who might be victims of Capture’s faults.
Evidence which could help to reveal the extent of shortfalls has been lost or destroyed, sub-postmasters may have died because of how long ago the system was in use, and there were at least 19 versions of Capture being utilised.
It is also uncertain how many criminal prosecutions were based on evidence from the Capture system, meaning it would be difficult to back up any claims for compensation. Ministers have ordered the Post Office to review its records and send them to the Criminal Cases Review Commission.
Business and Trade Secretary Jonathan Reynolds said: “It is thanks to testimony of postmasters that this has been brought to light and failings have been discovered. We must now work quickly to provide redress and justice to those who have suffered greatly after being wrongly accused.
“I’d like to encourage anyone who believes they have been affected by Capture to share their story with us so we can put wrongs to right once and for all.”
Post Office minister Gareth Thomas said his priority is “to deliver justice and redress to postmasters as swiftly as possible”. He added: “We will do everything we can to correct the mistakes of the past and ensure they are not repeated.
“Postmasters have raised concerns with me that their income has not kept up with inflation over the past decade. The Government therefore welcomes that the Post Office is going to make a one-off payment to postmasters to increase their remuneration.”
A spokesperson for the Post Office said it was “determined that past wrongs are put right”. Post Office records are being searched for “any evidence relating to the use of Capture software in the 1990s to support the Government’s work to provide fair redress to those impacted”, they added.