Fujitsu director gives evidence in Post Office Horizon IT inquiry – watch live

Fujitsu director gives evidence in Post Office Horizon IT inquiry – watch live

Good morning sir can you see and hear us yes thank you very much may I call Paul Patterson please yeah stand and repeat after me I swear by almighty God I swear by almighty God that the evidence I shall give that the evidence I shall give shall be the truth

Shall be the truth the whole truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth and nothing but the truth thank you thank you good morning Mr Patterson you know my name is Jason beer and I ask questions on behalf of the inquiry can you give us your full name please a full

Name William Paul Patterson thank you for coming to give evidence to the inquiry today you have been scheduled to give evidence today for many months now and today um I wish to be clear is not a rerun of the evidence that you gave to the business and trade committee on

Tuesday of this week um not least because many of the issues addressed in your evidence to that committee will be addressed to you when you return to give evidence in phases five and six of the inquiry do you understand yes in that connection um those watching the proceeding should understand that simply

Because an issue is not addressed by Mr Patterson today does not mean that it will uh not be addressed with him in due course the inquiry undertakes its work in a forensic manner only asking questions of witnesses when it’s satisfied that all reasonably relevant material has been obtained so that

Questions can be put on a proper evidential foundation so you’re here to today to give evidence primarily about the uh issues that you address in your third witness statement which concerns arq data you understand that yes I do and in particular the reliability of that data the use of it by Fujitsu and

The post office the provision of it to the post office in connection with criminal proceedings um against sub postmasters do you understand yes I’m also going to ask you some questions about matters in your um second witness statement so can we start please by formally adducing the evidence in your second and third

Witness statements not least so they can be made available to the public via the inquiries website can we start with your second witness statement please you’ll find that in tab um A2 of your hard copy bundle the UR n for it is fuj 012 6035 it’s dated the 20 9th of December

2022 and is 193 pages long including its appendices if you go to page 63 which is the last page of the statement itself uh is that your signature yes it is and are the contents of that witness statement true to the best of your knowledge and

Belief yes they are can we move to your third witness statement please which in your bundle is in tab A1 the urm for that is win 65300 that witness statement is dated the 14th of September 2023 is 103 pages long including its appendices and if you turn to page 80

You should find your signature yes is that your signature and are the contents of that statement true to the best of your knowledge and belief yes they are thank you very much before I ask you um uh question questions of substance this is the first occasion on which you’ve

Given oral evidence to the inquiry and the first occasion on which a senior Fujitsu executive has given evidence to the inquiry I know in your first witness statement which we published back on the 2nd of December 2022 you um gave an apology to sub postmasters and that um you said

Something to equivalent effect on Tuesday of this week uh to Parliament and since then Fujitsu as a corporation issued a public statement is there anything that you would like to say in that regard now yes Mr beard thank you to the sub postmasters and their families we apologize fij Jitsu

Apologizes and is sorry for our part in this appalling miscarriage of Justice this inquire is examining those events forensically over many many decades which involve many parties not least fi Jitsu and the post office but other organizations and individuals we are determined to continue to support this inquiry and get to the

Truth wherever it lays and at the conclusion of the inquiry and the guidance from this inquiry engaged with government on suitable contribution and redress to the sub Masters and their families thank you Mr Beer thank you uh can I start with your background then please you are a director of Fujitsu

Services Limited is that right yes it is which I’m going to call Fujitsu and I think your full title um at least according to the the internet and the Fujitsu web page is Corporate executive officer EVP is that Executive Vice President yes it is and the co-c CEO is

That chief executive officer or um corporate executive officer it’s actually um um the first one forgive me right so chief executive officer for the Europe region indeed it is so a director an Executive Vice President and corporate executive officer for the Europe region thank you yes when did you

Um join Fujitsu in early 2010 and what was your first role and job title uh I was hired into a sales Ro a sales leadership role and I was the sales leader for the private sector and what did that job involve very much focused on new business selling to fiu’s customers uh

In the private sector as was then and what was your your title again so head of sales for the private sector we can clearly will confirm confirm the individual titles um correctly the did that role have any connection to or responsibility for the Horizon it system so subsequently my role changed

And my responsibility changed I was in a sales or sales leadership role for the UK private sector then including the public sector and then that evolved into being a European head of sales role as well throughout that um certainly in the early part the middle part of that my

Responsibility also included the selling of the contract new contracts to the post office when was that so approximately 2012 I think 13 um is when the post office new business selling responsibility came to my came into my um responsibility so before that 2012 did you did your job um bring you into

Conect connection with um The Horizon it system in any way I don’t believe so after 2012 what was the extent of your connection to the Horizon it system so my connection was to the post office um we had a number of contracts with the post office one of them being Horizon uh

One of them being the uh um telecom’s contract so their home phone and Broadband contract and it was my team who were responsible for the sale of the uh Services associated with the new telecoms contract uh and clearly any renewal or extension to the horison system um

Subsequently did you remain in that role until you took up your present position in 2019 uh no I um that that role changed so I became um a European head of sales and business development and I did not have a team involved in the post office so how long did your involvement with

The post office last I would four years five years in that four to five year period let’s call it between 2012 and um 2014 sorry 2016 2017 um how um regularly were you dealing with issues conc concerning the Horizon it system so I wasn’t dealing with uh issues dealing with the post office

Account in so far as it concerned uh The Horizon it system so my engagement and my sales team’s engagement was what was very much focused on the new business into the post office um it wasn’t dealing with the service delivery or be clearly at times um in those

Conversations the post office may have have asked me questions about um um Service delivery and that would have been passed on to the relevant Service delivery team that was my um next question to what extent were you um cited on issues or problems with Service delivery in that four to five year

Period so far as Horizon was concerned so I think in several different meetings with post office Executives when we were discussing the changes to the contract so I think in about 20 1213 they were looking to change the contract structure into a tower structure in some of those meetings we

Would definitely made some reference to problems given I was in the room and that would have been handed back into the uh Service delivery team to your recollection did any of those um engagements concern um data reliability data Integrity or similar issues well so in the pack that I’ve got for in this

Supplementary pack I think for in in today’s hearing um there is a reference to uh questions asked of me and a colleague by the CIO which we passed on to which was talking about that very Point um I’m not going to go into that in detail today I just want to get an

Overview today for the purposes of the questions I’m going to ask you subsequently of your the extent to which you knew of issues concerning Horizon before you became CEO in 2019 or whether you were coming to these issues completely aresh in 2019 what would be the answer to that I

In 2019 in my appointment I was of course aware that there were issues regarding prosecutions clearly there was the public uh case as well so I was I was aware on a personal level there were issues with the uh um prosecution so I was aware of those those topics

Before you became CEO in 202 I think the email you’re referring to I’m not going to go into it in detail today shows that you had some involvement in and were briefed about the second site investigations yes and the impact of those on Fujitsu yes thank you and so overall we

Shouldn’t get the impression when we listen to your in a moment that you came to all of the issues concerning data Integrity the provision of information and evidence by Fujitsu to the post office and post office prosecutions aresh when you became CEO in 2019 I joined as as we already discussed

Uh I joined in 2010 and um certainly through my career inside the company laterally I become more and more aware of uh of the issues and clearly during this inquiry becoming more and more aware at a very detailed level can I turn to um your second witness statement then um please um fuj

012 6035 and it will come up on the screen for you um this is your second witness statement you’ll see at the top it’s dated as we’ve established already the 29th of December uh 2022 so 13 months ago or so and if we look at um paragraph three

Paragraphs one and two are um usual introductions but paragraph three at the um foot of the page um as noted in your first corporate uh witness statement you do not have firsthand knowledge of many of the matters set out in the statement um you wish to reiterate at

The outset how the information in the statement has been compiled you have been assisted by a team of individuals within Fujitsu and morrist and forer and they’re the solicitors to the uh to Fujitsu for the purposes of this inquiry is that right correct uh this is due to the vast amount of

Documentation and sources of evidence which have had to be reviewed for a period stret ing over 25 years uh this team has provided to me the documents which are referenced in this statement and exhibited at and then you give some reference numbers and you um exhibit 640 documents to this witness

Statement uh and which are the principal source of my knowledge of this statement’s um contents and so the inform information in the statement that you’re giving is principally drawn from documents that have been provided to you by your team essentially correct and then if we look at paragraph four

Please you say um responses to questions set out in the statement are generally drawn from documentary sources these documents have been exhibited and or are referenced the responses provided in this second statement represent fujitsu’s current understanding of the information available given preparations for phase three were then still ongoing

It may be that Fujitsu will need to supplement this corporate statement as further material is identified and made available to core participants I’m going to skip over paragraphs 5 to 189 of this witness statement about some 60 pages of the witness statement which concerns phasee three issues in

The inquiry and about which we heard many weeks of evidence back at the end of 2022 and the beginning of 2023 so primary evidence from the witnesses concerned can we pick up please what you say on page 61 of the witness statement at the foot of the page please page 61

That’s it knowledge and rectification of bugs and this section of the statement indeed right to the end of the statement addresses fujitsu’s knowledge of and rectification of bugs in the Horizon system is that right correct and you say as explained in fujitsu’s opening statement No complex it system will ever be completely free

Of bugs errors and defects beds fujitsu’s monitoring systems and processes seek to identify faults log them as incidents and then work to resolve them following the agreed Incident Management process fugits also relies on incidents being reported by postmasters directly all by post office limited many thousands of incidents have

Been logged since the Inception of Horizon and then over the page please or further down the page uh paragraph 191 and 192 in relation to the 29 bugs errors and defects listed by Mr Justice Fraser in appendix one to the Horizon issues judgment the inquiry has asked Fujitsu to provide details

Relating to the identification investigation communication and resol resolution of the bugs errors and defects in February 2021 Fujitsu helped to prepare a report for post office Limited in relation to the 29 bugs errors and defects identified by Mr Justice phaser the bed or bugs errors and defects report the bugs errors and

Defects report has been disclosed to PO core participants and is exhibited as your exhibit 260 so the sequence of events just so that we can get that clear and um decode things is Mr Justice Fraser produces his Horizon issues judgment that’s also known as judment number six

And that was in December 2019 correct correct um 16th of December 2019 to be precise that contained a number of findings of fact both in the body of the judgment and in an appendix to the Judgment called appendix one which you reference here as to the existence of

Bugs errors and defects in the Horizon system and that’s both is this right Legacy Horizon and Horizon online I believe so and he analyzes those 29 bugs errors and defects uh in 418 pages of his judgment in appendix one to his judgment amounting to some 105 pages of closely typed

Text then the next event is the event you refer to in February 2021 um a report by Fujitsu to the post office uh that’s the 22nd of February 2021 so a year and three months after the Judgment Fujitsu writing a report to the post office what do you understand the purpose of that

Report to have been I’m not quite sure I understand the question so Mr Justice Fraser produces his judgment finds the existence of 29 bugs errors and defects spends 105 Pages analyzing them and then 13 months later Fujitsu write a report to the post office about those 29 bug SAS and

Defects and I was asking what was your understanding of the purpose of the writing of that report so in my in the company’s second corporate statement we lay out um details on the 29 yes I’m going to come to that in a moment I think it would so don’t know Mr

Beer I’m I don’t know I haven’t seen the physical reports it’s one of the exhibits to your statement number 260 there I’m not going to display it at the moment uh but I just want to understand when the judge has found the existence of these 29 bugs why um a year and a

Month later Fujitsu is writing a report to the post office about those 29 bugs so I don’t know Mr B okay let’s move on um anyway uh paragraph 193 of your witness statement you say in addition to the bugs errors and defects report that’s the February 2021 report Fujitsu has set

Out in appendix one and that’s appendex one to this very witness statement a series of summaries addressing each of the 29 bugs errors and defects and any sub isues identifying within those classifications the bugs errors and defects report and the summaries set out in appendix one uh seek to build on the

Technical appendix that’s Mr Justice Fraser and have been prepared by reference to a variety of sources these summar summaries are indicative of amongst other things the investigation of each issue the resolution of each issue communication with other parties including post office limited and wider management and the impact on uh

Branches and then 1 194 please the summaries in appendix one are based on a review of contemporaneous documents primarily in the form of Pinnacles Peaks and Kels that have been identified as relevant to the relevant bugs error bug error or defect the summary should be read in conjunction with these underlying records

So that can come down thank you just to summarize in appendix one to this witness statement you’ve set out 29 summaries relating to the 29 bugs errors and defects found to have existed by Mr Justice Fraser correct correct I’m going to look through some um uh examples of those I’m not going to

Go through all 29 in a moment so we can see what they look like and uh the kind of things that they tell us but all of this information uh would you agree was available to Fujitsu um indeed to you because it’s in your witness statement written in December

2022 but also earlier than that in the bugs errors and defects report of February 2021 yes because the information is there that’s how we produce the um produce the report we produced the documents in the second statement correct and so in terms of something you said at the beginning of the um your

Evidence today about um the inquiry examining complex issues and the inquire Fujitsu wanting to wait until essentially the inquiry has reported in relation to this issue and I’m not saying that uh for a moment that the Fujitsu summaries of the bugs errors and defects are um complete

Or or um should be taken to be the final word on each bug error or defect but from fujitsu’s perspective is this is this right as a company um for the last couple of years it it has known of the existence of these bugs errors and defects at a corporate

Level yes in fact all the bugs and errors have been known at one one level or not for many many years is um right from the very start of um deployment of of this system there were bugs and errors and defects which were which were well known to all parties

Actually you agree I think therefore if we take the Fujitsu summaries read together with the bugs erors and defects report as a baseline it it follows that at a senior level in the company for the last couple of years that has been corporate knowledge of the

Existence of these bugs I have I have known about these bugs because I’ve seen the report yes would be my answer and so there’s no need to wait for the conclusion of this inquiry to find out at least this information because it’s already known to Fujitsu yes correct and it’s in the statement

Correct can we go to the examples then please I got to look at um four or five of the 29 um bugs can we start by looking at page 102 of the witness statement please and can we look at page 102 and 103 at the same time please

That looks like that’s not going to be possible um I just wanted to get um ah thank you this is what the appendices look like in your um or to your witness statement it lists the relevant bug error or defect this one is bed two the calendar

Square bug and then there are a series of bullet points sometimes less than this sometimes More Than This setting out in very summary form fujitsu’s um position on it is that right yes and the bullet point that always um is first um says documents relating to fujitsu’s knowledge rectification and

Communication of the issue including Pinnacles Peaks and Kels are set out in appendix 2 and then the relevant exhibit numbers are given so it’s taking us in the first bullet point off to the relevant exhibits and here there are about um 25 three 17 to 342 correct and I’m not on each occasion

Going to go back and look at um the underlying material if we can just read through then um uh the calendar Square bug and you say a problem existed in Horizon whereby on occasion a lock was not released and a second process would then wait for a given time before it

Timed out and reported an error saying it could not proceed the problem could occur in various places in the Horizon applications in the initial occurrences a reboot of the counter allowed the system to resume proper function with no data lost and then the third bullet point in

Some cases the calendar Square branch in particular the lock problem caused data to be lost when carrying out transfers between different stock units thereby causing um receipts and payments mismatches so this is a bug would you agree that um has an real impact on on balancing because it causes receipts and payments mismatches

Yes and then uh fourth bullet point there appear to have been instances of these repost lock errors from at least September 2000 so we get the start date and in this in instance a postmaster reported an error when trying to redeclare that cash the call was discussed between various teams from

Post office in Fujitsu and then you give um some further examples of um Peaks and then a known error log fifth bullet point you give the reference advise that restarting repost or rebooting the counter would resolve incidents where a message uh reported a timeout waiting for lock some of these

Also led to receipts and payments mismatches which after investigation were dealt with by the Fujitsu MSU team raise raising a bims report so that the post office could issue an error notice later known as a transaction correction to the postmaster uh to allow them to reconcile um the accounts

Uh bim’s report set out the progress to the resolution of a business incident the post office was used the information from the bims report to carry out reconciliation or settlement uh it was identified that an error in the underlying Isa repost software caused the lock problem the

Issue was raised with Isa who developed a fix this was implemented in the S90 software release the S90 release was scheduled on to start on the 4th of March 2006 for completion by the 14th of April 2006 by the 22nd of March uh the S90 migration report showed

The counter release was 99.9% complete Fujitsu monitored the issue 27th of March an employee noted that the time out locks had gone right down so um that’s on the Fujitsu account of matters um was a problem that was first noticed in September 2000 and a fix was applied in March and

April 2006 so 5 and a half years later yes yes that’s what it yes now in fact this is an example where this shouldn’t be taken to be the last word on this Mr Justice Fraser found that the bug continued in operation uh until 2010 but on

Um the the Fujitsu account this was a bug that was um operative for a a close on a six-year period is that right that’s what that says yes let’s look at a um another example of a bug please bug three the suspense account bug that’s page 104 of your witness statement

So um just page 104 please thank you so bug error or defect number three the suspense account bug the usual opening paragraph um bullet point two a change introduced into Horizon in July 2011 had the unintended consequence of leaving certain orphaned records from November or December uh 2010 relating to

A Branch’s suspense account in a table in the branch database rather than archiving them the consequence was that once a year when an impacted Branch produced the trading statement if they had any amount in their suspense account the suspense account records from 2010 were also pulled in so that the branch

Trading statement showed an erroneous amount in the suspense account when the problem resurfaced a year later a postmaster contacted Fujitsu and a peak was raised on the 25th of February 2013 Fujitsu then diagnosed the issue and identified 14 branches as being affected Fujitsu held a conference with the post office’s problem manager the

Orphan records were subsequently removed by the Fujitsu development team an extra set of checks were de introduced in October 2013 so if a pro similar problem surfaced in the future an error message would be displayed to the postmaster telling them to contact the horizon um service desk so here we can see we’re

Dealing with Horizon online yes yes rather than Legacy Horizon and it’s an issue that looks on the Fujitsu account to have lasted two years or so yes uh can we turn please to the a3d bug page 118 of your witness statement please this is the reversals

Bug uh we can skip the first bullet point which exhibits um four documents at second bullet point a code fix distributed as part of the s30 release caused a problem under certain circumstances due to faulty logic on occasion when a postmaster attempts Ed to reverse out a sum which had been

Remed in the balance showed double the IM the initial amount rather than um zero according to the April 2003 service review book delivery of uh s30 commenced in April 2003 and by the 2nd of May 2003 uh 1, sorry 2,135 branches were live the initial issue was reported by a

Postmaster on the 24th of April 2003 sent to Fujitsu um third line support the service support center on the 28th of April 2003 who identified that an error had occurred a known error log was raised and the issue was also um rooted to fujitsu’s MSU team so they could Lia

With the post office who would then issue transaction corrections to rectify the account following which the peak was to be rooted back to Fujitsu so development could produce a code fix so just stopping there the bug was a a doubling up problem um something that we’ve heard a lot about from sub poost

Masters um uh themselves we know from other documents I’m not asking you to comment on this that the postmaster that raised the issue that’s referred to in that third bullet point uh raised the issue uh concerning uh £1 13,910 he had remed in that sum as cash

Into his um Horizon terminal but then for a reason that’s not clear needed to reverse that particular transaction out might have got the wrong figure person at the till said no I don’t want to you to put in that 13,910 cash whatever it was wanted to reverse the transaction

They did so and instead of going back to zero when they were reming out the transaction the sum doubled to 27,800 and therefore on the system it showed that the sub postmaster should be holding cash of 27,825 we can see that um from the next bullet point on the 30th of April the

Fujitsu epos development team identified the coding error and that it had been released with s30 an emergency fix was created went live on the 7th of May 2003 instructions um for testers detailed how the fix was to be tested and to make sure that both the new problem and the

Original problem which s30 aimed to fix had been fixed so the um this tells us I think this is right isn’t it that the error was because of an attempted fix to another bug I think that is what it’s saying yes so um and if we look into the detail

Of it um we’ve got the underlying documents The Horizon code the problem was the person who’ written the Horizon code had applied the incorrect mathematical symbol to reverse the reming in so instead of applying the opposite mathematical symbol to what had been remed in it applied the same one as

The operator had so instead of applying a minus following a plus it applied a second plus understand I I understand the map so I I don’t know whether it was all of that was behind this but well the if we if we were to delve into the underlying material that’s exactly what

That would show so rather than I put some money in plus yes the reversal wants to um reverse that it should then apply a minus to take it back to zero U what it did was the mathematical symbol in the code was another plus sign and so it doubled it understood and I

Agree um it was um reported according to that bullet point in April and uh fix to the problem caused by the earlier fix was applied in May 2003 can we look at a fourth bug please um page 119 um this is the data tree um build

Failure and this is split into a number of sub isues this is issue one which is the only one I’m going to um address second bullet point Fujitsu understands this issue was first reported to a branch on the 10th of November 1999 after a discrepancy in the counts a

Number of Pinnacles for similar incidents were raised between February and may 200000 a list of cross domain problems was presented in the monthly service review books to uh be discussed in the service review Forum with post office the issue with the danganan branch was tracked in

A number number of these uh to resolve the issue uh Fujitsu implemented two changes specific Diagnostics to log a failure to build the data Tree and more error checking in the application code these um Diagnostics were distributed to 99% of the estate by the 16th of May um

2000 this would allow recurrences of the problem to be monitored and then the last bullet point error checking was included in a later release so um the issue was first reported in um the 10th of nov on the 10th of November 1999 according to uh the second bullet

Point um again if we dug into the documents we would see that um concerned a 43,000 pound discrepancy so quite a sizable sum of money and the fix was rolled out um we see from this last bullet point uh up until October 2000 yes yes and then lastly by way of

Example um page 146 of your witness statement please um bug 18 and again uh like the last bug that we looked at um there are a number of issues which have been split out so sub isues and This concerns the concurrent login bug and issue or sub isue two of

It second bullet point issue two concerns a receipts and payments mismatch that occurred due to a coding issue which permitted a Post Master to transfer money from one counter to another while the first counter was being rolled over the system should have prevented this the incident was raised

With Fujitsu on the 24th of July 2000 by the 28th Fujitsu had established what had happened after discussing the circumstances with the postmaster and confirmed he shouldn’t have been able effectively to log into two counters with the same user ID number on the 1st of August 2000 a further incident was

Recorded as another instance of the same issue next bullet point a number of detailed analyses were carried out with an interim diagnosis on the 4th of October by the 22nd of November Fujitsu determined that this was a transient bug caused by two modules in the application using different methods to communicate each

Other an earlier release known as um c145 should have already fixed the um issue so uh bug um identified in July with um a decision that a existing release by December 2000 uh by November 2000 should have fixed it okay that can come down all of those 29

Summaries are there for people to read the core participants have got them have had them for um many months now before you carry on Mr Beer I just want to be clear about something um in the previous examples you looked at with Mr Beer Mr Patterson you referenced um documents which

Demonstrated that uh the post office was made aware of each of those bugs more or less contemporaneously all right I’m not concerned about the detail of those documents in that last one that we looked at unless I’ve missed it you haven’t referenced um uh a contemporary I document or anything else to suggest

That the post office was made aware of that bug uh I I just want to be clear about this um is your evidence that each and every bug was notified to the post office contemporaneously or more or less contemporaneously or is it the case that there may have been some bugs which were

Not my understanding if I missed uh the reference in B18 then please put me right but but I can’t see it at the moment and and I can’t see it there either uh sirn so I think you are correct that the M vast majority of bugs and errors and defects were shared

Um whether bed bed 18 in this example was I would need to check all right thank you I wouldn’t know off the top of my head yeah as Mr be has uh noted you you will be returning so there’s no great urgency about it but I wanted to

Raise it while I was fresh in my mind thank you so you’re you’re right to raise it generally the summary um where um the post office has been notified or information shared uh says so so um looking at the 29 as a whole um would you agree with um the the

Following uh points uh firstly in each case Fujitsu agrees that the bug error or defect existed yes um secondly on fujitsu’s own assessment by looking at this um appendix the bugs Afflicted both Legacy Horizon and Horizon online yes thirdly we can see by reference to this

Summary and in particular if we read it alongside the bugs errors and defects report which contains much more detail we can see the date on which according to Fujitsu at least the bug error or defect was recorded or recognized by Fujitsu yes fourth we can see the impact that

Fujitsu assesses the bug to have had on the estate yes fifthly we can see for most bugs errors and defects uh whether it was notified to the post office and if so when Fujitsu say the bug was communicated to the post office yes uh sixthly we can see that the earliest bug

Of the 29 errors bugs errors and defects was in November 1999 it was one of the examples I took you to so that was in the course of the National Rollout yes agreed and the latest I’m not going to take it to you now was May 2018 that was

The bureau discrepancies bug bug 4 14 agreed and so bugs errors and defects Afflicted The Horizon system on fujitsu’s own assessment for a period of nearly two decades yes and then lastly uh we can see fujitsu’s assessment of the length of time for which the bug was operative and

Sometimes that was a substantial period of time the first one I took you to calendar Square for at least 6 years or 10 years by reference to Mr Justice Fraser’s findings yes so I think it follows from this that it’s plain that fujitsu’s staff knew about bug’s errors and defects in

Horizon well before 2010 yes I agree Fujitsu staff knew of them on fujitsu’s own account from at least November 1999 agreed and that this recognition by Fujitsu reflected in your witness statement here doesn’t need any investig investigatory work to be undertaken by the inquiry no it doesn’t it’s it’s in

The it’s in the notes I agree it doesn’t um need any application of judgment by anyone because it’s here in black and white in fujitsu’s own words indeed in your own words agreed when did Fujitsu um realize that the bugs errors and defects in its Horizon system impacted on the evidence

That was being relied on to investigate and prosecute sub postmasters for criminal offenses is that in my second statement no no um this is going to the third statement essentially about litigation support so so I don’t know that the exact date of um just repeat the question again Mr

When did Fujitsu realize that the bugs errors and defects in its Horizon system impacted on the evidence that was being relied on to investigate and prosecute sub postmasters for criminal offenses so I think in my in in the company second statement we draw attention to we we

Knew the company knew several times that that evidence that had been presented needed to be corrected given some bugs and errors or the data needed to be rerun so I think there’ be several examples in the second second statement which answers your question I I can’t

Give you the exact date on each and every one of them I think in each particular um uh arq request it would be applied differently in other words I’m asking when did Fujitsu put two and two together and realize they added up to four for being

We need to tell the post office about these bugs errors and defects not because there’s a problem with the system that we’re selling to them but because they’re Prosecuting sub postmasters on the basis of the evidence that we’re providing to them so I think there’s there’s there’s lots of evidence

Um of us informing the post office of that data that we’ve just discussed uh bugs and errors and how those bugs and errors did or did not uh impact the um the the financial position as reported what the post office did with that particular piece of data Mr be I do not

Believe fij Jitsu knew at the time but certainly laterally of course the company became more aware that it was being used nearly solely for Pro for prosecutions would you agree that the 29 summar that we’ve just looked at some examples of revealing bugs errors and defects in

The Horizon system um ought to have been uh revealed to the post office for the purposes of its investigatory and prosecutorial functions so I don’t know if if they were not yeah that’s a different question I’m asking would you agree that they ought to have been oh yes I

Do you know I think that um Fujitsu employees provided um witness statements to uh the post office uh for the purposes of um the prosecution of sub post Masters and um speaking in general terms these bugs errors and defects did not not find their way into those witness

Statements do you know why I do not know why I have seen um examples of the witness statements um on a personal level I am surprised that that detail was not included in the witness statements given by Fujitsu staff to the post office um and I have seen some

Evidence of of um editing of witness statements uh by by others where there was a proposal I think you’re referring to to include at least a reference to some of the bugs or some data Integrity problems and they were edited out correct Mr and I no doubt you would regard that

As shameful I would yes that would be one word I would use what’s the other one um shameful appalling um my understanding of how our laws work in this country um that all of the evidence should have been put in front of the sub postmaster that the

Post office was relying on to prosecute them can we turn please to your third witness statement then please now the matters about which you speak in your third witness statement and we’re about to address through my questions to you again generally the product of you having been provided with

Documents by your team or briefed by your team in the same way as your second witness statement was created is that right correct I going to ask you questions about the provision of litigation support by Fujitsu to the post office in connection with the Horizon system and

In particular the use the nonuse and the reliability of arq data audit record query or r data now you start your third witness statement perhaps naturally with the contractual and other forms of formal documents that regulated or ought to have regulated the litigation support to be provided by Fujitsu to the post

Office that’s where I’m going to start so the starting with the contract are you aware that Fujitsu was um contractually bound to provide evidence in support of post office prosecutions and civil proceedings yes and are you aware that Fujitsu operated a fraud and litigation Support Office yes I am aware which um still

Exist I think uh I don’t know if it does still exist Mr be I would need to check that this um office the fraud and litigation support office was to provide provide Horizon evidence to support prosecutions and civil actions correct yes correct would you accept that um as

Fujitsu was um an integral part of the system supporting legal proceedings against sub poost Masters and knew that it was it had a duty to ensure that the D the data that it supplied was accurate and complete yes has what you um discovered LED you to the conclusion that the data supplied

Was not accurate and complete yes it has and we made the company made that in this statement actually this um number three can we look at just what the contract said so this is your um third witness statement win 065 0300 at page three and again in general terms I get

To restrict my questions to what you’ve included in your witness statement rather than looking at underlying materials partly because of the limitations of your evidence given your um position um partly because I suspect it will turn into an ex size of you saying um you weren’t in the relevant

Post at the time and you didn’t see this document or that document at the relevant time uh but you can read the document like the rest of us and I I don’t want you just interpreting documents uh can we look at um paragraphs um six and seven then

Please you say from the outset um of horizon Fujitsu has been required by contract to maintain an audit trail of quote all transactions and events see uh for example par 31 of schedule AO3 to the codified agreement of the 28th of July 1999 and Par 31 of schedule D5 to v13 of

The codified agreement of 23rd of November 2020 I’m not going to ask you any questions about the agreement of um 2020 because prosecutions are uh stopped by them um this contractual obligation flowed from requirement 699 contained in paragraph 1.102 of schedule A5 to the 1999 codified um agreement uh in particular uh r699

Requirement 699 notes at 1.12.2 the content of the audit Trail should be agreed with post office counters limited by a date consistent with the project plan and 1.102 .9 the audit Trail shall have a level of security such that it cannot be altered or um deleted um no need to read um

102.1 and so you focused um in these two paragraphs um on the obligations of Fujitsu arising from requirement 699 of the codified agreement correct and they are all about the duty to maintain and provide what’s called an audit Trail correct were you told about and did you

Take into account in what you said in this witness statement a separate requirement in the codified agreement concerning what was described as prosecution support that’s requirement 829 do I ref no I don’t um I think we would have done in in our response to to in our evidence here in

Number in number three yes I would have we would have done you see the these paragraphs there’s a series of requirements in the contract yes um and you’re focusing all on all about 699 which is about audit either operational audit or commercial audit by Auditors there’s a separate series of requirements

Concerning the provision of evidence for the purposes of prosecution which spring up from um requirement 829 which you you don’t analyze here at all did you know about that separate requirement the 829 requirement so I am aware um of the I didn’t know the number but I I was aware

And the company was aware that there was a prosecut support uh obligation in the contract okay in any EV let let’s look at what you do talk about concerning the audit requirement W which may be a very different thing to prosecution support uh in that paragraph at the

Bottom of the page we’ve got there you remind us that the codified agreement said the audit Trail shall have a level of security uh such that it cannot be um altered or um deleted is it now recognized and accepted by Fujitsu that Fujitsu could and did make insertions and amendments uh into data

Which had an impact on Branch accounts the the way I believe the the system worked for discovering uh for the audit Trail was to take the raw data um and take a a copy of that to then provide the arq um so I think in the arq data um you

You could filter out or add data to that so yes do you accept this meant that um Fujitsu could and did alter the audit Trail data so I think it does say mean that yes I.E do the opposite to what the requirement in 102.9 says I I think the changes um or any

Adjustments were agreed with um the post office before any action would or would not hence the bugs and errors and defects so I I don’t think it was a um um secret intervention I think it was discuss you know this bug this ER causes this make

Change but I think you would accept that audit data should have been an exact reflection of the transactions taking place at the branch no more and no less I I do agree with that and I think the underlying data in the message uh store was exactly

That that wasn’t what was given in the audit data no can we turn to page H please where you set out for us a flowchart um at the top of the page thank you taken from a prosecution support process document of the 29th of February 2005 so a Fujitsu policy

Document and I just want to um look at the policy document this is one of the rare occasions when I’m going to delve into the underlying material that’s an Annex to your witness statement just so we can understand some foundational terms get those locked down for our later discussion discussion uh

The underlying document from which this uh diagram is taken is fj15 2209 this is um one of the exhibits to your witness statement the 11th exhibit to your uh witness statement and we can see the date of it as I’ve just said in the top right there 29th of February

2005 we can see that it’s version two from the top and if we just go over the page please we can see from that uh table at the top there I think the fourth entry on that table that version one one of this document was dated the 26th of November

2002 yes but let’s work from this version the one that was operative from the 29th of February 2005 and I’m afraid we’re going to have to go through a bit of it just to understand some terminology um and the process that was intended to start with um can we start

Please with um page eight uh scope of document if we can just uh look at the top half of the page this document sets out the procedures to be adopted by a Post Office Accounts prosecution support service for managing and dealing with audit um record queries for investigation and support purposes

Purposes including the undertaking of audit record queries presentation of transaction records extracted by audit record queries analysis of appropriate records and logs preparation of witness statements or fact in relation to audit record queries attendance at court by relevant employees to give evidence in respect of witness statements and undertaking of additional litigation and

Prosecution support activities as may be requested on a Case by case basis on the instruction of um legal councel going to skip the next paragraph and then onto aqs in support of potential prosecution will be obtained solely from The Horizon system audit archive stroke server the method by

Which the Integrity of this data is protected is described in the audit Trail functional specification evidence in support of data Integrity will be sourced from the audit archive Stoke OB server and post office account business logs all access to audit data is restricted to named individuals via dedicated workstations located in a

Secure environment this is consistent with the security controls employed for the existing service supporting evidence is sourced um from relevant business records and logs uh two types of requests audit record query only involving the extraction of audit Archive of Records for an outlet arq plus witness statement involves extraction of the ordered

Archive of Records um plus the provision of a particular uh witness statement yes yes and then um if we go over to page nine please there’s something about the history in the penultimate paragraph on this page the provision of prosecution support specifically the provision of witness statements of fact was not formalized

And was provided on a without prejudice subject to contract basis pending the receipt of a change request prosecution support for the existing system is now provided as part of the prosecution support system this document outlines the operational approach to this service so that’s a reflection is it that before um this

Document uh there wasn’t formalized statement or policy on the provision of prosecution support that is my understanding and then if we can go forwards please to um page 10 uh if we read paragraph 3.2 at the bottom uh there is a provision here about the limits or the limitation

Ations on arq the number of arq requested by post office in connection with investigation or prosecution shall be the first uh to be met per year of 720 or 15,000 query days on a rolling basis with no more than the first to be met in any calendar month of 60 queries

Or 1,250 query days any um aqs over and above the 720 maximum will be rolled over to the next 12- month period and count towards the total for the next year post office may vary the aggregate limits of aqs um between the limits set out above um and um following um

Substitutes for those limits and there are some different figures um uh required or provided for and then if we go to the foot of um this page thank you each um audit record query shall relate only to an individual Outlet aqs are limited to specific types of information data fields these are and

Then they’re listed and then page 14 please 14 please uh Under The Heading prosecution support in addition to the details at 34 above which we’ve just looked at post office shall wherever possible advise on the relevant section of the arq form whether an Associated witness statement is required C appendix

One which we’ll look at in a moment and then scope a post office account that means Fujitsu shall in relation to an arq at the request of the post office one analyze appropriate Horizon help desk and non- pooling reports for the specific search criteria in order to check the Integrity of transactions

Extracted two analyze fault logs for the devices from which the record of transactions were obtained to check the Integrity of trans transactions three provide witness statements of fact in relation to that arq um the above anal analyses and witness statements will be undertaken in respect of a maximum of 250 arq per year

And fifth Fujitsu will provide for the attendance at court by the person who has provided a witness statement as identified above to give evidence in support of that witness statement a maximum of 100 days a year and then at page 19 please we see at the top of the page there under paragraph

7.0 the diagram which you have cut into your uh witness statement yes which we’ll come back to in a moment then at the foot of the page 7.1 and 7.1.1 there’s a list of the nine steps um to be taken when an arq is uh request is received so

7.1.1 team member shall identify the search criteria then if we just go over the page two that create they shall create an audit Trail of the request and then three search the files required to complete the report four select and retrieve the files five generate the

Message store um uh six use a tool called R query to select the files per the search criteria over the page please seven um uh burn the data onto a closed CD along with a Word document with an explanation eight carry out a virus check

Nine uh dispatch it so the nine steps in the process are described and then P page 21 please you remember that um there were four other things under prosecution support that Fujitsu could do and this lists them out if we look at 7.2.1 so the first of them 2.1 is check

Horizon system help desk logs uh problems or faults at the post office um Outlet logged with the hsh will be examined using the search criteria so this is if the sub postmaster has um called an issue in it ought to be discovered by searching the helpless logs Y and then secondly over the

Page the the second thing as well as the production of arq data uh that was to be done was an analysis of non-p poing reports non-p polling reports should be reviewed for the outlet in question uh can you do you know what non-p poing is I’m assuming it’s about

The network and connecting to the main database and broadly yes yes so conduct um an analysis of um non- pooling reports the third thing is um analyze the fault logs so any relevant Pinnacles in power help logs will be reviewed through the peak system to identify any recorded faults that might affect the

Integrity or admissibility of the audit archive from which the arq queries are extracted PE clog will detail the error relating to the site equipment and service in question and then the fourth um add-on uh complete a witness statement of fact prosecution support will provide a witness statement of

Fact as far as possible to be undertaken by the person responsible for the actioning of the work so as to to retain continuity of evidence and then 7. 4.1 about witness statements of fact uh any material or otherwise pertinent information shall be recorded and included in the relevant witness statement of

Fact requirements for witness statements shall be completed by the individual from prosecution support who completed the request the statement shall follow the standard format and layout for witness statements of facts provided in evidence contents of witness statements of fact are flexible depending on specific requirements and the knowledge of the

Witness giving the statement an example of a witness statement a fact is provided in appendix 2 let’s just go and look at that please that’s um page 29 I think this document so there’s a template or boilerplate um witness statement if we just um look at paragraphs one and

Two and just read those to yourself yes and then the page so an explanation in C of the system and in D and in E then if we go forward to page 32 please foot of the page of 32 to uh during audit extractions the following controls apply and then

They’re listed out between 1 and 10 you just scroll keep scrolling thank you then there’s some deletions and then this arq whatever the number was was received on whatever the date was and ask for information information in connection with the post office at whatever The Fad code of the post office

Was I produce a copy of arq as an exhibit number on various dates and at various times between two dates I I undertook extractions of data held on the horizon system in accordance with the requirements of something and followed the procedure outlined above I produced the resultant CD as um

X as an exhibit number that’s all we need to um look at there and if we go back then please um to page 22 of the W uh of the prosecution support document we were looking at witness statements of fact in 7.2.4 point1 at the foot we breached um halfway through

Paragraph three for each request post office limited and prosecution support will agree relevant matters such as those listed below which should be covered in the witness statement of fact based on the knowledge of the witness one identification information about the author summary of the previous manual system used by the post office before

Horizon summary of Horizon and what information is recorded how consistent time is recorded within Horizon the types of report that can be generated on a counter by a Clark over the page transfer of accounts from post office main accounts Department brief overview of applications how data is

Passed from the counter to the archive process for extracting information for aqs and the controls in place to protect and ensure the Integrity of that data analysis of the arq when the arq form was received and the date when the audit data extraction took place a summary of The Evidence provided

For the um request and then 7.2.4 point2 Court attendance in support of a witness statement of a fact the author of a witness statement of fact may be required to attend court in order to Bear testimony to the facts 2.5 provision of exhibit this will generally comprise one of the

Following four CDs which we’ve seen hsh logs which we’ve seen reference to non-p polling reports which we’ve seen reference to and fault logs their back references essentially to paragraphs 7.2.1 3 two and three of the document then over the page please sorry to page 25 um under the heading additional

Prosecution support there may be occasions when information is requested which exceeds that provided for and under 8.2 expert witness evidence to offer all the available evidence without it being requested will only serve to flood the courtroom with documentation for this reason expert in-depth analysis and detailed expert witness statements are

Rarely required as opposed to witness statements of fact it’s conceivable that given the size and complexity of horizon the Integrity of the witness statement of fact may be challenged by defense Council in order to discredit a prosecution in these add cases additional granular detail about the working technical the technical working

And integrity of various systems may be required if only for unused material and then there’s a list of the um uh types of um expert evidence that could be called upon to be provided above that expert Witnesses could comprise anyone within the post office account or its approved

Contractors who would be called upon to provide and testify to this additional um evidence right we can stop there uh looking at that um policy document would you agree that this is uh provides quite comprehensive U guidance on the provision of prosecution support by the uh Fujitsu prosecution support service

To the post office yes it does um would you agree that it um recognizes on its face a difference between evidence of fact and expert evidence yes and that it treats them differently yes uh would you agree it sets out the steps to be taken in each case to obtain

And then to disclose arq data yes and it reflects those steps or requires those steps to be reflected and spoken to in a witness statement and more so I think the arq data alone is not enough and in our in our corporate statement um we say that also yes we’re

Going to come to that probably after the break the important point you make in paragraph 19 of your statement that um arq was never enough yes and and I think that document shows that there is a range of information that the sub postmaster should have been presented

With uh if we go back to the diagram on page eight of your um third witness statement please win 65300 Uh page eight please if we look at the diagram at the top you’ll see that um it splits immediately if that just can be blown up the diagram please thank you between um on the right hand side an arq form which is um for prosecution support

And on the left hand side um seemingly one which is not yes H yes and it it treats them um differently and you’ll see that on the right hand side as we’ve just seen in the policy document that um Step One includes um checking help Des logs we’ve

Seen that uh the second step is to analyze non-p polling reports and the third step is analyze the Peaks and as we’ve seen in the policy document that’s all about integrative data yes it doesn’t include um checking the known error log that’s neither in the diagram nor in the

Policy does it no it doesn’t and so it’s not in the diagram it’s not in the policy and if we looked it’s not in the witness statement either the the boiler plate Witness statement do you know why that is that if you’re wanting to look at the Integrity of horizon

Data one wouldn’t look at the known error log I I don’t know why they wouldn’t have done and and I would have expected a more holistic assessment of the entire environment um that a sub postmaster was using um so I would have expected um era logs and other matters to be presented and

Considered in your um reading of the materials in your um investigation of the issues and in the briefings you have received did you note any reluctance on the part of Fujitsu in the past to reveal the existence of a thing called the known error log there is in in the um submission to

The inquiry today for number three there is evidence of that where don’t don’t share with the post office yet I don’t I don’t know the individual situation where it was subsequently shared with with the post office but there was certainly those reluctant whether that was just for completeness completeness

To make sure that what was shared with the post office was complete versus I think um it may well but there’s definitely evidence in in submissions from from in this uh um submission around exactly what you just described do you know why Fujitsu might be reluctant to reveal

Even the existence of something called the known error log no no I it the title is known ER log it’s It’s Not Unusual in a large system of certainly of this size that there will be errors and known errors and certainly from the very outset um there were lists of them and

Communication between all parties um how that was communicated to sub postmasters I think is slightly different but known errors were known and lots of people knew them whether a particular one Mr Beer to your question earlier that might be a timing Thing versus not trying to

Share it I’m I’m not at the moment delving into any individual cases as to why the known Arrow log uh was not revealed to a sub postmaster in a prosecution I’m asking why it’s missing from the process yeah I have no idea why it’s not so that would be an appropriate

Moment um if it’s convenient to you to take the morning break until a quarter to 12 that’s fine by me so we’ll um reconvene it quarter to 12 thank you very much sir um it’s a diagramma form the process the main parts of the process that we saw in the 2005 process

Document I think you’ll agree that um it’s either the process uh or the diagram does not include as part of the process checking um event logs yes including the NT event log MH yes yes and I think elsewhere in your statement I’m not going to take you to them I think paragraph 89

And 100 in your witness statement you uh speak to the fact that some errors um which were not otherwise picked up were recorded in such error logs yes you tell us in your statement that um checking event logs was only considered as part of the process of um

The routine process to be undertaken after the locking problems were discovered in 2008 do you know why checking event logs was only considered as part of the routine process after 2008 no I do not Mr B when you describe that for us in your witness statement you say that you

Understood or you UND it is understood to have become part of the process in 2008 um do you how do you know that it was um or it is understood to have become part of the process after 2008 only from the information that we’ve gathered from conversations and and and documentation from

Investigations around the process um and that that is what I think I’ve reflected in the uh in the submission the process that we see in the diagram and in the the policy um did not include checking the message store for any U Notes for example left by SSC staff correct

Correct uh and therefore if SSC staff uh left messages when they had inserted data into Branch accounts we’ve heard about this from um an Chambers uh that would not be revealed by the process undertaken no it wouldn’t be do you know why that check was not built in to the

Process checking the message store for notes left by SSC staff no I do not that might um record or reflect the fact that they heard inserted data into Branch accounts so I I do not Mr Why as a result of those um things that were not um done checking the known error logs um not looking at event logs including the NT event log not checking the message store for notes left by ssse sta ssse staff means that in the gator data Gathering process when the post office

Made a request for arq data Fujitsu did not provide everything that was required to reveal whether Horizon was working properly at a particular Branch at a particular time do you agree I think the the document requesting the aiq I think you said we we we saw earlier about witness statement or no

Witness statement that document laid out the criteria for the surge yes um it did not include those those points that we just agreed yeah those three things that we’ve just agreed on so and and I don’t know why would you agree that the failure to include whether as part of the process

Or a witness statement that reflected the steps that were taken as part of that process mean that Fujitsu did not provide everything that was required to reveal whether Horizon was working at a particular Branch at a particular time properly yes I think the witness statement and other evidence should have been far more

Comprehensive uh before it was placed in front of a sub poost Master yes not just a witness statement the the steps that were Tak oh no indeed yes yes because the witness statement should only be a reflection of what has been done agreed agreed additionally we’ve heard evidence

Uh evidence this week in fact that members of third line support the SSC undertook a process of filtering arq Data before it was provided to the post office and that filtering of data data meant that some relevant data may not have been provided to the post

Office that part of the process the ssse getting involved and filtering data out is not described in either the policy the diagram or the witness statement is it no it’s not so it’s not in the process map we see here no it’s not it’s not in the broader

Policy or indeed in any other document that describes the full process and it’s not in the boilerplate witness statement no it is not indeed would you agree the witness statement the boilerplate witness statement gives the impression that all of the raw data that has been obtained within the relevant date ranges has been

Extracted and provided to the post office yes it does whereas in fact there’s a step in the process that’s not been revealed to the sub postmaster or to the court agreed and so if the evidence that we’ve heard from Fujitsu Witnesses this week is correct then a witness statement that

Followed the template and didn’t mention the filter ing out exercise would mean that the witness statement was false and misleading by Omission wouldn’t it I think the witness statement generally needed to be more comprehensive and it did it absolutely missed those points you’ve just alluded to and it would be

Misleading because it gives the impression of extraction essentially onto a CD very simply yes it does can we um please turn to the utility of the arq data and um look at what what might be one of the most significant paragraphs in your witness statement which is paragraph 19 this is on page

11 you say um the inquiry has asked Fujitsu to confirm whether in its view the arq data provided to the post office over time was sufficient to enable a postmaster to understand whether Horizon was operating correctly at their Branch indeed that is the question that we ask you to

Address in the light of one the evidence heard by the inquiry from postmasters during the human impact hearings two the evidence set out in the fujit 2 witness statements and three the matter set out in this cour corporate statement in relation to the arq spreadsheet Fujitsu

Cannot confirm that arq data on its own was sufficient to enable a postmaster to understand whether Horizon was operating correctly at the relevant branch in the time period covered by the arq data requested by the post office correct so you’re saying uh by reference to three data sources there or

Three bits of information or evidence that the conclusion in the last three lines Fujitsu can’t confirm that arq data was sufficient on its own was uh uh was sufficient to enable a postmaster to understand whether Horizon was operating at their Branch correctly agreed that’s um would you agree a rather startling

Emission yes I would agree and it’s but it’s but importantly it’s the truth on its own the arq data could not give a sub postm of all the data that they would need to determine whether everything in that environment was working correctly apart from the event logs that I’ve described that weren’t um

Accessed the Kels that I’ve um described the notes left in the message store that were not accessed has Fujitsu identified anything else that was needed to understand from a postmaster and a Court’s perspective whether Horizon was operating correctly at their branch in in our submission in the company submission here we haven’t

Identified um any other material or any other systems that needed to be interrogated um in in my um reading of our documentation and given given what I know I think there are other areas that may well be in terms of the other systems inside the um the Creedence

System and the pulse apps how these things all feed into each other should also have been uh should also have been checked in the um that can come down thank you in the um group litigation uh proceedings in the high court in the Horizon issues trial the post offices um expert um Dr

Warden um explained audit data as being Central to the operation of the whole system and he said it’s a central principle of herizon that the core audit database acts as a gold sec sorry a secure gold standard for branches a central principle of horizon that the core audit database acts as a

Secure gold standard for branch accounts and indeed the trial judge Mr Justice Fraser based in part um a number of his findings on this evidence and what he was told about the centrality and completeness of arq I think you’ll know that from reading the judge yes and

The issue that confronted the judge was why was arq Data not sought in a number of the cases and the consequences for the uh reliability of uh action taken against the sub postmaster because arq data was not sourc in the light of what you’ve said I think you would agree that the

Provision of uh the arq data in the form that it was provided and the extent that it was provided was not really the gold standard at all no it wasn’t more a bronze standard or copper standard I I wouldn’t use that characterization at all I’ve seen um putter

Well I have seen one of the um examples I think in Mr castleton’s case and looking at that spreadsheet and it’s I I think for me it’s impossible to determine from that and that’s certainly not a goal standard or any standard it’s a it’s a very simple Excel file which

Tells you not very much do you know why Fujitsu allowed that mischaracterizing ation of the position to stand in the course of the group litigation no I do not whether or not it was the gold standard as it was presented in the group litigation in fact you I think

Agree that arq data was only a start I completely agree and at the very least arq data ought to have been provided in uh any case of the investigation or prosecution of a sub postmaster for a criminal offense yes looking at the three reasons that you gave for um arq

Data uh not being sufficient to enable a sub postmaster to understand whether Horizon was operating correctly at the relevant time the first reason was um evidence heard by the inquiry from sub postmasters during the human impact hearings what was it about that evidence that leads you to the conclusion that you’ve

Reached listening to or reading in my case actually the um the the submissions the notion that all of those sub postmasters um had somehow all uh independently experienced the same thing and were all not aware and couldn’t control it or didn’t know what was going on is clearly not true there were

Problems and the sub poost Masters were flagging those problems and it is very clear from all of the evidence from sub post Masters that on its own it could not be relied upon the AQ that the the arq data that is so it’s listening to the evidence of

Sub postmasters or reading the evidence of sub postmasters so in how is that translated into the arq data was not enough conclusion so in the um research and and the work that the team have done in looking at all the evidence of all the um commentary from the sub postm

To have that volume of commentary around the data the uh the appearance of it how it was presented how it was you there is clearly a problem in that process and that is why we’ve concluded it was not on its own sufficient enough for the sub postmasters to

Conclude thank you the second reason you give for reaching the conclusion you do is the evidence set out in the Fujitsu witness statements and the Fujitsu witness statements are the witness statements that were filed at the same time or roughly the same time as your corporate statement

Yes uh they included um for example um that of John Simkins and Gerald Barnes from whom we’ve heard this week John Simpkins told the inquiry in his witness statement and in his evidence in relation to Legacy Horizon the the message store provided a much more comprehensive account of the data

Held in the audit archive than did at the arq data that was provided presumably it’s that kind of evidence that you’re referring to here as meaning that arq data was uh not good enough yeah yes all three of the um witness statements and is that because in this

Example the information held on the message store would have been of use to sub poost Masters who sought to challenge alleged shortfalls yes and I and and I believe in reading the witness statements from other fij Jitsu colleagues was very clear that M store was a far richer source of that

Information the third thing you mentioned as leading to the conclusion that Fujitsu has reached is the matter set out in this corporate witness statement yes yes is that essentially the six subtopics that you go on to address in your witness statement from paragraph uh 26 onwards yeah it’s the um it talks

About the table yep yeah so if you look at the table yes at the foot of page 14 yes if that can come up on the screen please third corporate witness statement page 14 it’s essentially those six things which are um can I call them problems with arq

Data yes that’s LED you to the paragraph 19 conclusion to yes so let’s just see the context of this if we go back a page to page 13 foot of the page paragraph 26 inquiry has asked whether Fujitsu is aware of any cases where an arq log produced for the purposes of Court

Proceedings against sub postmasters uh one may not have accurately match the original log files or two was or maybe unreliable get together you call them arq reliability and you say you tell us in paragraph 27 in the course of fujitsu’s Investigations to date a number of incidents that may have impacted on

Either the underlying audit trail from which arq data is extracted all the arq extracts themselves have been identified your investigations have included both document searches and discussions with employees they’re described in more detail below given the extensive period covered by the requests and the limitations of relying on interpreting records of technical

Matters without the benefit of guidance or explanation from relevant employees with contemporar knowledge Fujitsu cannot be sure that these incidents uh contained in the witness statement are exclusive and if more are discovered you’ll tell us correct so just looking at sort of the hierarchy of problems

That we’re dealing with one is that in the prosecution of sub postmasters in many occasions no arq data was asked for or provided yes top tier problem second problem in the cases where arq data was provided it wasn’t sufficient in itself see paragraph 19 of your witness statement yes and suffered

From the defects that your employees have described yes third tier problem in any event there were incidents across time that affected the very reliability of the arq data itself yes can we look then at that third tier problem reliability of arq um data so bearing in

Mind the health warning you give us here that um this shouldn’t be taken to be um exhaustive or complete but what you are telling us is is this right that the six incidents or the six issues that you set out in the table do cast out on the reliability and

Completeness of arq data yes can we look please at um paragraph um 28 and 29 on page 15 you say I understand that Fujitsu has identified approximately 2,400 arq requests dating from November 2002 onwards for reasons highlighted above it’s not been possible to conduct a forensic investigation into the arq

Reliability of the audit data supplied to post office in respect of arq requests is that essentially because the raw data is not available in in some cases yes I think before 2007 we don’t have the thew data the following summaries of incidents which Fujitsu has identified as having a potential impact on the

Issue of arq reliability have been prepared from documents produced to the inquiry they’re not within your personal knowledge so just transla the effect of those two paragraphs uh 28 and 29 uh it’s right that the six issues that we’re going to speak about in a moment referred to in the remainder of

Your witness statement haven’t been run against the 2,400 arq requests that the post office made correct to see whether they in fact Afflicted um that data and so secondly is this right the actual impact of the six incidents or issues on the 2,400 arq request is not

Known in some instance they are very time bound some of these six topics so they wouldn’t have applied to a previous version of horizon so there will be definitely not all of them would be have to be applied to all 2400 because of time yes um other than

That you I would agree with your characterization but looking at it the other way around would you agree that these six um incidents or issues are not assessed to have had no material impact on the reliability or Integrity or completeness of arq data otherwise you wouldn’t be telling us yes agreed agreed

Yes instead they have at least a potential impact on the reliability of some of the arq yes I think it follows from that is this right that you accept that the post office ought to have been told about these six incidents or issues I yes they should have been and I

Believe they were in relation to all six we might go through through all of them now as I said I think earlier there was certainly a delay in some correspondence we’ve seen in evidence between when an in when a problem which could affect was communicated but I I am

Unaware Mr Beer whether any of these were help held back entirely okay well we’ll look at that as we go through um um each of them okay and just to be clear so everyone can work out where we are this is a completely separate issue from the 29 bugs errors and defects

That’s um errors and defects with um the operation of the Horizon system this we’re dealing with six um incidents or issues problems concerns uh with the production of arq data yes but just going back to my question I think it follows that you accept that the post office should have been told

About these six incidents yes and that’s because that would enable the post office to um either decide whether Reliance could be placed on the arq data that it was being given or not and if it decided that Reliance could be placed on the arq data then it would need to tell

The defendant and the court about the issue or issues that it had been told about by Fujitsu agreed so it can give proper disclosure of the um flaw in the data which might cast doubt on its reliability agreed that’s why they needed to be told I think it’s clear from um the

Evidence you’re going to tell us about a number of the um six issues that the in ents were indeed known about by the post office and discussions took place um at a senior level between the post office and Fujitsu including the consequences of the error and whether compensation

Needed to be paid by Fujitsu to the post office is that right compensation from fitsu I didn’t quite catch the last part Mr yes when we look at one of the incidents we’ll see that um there was a threat of litigation from the post office to Fujitsu on Theo was that the broken

Audit Trail um yes it was I yes yes indeed I understand so I agree with you Mr Mr be on that one yeah so some of them escalated up to a senior level yeah yes yes I I follow you now yep are you aware of um any instances

Where there was a known or suspected um issue with the arq data and that arq data was nonetheless relied on by the post office in a uh civil or criminal proceeding brought against a postmaster have you got an example I’m asking you whether as part of the process that you’ve gone

Through that you have uh and your company has discovered uh never mind the 2,400 requests that were put into us by the post office office let’s look at the ones that actually resulted MH um in criminal proceedings in a conviction mhm can we see whether any of these six

Um bugs I get to call them yeah uh Afflicted the reliability of that data so so so so my evidence says yes it could have done yes it could have done can we look there at the six um incidents and the first of them comes on page 15 of your witness

Statement I’m going to deal with these at relative speed because um the detail is set out in your witness statement um in in detail and is backed up by over 300 exhibits uh firstly the broken audit Trail this is problem number one I’m going to call

It and we can see what the issue is uh on page 15 at paragraph 30 um in or around May 2001 it was identified that there was a data loss in the audit Trail for a sixday period in August 2000 so I think that tells us that 9 months after the data loss

Occurred it was recognized yes yes at this time audit dat was gathered by an audit server and written to a tape for long-term storage to be retrieved when needed two data centers at Bole and Wigan which contains the main Horizon servers and then you go on to

Describe um in more detail how the data loss occurred and then if we look at the second point which is notification to the post office that’s page 33 sorry paragraph 33 on page 17 so paragraph 33 according to a letter from Yan Holmes to sue um Kinghorn so that’s from

Fujitsu to Royal Male um uh dated the 23rd of May 2001 Fujitsu identified the broken audit Trail while undertaking an audit um data extraction for an internal crime manager in the post office in relation to arq request number8 it appears that data for the period um 8th to the 14th of August was

Held on four of the tapes then if we go over the page please to page um 30 page 18 paragraph 35 you’re quoting U from um in part from the letter on the 9th of May um the post office was notified that Fujitsu was unable to Source the evidential data

Requested then in the letter you’ve just referred to Fujitsu informed the post office of the issue and explained that quote the break has arisen due to a combination of events outside fujitsu’s immediate control but it does mean we’re not able to Reeve TMS records for that Six-Day

Period or other elements of the audit uh Trail are um complete and then if we um go to page 24 please in paragraphs um 40 to 51 you have described for us the attempts to recover and rebuild that missing data but the essence of it is in this paragraph 49 here by October

2001 the backup tapes had also been recovered from the relevant data um Center in order to reconstitute the audit data from the backup tapes a pseudo audit server was built which the backup tapes were loaded onto by December 2001 Fujitsu had reportedly identified that about 66% of the missing data was

Available uh on the backup tapes remaining 34% was not present and was deemed irretrievable Gap in audit Trail was therefore said to have been reduced from a period of six days to less than 24 hours correct so is that an example of the uh the what you would describe as a

Limitation in time of the effect that uh this issue had on the audit drill yes and then if we go forward to page 27 please uh you address steps taken to prevent this happening again I’m not going to go through all of those but if we go forward to page 31

Please at paragraph 63 in the preceding paragraphs you have dealt with essentially um an escalation of Correspondence between Fujitsu and the post office concerning allegations of breach of contract by Fujitsu and threats of litigation by the post office and the outcome of this was that post office and Fujitsu agreed to settle any

Claims regarding possible breaches by Fujitsu of its contractual obligations in return for a payment of £150,000 yes sorry can we turn to um problem number two please omissions in arq data caused by operator error you deal with that immediately underneath these paragraphs here and describe the issue in paragraph

64 so we’re moving forwards in time here to 2003 uh data had been um omitted it was discovered in 2003 in response to three requests and you give the numbers related to Forest Gate and one request related to Herston and that’s in July and DEC December 2003 respectively yes yes and essentially you

Go on to describe a series of operator errors that occurred uh when the operator was seeking to recover data from um uh those two branches in respect of those four Arps yes if we go forwards to um Pages 34 and 35 in in paragraph um 72 you um thank you explain the explanation

Given to um the post office at the time of the cause of the um omissions yes yes I should have said um a moment ago that um these omissions were picked up by a change in Personnel is that right um who was going to attend court so the person that had originally conducted

Those four arq couldn’t attend court a new Fujitsu employee was brought in to attend court Penny Thomas I think and uh she reran yes that’s correct um the four aqs and found that um there was missing data correct and so essentially that was my chance yes if the original

Fugiu employee had been able to attend court um this wouldn’t have been discovered then we go forward to the conclusion on page 35 paragraph 74 um Mr Mitchell provided a witness statement in relation to the two branches is and he concluded that the omissions made in the data um provided by Miss

Lther that’s Nina lather the thir the first person the one who couldn’t turn up at Court had not been repeated in the data provided by Penny Thomas and that the latter data was complete in accordance with the original arq yes so that’s a case where it was revealed and

Revealed in a witness statement yes um third um problem please the repost lock event on of 2008 you describe this at the foot of the page page 75 uh we’re moving forwards now to December 2007 an incident was reported by a branch to the network business support

Center that’s a poll operation it was recorded in a peak and referred to Fujitsu um the information was quote that a BM stock unit had a gain of £ 46573 which did not go to local suspense when the stock unit rolled over the local suspense was cleared and the game was not accounted

For the value of the game was um shown on the trading position line on the Branch’s trading statement the trading position line should always show um zero now in the following paragraph 76 to 109 you set out the history of this repost um lock event which had that effect

There um and how it was first identified by Fujitsu in uh 2007 and then extensively considered uh during 2008 during a series of calls emails and meetings culminating in an internal email uh and presentation to Fujitsu um employees on the 17th of December 2008 so if we go forward to um paragraph

Uh 110 please uh which is at the foot of page 49 this is about when the post office were told um on the 7th of January 2009 uh and Fujitsu employee notified Sue lather of post office and David Gray of post office about the 2008 uh arq issue via email uh Miss

Waram provided a summary of the 2008 arq issue and similar terms MMS to that set out in a proposed witness statement which You’ previously narrated and the various steps that should be taken by Fujitsu and post office to address the issue including and then you set them out um between a and um

E yes given it was clear to Fujitsu in 2008 throughout the course of 2008 remembering the incident had first been notified in December 2007 that the repos lock was an issue capable of impacting on criminal and civil litigation for which arq data was being requested and provided uh do the papers that you’ve

Read or the briefings you’ve received reveal why Fujitsu didn’t alert the post office to the issue immediately no not seemingly for the first time until the 7th of January 2009 so the evidence we we’ve got is that that it was delayed and I don’t know why the papers don’t reveal why

No would you agree that um as the issue was one which was capable of impacting on criminal and civil proceedings as is later recognized it ought to have been notified to the post office promptly yes can we just look please um at the email that you refer to here

In um paragraph 110 if we just go back please um at the foot of um the page you refer to the email on the 7th of January Miss waram notified Sue lather via an email and it’s your footnote 175 can we look please at fuj 0155

399 and it’s a um the Wendy waram email 1046 of the bottom 2/3 of the page thank you I’ve left your a voicemail as I need to update you on a recent issue that has occurred and has been resolved but does have some short-term impacts would you agree that’s being

Presented by Fujitsu as an issue that’s already been solved and fixed it’s only recently Arisen a recent issue that’s exactly what it says whereas in fact this dated from December 2007 didn’t it in the earlier where we where we saw the problem yes it did going back to uh your paragraph 111 please

Which is on page 50 of your witness statement you say um Miss Thomas forwarded uh Miss War’s witness statement to Dave posnet in post office as attaching a proposed um witness statement can we just quickly look at that witness statement please it’s fuj 012 2604 this is the draft witness statement

That it’s proposed by Fujitsu is going to explain in any Court proceedings the repos loock event and can we just look at at um page seven please and at the top of the page so if we can look at the top half um in December 2007 occurrence was reported in one

Office this led to a previously unseen database Bas log where an administrative balancing transaction failed to be written to the local message Thor database this generated a generic and non-specific software error a financial imbalance was evident and was subject to investigation by Fujitsu and post office the financial imbalance has been

Resolved a software correction was applied across the estate in early November 08 to ensure that such an that any such event generated would be monitored testing of the correction is established that the unmonitored error does not occur elsewhere in the system it’s proposed by this witness statement would you agree to summarize

The issue by offering reassurance that testing confirmed that the issue did not occur elsewhere in the system yes that’s that’s what it’s trying to do yes and so effectively reassuring the post office that this was an isolated incident not affecting any other case in which arq data had been

Supplied that that would be the infuence from this yes that’s not accurate is it on the information that you have been provided with because it would because it lasted longer yes well the the fix in November 08 is about monitoring the event after that time what’s overlooked is the

Operation of the event from December 07 until November yes I agree but but I in paragraph 110 I thought Mr Beer she um Miss Wham laid out going back and checking some other factors before which I thought was the point point a yes checking aqs to confirm data

Integrity in the period May 07 to November 08 yeah now what I don’t know is whether that took place I think is what you’re and if it did whether it ever got reflected in statement yes because we know what happened is it was decided in the event not to reveal any

Of this in a witness statement yeah correct the advice well you going you might be going was to remove that those two paragraphs the post office lawyer’s view Rob Wilson’s um view that can come down thank you was that it wasn’t necessary to give disclosure of um this

Incident uh but he said um if we’re sure that there have been no other incidents do you know what steps were taken to determine whether there had been any other incidents as he called them no I don’t are you aware overall of um the provision by Fujitsu of information of the outcome of

Any investigation as to whether the 2008 data lock had affected um any other um aqs so uh I I thought there was it may not have been this particular problem but I think there is something later on in our in our answers around having checked the number of aiqs where problems had been

Presented or not I think in the case of this two 20081 I do not know whether previous um arq material had been checked against that problem and um what about whether irrespective of arq data whether data had been checked in that period to see whether the repos lock had Afflicted the

Integrity of that data um I’m unaware of any other checks had taken place we do have an email um fj15 if we can look at that please 5421 fuj 015 5421 thank you and this is um February it’s the second email on the page 2009 from um Penny

Thomas we just scroll up please um to D POS in post office analysis of the data covering may07 to end November 08 has been completed uh second line next paragraph 27 instances of concern were identified they’ve been fully analyzed we can confirm that the Locking was caused by

Contention between the end of day process and a repost checking checkpoint being written no transactions or balancing action activities were affected so I think that answers the first point um that we were looking at whether there had been a back check over that relevant period um but that’s in relation to 195

Arq it’s not in relation to data that hadn’t been the subject of an arq correct and that’s what I was referring to Mr Beer I said I thought that we had that there had been some analysis back then going going back back to the arq that had been

Submitted can we turn to the duplicate transactions issue which is um problem number four this is paragraph 118 of your witness statement which is on page 54 uh you tell us in 117 the inquiry as indeed we did asked for details of the duplicate transactions incident first

Identified in 2010 and recurrences of it in 2014 and um um 2016 uh you describe what the incident was in paragraph 118 onwards I’m not going to rehearse that it’s quite um straightforwards and if we go forwards to 131 please which is on page 61 you um indicate in paragraph

131 that uh post office were informed about the incident on the 30th of June 2010 yes and I’m going to summarize the um the relevant email it stated that Fujitsu had identified the affected arq it had already developed a workaround uh and the workaround would enable anyone looking at arq data to

Identify the duplicate transactions and ensure that they weren’t brought into account yes and presumably the idea of that is to reassure the post office that um the data still had Integrity um if you use the workaround you could still rely on the data yes uh if we go forwards please to

Paragraph 137 of your witness statement which is on um page 64 between 137 and 140 um you refer to the fact that the post office requested a witness statement to explain the issue and the workaround yes I’m I’m summarizing sorry yes um and uh that subsequently Fujitsu provided such a witness statement yes

Have your um investigations and your briefings in the documents you’ve read um revealed to you whether the uh statements provided by the Fujitsu Witnesses in relation to um data AFF afflicted by the duplication issue true and accurate so I think we’ve got an example in here I I find personally the language

Very comp very convoluted of than being very very clear but there was there is a statement in the witness in the witness evidence um trying to describe what had happened with the uh with the audit but your reading of the material is this right is that as far as Fujitsu was

Concerned the a arq data could continue to be relied upon so long as the worker around have been deployed yes and therefore it was reasonable for the post office to continue to rely on those data that would be my understanding of it yes can I turn to issue five please um

Historic um gaps in the um arq data um you deal with this in paragraph 153 and I think think um this is uh new material sorry it’s on page 73 uh this is new material for the inquiry so it wasn’t something we were asking Fujitsu about that we already

Knew from reading the primary material this is a a voluntary Revelation fujitsu’s identified a small number of documents in relation to the topic uh and you describe um uh what happened from paragraph um um 54 onwards is it right in relation to this incident that there had not been um Revelation to

Um at the post office or was it essentially addressed in the course of meetings the way I understand what um the emails were saying which is on towards the end of that paragraph uh Mr gordner was asked to write up and communicate about during meeting so exactly to the point you’ve just

Made thank you and then lastly please if we can look at um um incident number uh six uh bottom of page 78 in addition to the five other issues I understand that Fujitsu has disclosed to the inquiry 102 documents from its peak database its Pinnacle database and its known erog

Database these um have been identified as records incident records of incidents referring to the arq process in the context of Court proceedings over the page many of these documents relate uh to system changes and support issues however there are certain Peaks set out below that could be relevant to the issue of arq

Reliability uh but in the um course of time available those five sorry um those eight I think there are in total um uh Peaks haven’t been um analyzed is that right correct and does that remain the case yes as far as I know Mr be as far

As I know yes it does thank you that can come down would you agree that um that collection of six incidents presents a rather sorry tale of the reliability of arq data yes it does there were there were many as as is the evidence just been through many um bugs and errors

Throughout um the time with with with the Horizon system in in in all three of its Al certainly in its first two incarnations um so yes I would agree with you and that is one of the three building blocks you’ve used to reach the conclusion that you have in paragraph 19

Yes it is that arq data um ought not to have been relied upon as and presented as being a um an accurate and complete record of the health of the um transactions um conducted by a sub postmaster at his or her Branch agreed and and I would expand it slightly to

Say I think just for the overall health of the system which I think was one of the earlier questions I think for the sub postmaster that data on its own is not sufficient are you aware of um a an experienced Fujitsu employee from the um SSC being required to give evidence in

Court in 2006 and Chambers and um writing after the event a um a document that sought to ensure that problems that she had encountered uh I just stop there so You’ disappeared from the screen can I check that that does not mean that you are not connected I’m I’m still here and I’m

Able to view everything that’s going on in the hearing so it’s um it’s only us that’s losing out yes I I’ll continue with the putting it Mr yeah yes um I’ll continue with the question I was asking you about an Chambers giving evidence in civil proceedings the Lee

Castleton uh civil proceedings um in 2006 were you aware of her preparing a um a document about problems that had Arisen in the um course of preparation for and the act of giving evidence in those civil proceedings so in the pack there is an it’s one of the um in the

Supplementary pack there is her document that you referring to document forgive me it’s called afterthoughts afterthought yes yes so I have read that document can we look at that please fuj 01529 can we see from the second page at the foot it’s signed off by Miss

Um Chambers Mrs Chambers on the 29th of January 2007 and if we go back um to page one um she deals um with four topics the initial approach to ssse Star um the review of the technical evidence that had been undertaken um before she was called to give evidence um the

Disclosure of evidence into the proceedings and accessing help desk calls before um we gave this to you recently is this a document you were aware of no if I just re familiarize you with it before I ask some questions um she says in some 2006 she was asked by the security manager

Whether she would be prepared to speak to a solicitor she dealt about a call she dealt with in 2004 her initial response this wasn’t normal process he reassured me it was more or less a formality so somewhat reluctantly she agreed subsequently before meeting with the solic he asked me what his her

Availability was in the Autumn for the court case this was the first mention there was any possibility of having to go to court repeated assurances that this would all be settled before getting to court proved to be unfounded there may be circumstances where Witnesses are summoned and have no

Option to comply but I was not at all happy about how this was handled at this time are you aware of um within Fujitsu how approaches to witnesses to provide either evidence of facts or expert evidence were supposed to be handled so so I only know what I’ve seen

In my document because I wasn’t there at the time um as a as someone in my position now I am surprised that that was even taking place where there was a direct connection between a member of staff and a solicitor representing um um a sub postmaster no it’s um solista

Representing the post office sorry yeah representing the post off I I was S I am surprised that that was even part of the day-to-day working uh her second issue review of technical evidence um when I took the initial call in February uh 2004 and what she’s referring to here is when she

Was doing her day-to-day work in the third line support she took a call and she administered it on the on the relevant Peak um I spent only a few hours on it before deciding that I could not see any sign of assistance problem I only looked at a couple of weeks

Information while in this case I’m now sure that I didn’t miss anything my initial analysis and my initial analysis was correct I’m concerned there was no technical review of The Horizon evidence between the original call and the case going to court it’s probable that any system problem affecting the accounts

Would have shown up to post office staff who did did check the figures very carefully since the postmaster was blaming the system for the losses I think it would have been sent ible to have double checked this within Fujitsu before it got as far as c i was

Certainly concerned in the early stages there might be something i’ missed once in so just stopping there she’s making a suggestion that in investigation and prosecution or in civil cases one doesn’t just uh before taking action against the sub postmaster um rely on what was done back

In the day there’s a recheck done to your knowledge was what she suggested there implemented from my knowledge no it wasn’t and I think her suggestions are very very important these are serious matters which isn’t just ticking a box and I think the point she’s making here is that given the

Seriousness of it um further analysis should have been done to make sure it was correct and all the data was correct uh once in court she continues I found myself being treated as an expert witness and answering a wide variety of questions about the system although

Normally I was a witness of fact and my witness statement covered just the investigation done in 2004 fortunately I do have extensive knowledge of the system and was able to fulfill The Wider role but what would have happened if the initial call had been handled by a less experienced SSC

Person if there’s a similar case in future where the systems being blamed would it not be sensible to have a technical review of all the evidence at the first indication that a case may be going to court someone in that review would be then well placed to give

Evidence in court I think you’ll agree again that’s a very sensible recommendation a very sensible recommendation and I’ve learned in preparation for for uh the inquiry the change the the the term expert and witness a fact which is very very important we saw in the 2005 process

Document that um a distinction was drawn between a person providing a witness statement of fact and um and a person being called to provide expert evidence but that document did not precisely delineate the difference between them no it did not and it didn’t explain to Fujitsu staff um the um the

Boundaries of each and the additional duties that apply if one is giving expert evidence agreed Mr May agreed uh her third Point disclosure of um evidence uh Fujitsu made a major legal blunder by not disclosing all the evidence the the relevant evidence that was in existence I found myself in the

Invidious position of being aware that some information IE tiv event logs existed but not sure whether they’ve been disclosed or not since i’ had not been party to any of the requests for disclosure it became evident in court they’ not been disclosed she quotes from an email from the post

Office solicitor after the Revelation and then scrolling down this suggests that the disclosure of the message store itself was an afterthought though it is fundamental to the system I think that reflects something you’ve told us already Yes I uh know that for fraud cases the transaction log and event log are

Extracted from the full message store and submitted but surely the full message store has to be disclosed in all cases uh many other files are also archived to the audit servers as a matter of course and could hold relevant information although security team are not necessarily aware of their existence

Or potential relevant I’d like to suggest that a list of these files is compiled so that similar mistakes are not made in the future again sensible recommendation you would agree I would agree and when I when I read this um I was sadly again word I’ve used before appul that we have

A a solicitor writing to a member of Staff pointing out obligations and I think as we’ve already discussed in evidence the material needed rightly needed by sub postm needed to be far more comprehensive which is what Mrs Chambers is alluding to here it’s essentially a um a 2007 reflection of

Some of the points that you make in paragraph 19 of your um uh witness statement um 17 years later yes it is Mr uh and what about calls on Peak which may have been uh which may have evidence attached and any evidence which may have been kept within the ssse I was not

Asked whether I had anything that might have been relevant as it happened she didn’t of course there may be subtleties to this that I’m unaware of whereby data made exist but there’s no obligation to disclose it if this is the case could any future Witnesses be briefed appropriately the response quote no one

Has ever asked for that before does not seem to be a good reason for non-disclosure I think you would agree with those sentiments I would agree with those sentiments yes lastly help desk calls her F fourth issue uh the case highlighted a common problem both in 2004 and now postmaster

Raised many calls about his continuing losses both with Horizon and mbsc these keep kept being bounced and it took weeks before a call was pass to the ssse we’ve heard a lot of evidence about this merry-go round um as between the mbsc and um the help desk uh strictly speaking problems with

Discrepancies do need to be investigated by mbsc in the first instance but where there are continuing unresolved problems it should be possible to get um the issue investigated properly and one of the help desk should be prepared to take responsibility personally I think the Horizon help desk is peniz for passing

Advice and guidance type calls to third line um uh because this leads to too many calls being closed without proper investigation or resolution this is very frustrating for postmasters though possibly not an issue of concern to the post office against sensible and reasonable advice about an an earlier

Escalation within the teers of uh uh the help desk system yes um I think Miss Chambers has made many several points in this document which are very sensible and I think it for a sub postmaster who is uh who who who is constantly calling up for

Problems for that not to be flagged as to needs an intervention and a proper intervention not just passed around um is was wrong and so would you agree overall that this document lists a series of opportunities Each of which was missed by Fujitsu I don’t know what action was

Taken from this but as I said a moment ago to you I’m unaware of whether this has gone into did it go into day today operations or not we’ve heard evidence that um uh the response to this uh from uh Miss CH Mrs Chambers manager was essentially a pat on the

Head and said thank you very much and then they carried on with business as usual well that’s wrong Mr be that’s wrong if that evidence is accurate and nothing was done in relation to each of these four issues would you agree that this is a series of missed opportunities

I would agree this a series of missed opportunities thank you very much Mr Patterson there’re the only questions that um I wish to ask you today as I’ve said already there’ll be more extensive questions of you on a broader range of issues when you come back to give

Evidence um later in the year but thank you very much I don’t know whether there are any questions from uh Representatives I think there are so so might that be an appropriate moment to break until 2: p.m. y certainly thank you sir

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