Sub-postmasters celebrate the quashing of their convictionsImage source, PA Media

The public inquiry into the IT failures that led to the wrongful prosecution of hundreds of Post Office branch managers begins this week.

One of the most widespread miscarriages of justice in UK legal history is the aim of the new stage of the inquiry.

No one at the Post Office has been held to account.

He was determined to expose the truth.

More than 700 Post Office managers were convicted of criminal offenses after a new computer software system wrongly showed money was missing from individual branches.

Sub-postmasters were forced to pay back money they were accused of missing from their branches.

Sub-postmasters who were wrongly bankrupted and imprisoned testified in the first phase of the inquiry. They said they were treated like criminals by their employers. Dozens of people have had their convictions overturned.

The next phase of the inquiry will hear from the Post Office. What they did or did not do with the information will be examined.

Sir Wyn Williams said the evidence he heard through the spring and summer had made him think.

He stated in a recorded statement that he was going to expose the truth.

The process is expected to take several months, with witnesses called who were involved in the design, roll out, operation and management of the new system.

According to Jez Thompson, who worked on a team training sub-postmasters to use the new software system, there were problems when it was first introduced.

He said that when the software failed to compute the sums, he would pass on the problem to his supervisor.

He said that he reported the issues to his line manager, who then reported them to a weekly meeting with the Post Office and the training company.

Image caption, Jez Thompson worked on Fujitsu's Horizon Training Project which covered 60,000 Post Office branches

According to a member of the UK board, the board wasn't aware of any major technical issues when the project was being rolled out.

ICL was hired by the government to roll out new computers and accounting software in every branch of the Post Office. Mr MacNaughton was in charge of managing the contract after ICL was taken over.

He was under pressure because the firm would only be paid once a working system was delivered.

The system could not have been made live without the approval of the Post Office, he said.

We couldn't put a system in if the customer didn't sign off.

It's not possible to force someone to take something they don't want or don't think works. We are unable to do it.

Image caption, Fujitsu's UK board was never informed of the problems with Horizon, says Andy McNaughton

Mr MacNaughton didn't know the Post Office were prosecuting staff or that data was used to prosecute sub-postmasters.

Two people are being investigated by the Metropolitan Police for failing to tell the truth in court.

"Fujitsu has been co-operating with the current Post Office Horizon IT statutory inquiry since it began and continues to be focused on helping assist its chair and his team", the company stated.

It wants to give the fullest and most transparent information so that key lessons can be learned.

The compensation bill for the victims of wrongful prosecutions has not been paid by the company, and no apology has been made.

Mr MacNaughton said it could be legal. There is an admission of guilt and liability when you start doing that.

He doesn't think there's anything to apologize for since he thinks the Post Office didn't tell him about the problems. More than a dozen staff from the company are set to be questioned at the inquiry.

When it pursued criminal prosecutions against more than 700 of its own staff, the Post Office called on the staff of Fujitsu to testify. Many of them had their contracts terminated due to accusations of theft and false accounting.

The Post Office apologized for the impact of the scandal on the wrongly accused postmasters and believes that the inquiry will ensure thatlessons are learned.

The Post Office said in a statement that it was helping the Inquiry in its important work to determine what went wrong in the past.

The Post Office has agreed compensation deals for sub-postmasters who have had their convictions overturned.

The firm is still able to win government contracts even though it has been removed from the preferred supplier list.

Sir Wyn's determination to "uncover the truth of how theHorizon scandal came about" was echoed by a BEIS spokesman.

They said the statutory inquiry should make sure something like this can't happen again.

The postmasters whose lives have been badly affected by the scandal are getting compensation.

  • Post Office Inquiry
  • Post Office Ltd