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Message
From: Brian Altman
Sent: 28/08/2015 08:29:31
To: Parsons, Andrew [/O=BOND PEARCE/OU=First Administrative Group/cn=Recipients/cn=ap6]
cc: Matthews, Gavin [/O=BOND PEARCE/OU=First Administrative Group/cn=Recipients/cn=grm1]
Subject: Re: Post Office - Balancing Transactions [BD-4A.FID26610170]
Andy
Your email reflects, as I now recall it, the effect of our discussions on that topic on 21 July.
While I was away I was alerted to the Panorama programme that went out. I have just watched it.
I think it amounts to little more than sensationalistic reporting.
I think the programme has confused the crime of theft with the crime of false accounting so that it leaves the
viewer with the false idea there has to be theft of money to be guilty of false accounting.
The alleged pressure letter re theft/false accounting was clearly about the ease of POCA recovery & I doubt
had any bearing on whether or not theft should be charged in order to trigger a false accounting plea.
The whistleblower only worked at Fujitsu between 2001 and 2004 so what's his relevance thereafter?
lan Henderson failed to disclose any bugs we had not known about before and McLachlan (Misra's computer
expert) complained that he would like to have had disclosure of another bug which the programme
evens admits in passing had no relevance to her branch.
Brian
Brian Altman QC
Chambers of William Clegg QC
2 Bedford Row
London WC1R 4BU
personal website: www.brianaltmanqc-barrister.com
From: Parsons, Andrew
0.Uk,
Sent: 27 August 2015 10:49
To: Brian Altman
Cc: Matthews, Gavin
Subject: Post Office - Balancing Transactions [BD-4A.FID26610170]
Brian
I hope your trial went well.
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A few weeks back we discussed the issue of Balancing Transactions within Horizon and whether further disclosures were
required (email attached).
My record of the output of those discussions was that:
«There is currently no need for POL to give any further general disclosure to SPMRs who have been prosecuted
about BTs.
e — Inrelation to New Horizon (ie. 2010 onwards), we know from information provided by Fujitsu that the only BT was
in a branch not touched by any prosecution so there is no disclosure to give in this regard.
e — Inrelation to Old Horizon (ie. before 2010), POL are not currently aware of any BTs, albeit that this is due to
limitations in the ability to quickly search for this information within Old Horizon. POL does not have an obligation
to go on a fishing expedition to find any possible BTs, particularly one that would be extremely onerous and
costly.
o General complaints by SPMRs about "remote access" or "mysterious transactions" was not sufficient to
trigger a general disclosure around BTs. If a SPMR raises a focussed complaint targeted at particular
transactions or events, POL may then need to make disclosures in those circumstances. However, it
does not need to go looking for those circumstances.
o If POL knew that a prosecuted branch operating Old Horizon had been subject to a BT, that specific fact
may trigger a disclosure in that specific case. At present, we understand that POL is not aware of any
affected branch and therefore does not need to go searching for this information.
o Ifthe CCRC were to make enquiries around this topic (given that the existence of BTs has been disclosed
to the CCRC in Second Sight's reports), POL may then need to consider doing some form of
investigation. However, such investigation would likely be limited to those cases before the CCRC ie. a
more limited exercise and one within parameters agreed with the CCRC.
POL would you like your confirmation that I've accurately captured our discussions so that they have an audit trail on this
point in case they need to revisit it later.
Do you agree with the above? If you would like to discuss, please feel free to call Gavin or me.
A response sometime next week would be great.
Kind regards
Andy
Andrew Parsons
Managing Associate
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