Here he comes…

This is one of the only known sightings of Gareth Jenkins, former Fujitsu Distinguished Engineer and one of the original architects of the Horizon IT system.

He was papped in January close to his home in Bracknell, site of the UK Headquarters of Fujitsu.

Jenkins will be giving evidence at the Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry over the next four days where he will be asked about bugs, errors and defects in Horizon and why he did not mention them in his witness statements during the criminal prosecution of at least fifteen Subpostmasters.

Predictions

I suspect Jenkins will say that as far as he was concerned there were no Horizon errors which affected the branches in question.

There will likely follow a detailed examination of just how hard he and his colleagues interrogated the system in order to reach that conclusion.

I suspect, like Anne Chambers’ quick once-over of the data concerning Lee Castleton’s branch for his civil trial, the answer will be nowhere near enough.

One thing the inquiry has already established beyond any doubt is that the Post Office failed to properly instruct Gareth Jenkins as an expert witness. This is an appalling failing by the Post Office legal team.

It wasn’t just that they failed to properly explain his duties to him, during Seema Misra’s case, Post Office lawyer Jarnail Singh told Jenkins his job was to “find the shortest span of [data] logs, analyse it, disprove or rebut what the defence expert is saying in his reports.”

That is not the job of an expert witness.

Disaster Architect

One other snippet of information I expect Jenkins to be asked about is a complaint raised during the evidence of David McDonnell, a troubleshooting contractor who was brought into Fujitsu in 1998 to try to get the system to work.

McDonnell quickly diagnosed Horizon’s problems, including the fact that the cash accounting software was so full of junk code, it couldn’t produce reliable branch accounts.

Whilst McDonnell was based in Fujitsu’s offices in Hounslow trying to deal with these problems, he sought assistance from Gareth Jenkins, who was based in Bracknell. McDonnell was astounded at Jenkins’ “total disengagement” from the problems McDonnell was trying to solve, telling the Inquiry:

“As the chief architect, I would have expected him to be much more involved in overseeing a lot of the previous coding standards and methodologies… I was quite surprised that he was based in Bracknell. I had to dig him out rather than him coming to the building to visit the team. Unless I made a specific effort to try and talk to him about something, he was just not present on the project.”

The BBC have put together a good preview of Jenkins importance to this scandal here.

This week’s plan

I am currently sitting outside Broadcasting House, having done a short hit with Mishal Hussain and Seema Misra on the Today Programme. When I’ve finished this newsletter I’ll head to the Inquiry. I’m going to live-tweet Jenkins’ evidence today and put together a blog post, but I’m not sure if I can attend tomorrow and I won’t be there on Thursday or Friday.

I will write up Jenkins’ evidence on Wednesday and Thursday (and send newsletters), but I am unlikely to live-tweet tomorrow or Thursday.

I won’t be able to do anything on Friday as I am speaking at an event in central Edinburgh. Do come along if you can – tickets can be found here.

Subpostmaster Social

I am delighted to be able to tell you that the Horizon Scandal Fund is organising a Subpostmaster social on 19 July in central London.

The venue is a hop, skip and a jump (or a gentle trundle, depending on your preference) from Aldwych House and is open to Subpostmasters and their immediate families only. It is being funded by the charity and is being held as an opportunity for Subpostmasters to get together and chat. Simple as that.

I realise only a small (but significant and very welcome) percentage of subscribers to this newsletter are former Subpostmasters, but I would be most grateful if those of you who are could spread the word throughout your networks. This is the link to share, which has much more information:

https://www.horizonscandalfund.org/news/a-chance-to-catch-up-with-other-former-subpostmasters

Keen Inquiry followers will note that 19 July is the date that former Post Office Minister Jo Swinson gives evidence and I suspect there will be plenty of people who want to be in the room to hear it.

You may wish to combine a day at the Inquiry with the social, which starts at 3pm. Financial assistance for travel and accommodation is available. More here.

The trustees will be funding the drinks for the event out of their own pockets. If you belong to a legal firm with an interest in the Inquiry and would like to help by putting a few quid behind the bar, please get in touch by hitting reply to this email.

Showtime

Right, I’ve got a half hour walk across town in the glorious morning sunshine to get to Aldwych House, so I’d better stop here. Thanks to everyone who signed up over the weekend.

Have a great day

Nick

PS Told you about Thomson, didn’t I? What a muppet.