Best Of

Another good header from Cyclefree, which along with the majority of PBers (and probably the rest of the public, too) I'm in sympathy with.

Two comments here - while she is right to condemn the "cheeseparing' when it comes to compensation, the figures government pays out in compensation every year are quite significant. It's difficult to get a total figure, as government doesn't publish one, but it's likely well over £5bn excluding exceptional cases like the blood, and Post Office scandals.
I'm not sure what conclusion to draw from that, other than just doing stuff better would save us an awful lot of money.

Secondly, it seems to me that there's little reason we shouldn't pick out the most senior figures in the PO scandal who are most clearly likely to have been in breach of the law, and save years of investigation by concentrating on investigating and prosecuting them first.
That ought to be doable with existing resources.

When government fucks up, the money should be there to right that (invariably) egregious wrong.

No ifs, no buts. Imagine you or a loved one on the end of that "cheeseparing". Yep, we'd both be incandescent.

Worth remembering that in 2003 Alan Bates wrote a letter to the then Chief Executive, Allan Leighton, which set out concisely the 2 key problems with Horizon which it later took a judge over 500 pages to explain in 2019. Had his complaints - and he was in effect a whistleblower - been looked into properly, had they had a Cyclefree Investigations Team, much agony and eye watering cost would have been avoided. The PO's investigations team was nothing of the kind. A decade was lost because so-called managers did not know how to deal with a complaint. This is - to me - a level of incompetence which should never be tolerated, let alone rewarded in the way that it has been. Leighton should be in the stocks quite as much as Vennells.

A decade was lost in the case of Malkinson too.

The blood contamination case is even worse. I've read the report. It makes you weep. I and my brother have a rare blood condition and we were treated for it at the Royal Free's haemophilia unit run by Dr Kernoff. He was one of the doctors who warned government about the problem with infected blood products. It was our sheer good fortune that we did not get treated with any of the infected blood. I have lost all trust in the authorities to behave with any sense of decency towards me should something dreadful be done to me by those authorities. Such good behaviour as there is comes from individuals trying to behave professionally within a system which either makes this harder than it need be or does not reward or value it. And it is incidentally one reason why I am against AD - give the state the power to suggest suicide to those people who will cost it a lot to treat or help (like me, now) and that power will, without question, be abused - no matter what any procedure says.

I think you’re mixing up the two versions of Horizon there. The earlier EPOSS version - generally called legacy horizon, would be the version that was being written about in 2003. Everybody in the business knew back then that it didn’t work; I remember sitting down to lunch in the canteen with people working on it, who were in despair at all its bugs. So if Bates wrote about it, he wasn’t telling the business anything it didn’t already know. The later Fujitsu Horizon was a different beast entirely.

My main concern - alarm bells are ringing - is that we’re hearing the same things from Burnham’s team that we heard from Starmer’s in 2024.

“The plan will come”.

I won’t be lied to twice.

Are you not including Corbyn too? Or did you not regard him as lying. more deluded?

Corbyn lied about anti-Semitism. But that wasn’t not having a plan per se.

I think his lies were more about the extent of the things he was going to provide - free wifi for all etc.

I didn't doubt there was a plan to do those things, though. It wouldn’t have been delivered but I think they did have a plan.

Burnham doesn’t seem to have a plan. Better comms will start him off well but it will only take him so far. Get Blair back in.

If Blair was PM we would have troops in Iran and be in Trump’s pocket. Is that what you want?

Yes, and hell no.

You want our troops in Iran - what would they be doing

Regime change.

Support a new leader, eg Pahlavi, to take over the powers of the state and get their own army running things in Tehran and the oil fields etc (to control money) not the entire mountainous country, then let that leader take it from there.

Um you clearly haven’t the first clue as how big and geographically awkward Iran is.

I do, which is why I literally said do not take the entire country.

Try reading what you respond to next time.

Can you highlight an example where regime changew imposed by the West has worked out well in the long term? I don't say there won't be an example, I just can't think of any, whereas I can think of lots where it's gone badly.

Like socialism, it will always be different the next time.

Lol! ...unlike Neoliberalism which is always the same old failure.

True. We need socialism. Let’s make everyone poorer. That’s just the ticket.

Finish your new build and it can be turned over to a hippy commune 👍

It's all done Taz. We moved in in February. Nine months to build from digging the first sod to moving in. We're now working on the garden which is very fulfilling.

No hippies on site or in sight.

Nice one

I did look at the webpage a couple of times after you mentioned it it.

I couldn’t do it, wouldn’t gave the patience.

I thought you’d planted some apple trees.

No apple trees but about a dozen non-fruit trees: birch, maple, willow, that type of thing. Mrs P. is manically watering to get them through their first summer.

My main concern - alarm bells are ringing - is that we’re hearing the same things from Burnham’s team that we heard from Starmer’s in 2024.

“The plan will come”.

I won’t be lied to twice.

Are you not including Corbyn too? Or did you not regard him as lying. more deluded?

Corbyn lied about anti-Semitism. But that wasn’t not having a plan per se.

I think his lies were more about the extent of the things he was going to provide - free wifi for all etc.

I didn't doubt there was a plan to do those things, though. It wouldn’t have been delivered but I think they did have a plan.

Burnham doesn’t seem to have a plan. Better comms will start him off well but it will only take him so far. Get Blair back in.

If Blair was PM we would have troops in Iran and be in Trump’s pocket. Is that what you want?

Yes, and hell no.

You want our troops in Iran - what would they be doing

Regime change.

Support a new leader, eg Pahlavi, to take over the powers of the state and get their own army running things in Tehran and the oil fields etc (to control money) not the entire mountainous country, then let that leader take it from there.

Um you clearly haven’t the first clue as how big and geographically awkward Iran is.

I do, which is why I literally said do not take the entire country.

Try reading what you respond to next time.

Can you highlight an example where regime changew imposed by the West has worked out well in the long term? I don't say there won't be an example, I just can't think of any, whereas I can think of lots where it's gone badly.

England 1688.

Regime change imposed by the West?

1688 was regime change driven from within, which is a completely different beast.

It was an invasion to support one domestic faction against another. Much like backing the northern alliance in Afghanistan.

William III was a Johnny Foreigner usurper. Discuss.

What about William 1. Does he not get a mention?

He was a fucking disaster as King. Ask any Yorkshireman.

My main concern - alarm bells are ringing - is that we’re hearing the same things from Burnham’s team that we heard from Starmer’s in 2024.

“The plan will come”.

I won’t be lied to twice.

Are you not including Corbyn too? Or did you not regard him as lying. more deluded?

Corbyn lied about anti-Semitism. But that wasn’t not having a plan per se.

I think his lies were more about the extent of the things he was going to provide - free wifi for all etc.

I didn't doubt there was a plan to do those things, though. It wouldn’t have been delivered but I think they did have a plan.

Burnham doesn’t seem to have a plan. Better comms will start him off well but it will only take him so far. Get Blair back in.

If Blair was PM we would have troops in Iran and be in Trump’s pocket. Is that what you want?

Yes, and hell no.

You want our troops in Iran - what would they be doing

Regime change.

Support a new leader, eg Pahlavi, to take over the powers of the state and get their own army running things in Tehran and the oil fields etc (to control money) not the entire mountainous country, then let that leader take it from there.

Um you clearly haven’t the first clue as how big and geographically awkward Iran is.

I do, which is why I literally said do not take the entire country.

Try reading what you respond to next time.

Can you highlight an example where regime changew imposed by the West has worked out well in the long term? I don't say there won't be an example, I just can't think of any, whereas I can think of lots where it's gone badly.

England 1688.

Regime change imposed by the West?

1688 was regime change driven from within, which is a completely different beast.

It was an invasion to support one domestic faction against another. Much like backing the northern alliance in Afghanistan.

William III was a Johnny Foreigner usurper. Discuss.

I think he might qualify for ILR, though perhaps not with Restore. Mother - Princess Royal; grandfather - King of England; great grandfather - king of England; two uncles - kings of England. Bits of Scottish and Welsh blood creep in via Mary Queen of Scots and Henry VII. Arrest. Deport. Do not pass go.

George I would have failed the Secure English Language Test.

Another good header from Cyclefree, which along with the majority of PBers (and probably the rest of the public, too) I'm in sympathy with.

Two comments here - while she is right to condemn the "cheeseparing' when it comes to compensation, the figures government pays out in compensation every year are quite significant. It's difficult to get a total figure, as government doesn't publish one, but it's likely well over £5bn excluding exceptional cases like the blood, and Post Office scandals.
I'm not sure what conclusion to draw from that, other than just doing stuff better would save us an awful lot of money.

Secondly, it seems to me that there's little reason we shouldn't pick out the most senior figures in the PO scandal who are most clearly likely to have been in breach of the law, and save years of investigation by concentrating on investigating and prosecuting them first.
That ought to be doable with existing resources.