Defence Secretary John Healey was confronted over the decision to award more than £500million in government contracts to Fujitsu since the ITV drama on the Post Office scandal
Defence Secretary John Healey has said the Ministry of Defence will “continue to consider using” the IT firm responsible for the Post Office scandal.
The Cabinet minister was confronted over the decision to award more than £500million in government contracts to Fujitsu since the ITV drama Mr Bates vs The Post Office aired last year
It comes after the Horizon IT public inquiry this week said at least 13 people are believed to have taken their own lives after Fujitsu’s faulty Horizon system made it look like they were stealing cash. The harrowing report said 59 others had contemplated suicide – including 10 who attempted to do so. Around 1,000 people were prosecuted and convicted using data from the faulty Horizon system, the inquiry estimates.
In a tense interview, LBC host Nick Ferrari asked Mr Healey to “imagine your mother or father took their life” due to the flawed Japanese tech firm’s software as he asked why Fujitsu was still getting new contracts.
Pressed if there was no other tech firm they could use, Mr Healey said: “We are making sure that what they supply at taxpayer’s expense to reinforce our forces or our defence systems that is good value for money and where it is, we’ll continue to consider using them.”
READ MORE: Post Office inquiry bombshell as at least THIRTEEN victims took own lives
A stunned Ferrari said: “But this is a company that we now learn is possibly responsible for 13 people taking their lives, 59 others considering it, and they’re rewarded with the award of five more contracts since 2024. There’s no other supplier out there, Secretary of State?”
Mr Healey attempted to defend that Fujitsu is “the supplier that is best able to meet the terms of the contract”. But Ferrari hit back: “I hear you sir, but imagine your mother or father took their life as a result of the Fujitsu horizon programme, and you now hear that this government has given 500 million pounds in contracts since 2024. How does that sit?”
Mr Healey replied: “I think if, and I’ve dealt as a local MP with some of the postmasters and mistresses and their families that have been hit by this scandal. The one thing that they want is justice.
“The second thing they want is proper compensation. And as a government, we’re determined to get that up in place and speed that up, because the payments have not been fast enough.”
Some 23 contracts, at a combined total of £510,704,582, have been awarded to Fujitsu since ITV’s moving documentary on the Post Office scandal, according to procurement information analysed by Tussell, a firm gathering information on government contracts and spending.
More than half of the £500m of government contracts awarded to Fujitsu related to two HMRC contracts for IT services, while £7m was for contracts at the MoD and £28m was for Home Office contracts,
A Fujitsu spokesman told LBC: “We continue to work with the UK Government to ensure we adhere to the voluntary restrictions we put in place regarding bidding for new contracts while the Post Office Inquiry is ongoing.”
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