My Lords, I will be moving the amendments tabled in my name. I will also discuss the other amendments tabled ahead of Committee.
Amendments 7 and 8 in my name are about condition E. They are technical amendments concerning condition E in Clause 2(6) to ensure that it is clear how the condition should operate. Condition E requires that, to be in scope of the Bill, at the time of the alleged offence, a relevant version of the Horizon software was being used in the branch where the individual was carrying out Post Office business. Currently, this condition does not have the same provision for overlapping dates, which we have in condition A relating to the offences falling within the Horizon period.
The provision in condition A ensures that convictions meet the condition if the date of an offence overlaps with the specified dates, even if it does not fall entirely within it. The absence of an overlapping dates provision for condition E means that it could be possible for a Horizon case conviction to meet condition A but not condition E, even though both are intended to relate to a relationship between the use of Horizon and the date of offending in the same way. This makes condition A less effective so, to remove this inconsistency of approach and ensure that the criteria are clear and operate as intended, we seek to amend condition E to include an overlapping date provision similar to the one included in condition A.
This approach allows us to include within the quashing the possible circumstance where, following the installation of Horizon, an alleged shortfall was identified and the Pose Office concluded that this shortfall must be as a result of theft or some other offending over a period leading up to this installation, leading to a charge offence date overlapping with the period of installation.
Turning to DWP cases, I will now address Amendment 1 in the names of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer of Thoroton, and the noble Lord, Lord Sikka. I thank them for their careful consideration of this issue. It is the Government’s view, however, that the cases the DWP prosecuted are
of a very different character from the cases in the scope of this Bill. Therefore, the Government’s position on this matter is unchanged. These cases were investigated and prosecuted between 2001 and 2006 by DWP investigators using different processes from those used by the Post Office. They are of a fundamentally different character.
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The DWP prosecutions were for welfare-related fraud offences and did not arise from shortfalls in the Horizon IT system. Rather, they were related to the fraudulent use of pension and allowance order books or girocheques. Many involved people stealing money intended to be paid in benefits to vulnerable people. We know of cases in which organised criminals seized large numbers of girocheques and order books, which were then converted to cash.
Crucially, unlike the cases in the scope of this Bill, cases prosecuted by the DWP relied principally or exclusively on non-Horizon evidence. They relied on physical evidence of irregularities in the security foils on the order books or girocheques, slips being cashed out of sequence in the books, stamp and handwriting discrepancies, surveillance and evidence from searches. Parallel work concluded by accredited financial investigators traced the money in many cases to show that it was actually going into staff members’ bank accounts.
A typical case could involve, for example, someone working in a Post Office removing pension books, sometimes in large numbers in conjunction with organised criminal gangs, and cashing them separately, keeping the cash for themselves. When the pensioner arrived at the Post Office to collect their pension book, it was not there, leading to delays and difficulties for them in accessing their pension.
Unlike cases prosecuted by the Post Office, we are not aware of DWP cases that have been overturned on appeal. Given that the DWP cases are of a very different character from those in scope of the Bill, I hope that the noble Lords will agree not to press their amendments. If there are cases prosecuted by DWP that do not follow this pattern, they can, of course, be reviewed by the CCRC, but it would be inappropriate to overturn them in bulk.
I turn now to the amendments on the Court of Appeal. Amendments 2 to 6 and 9 to 12, in the names of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, and the noble Lords, Lord Holmes and Lord Arbuthnot, address Court of Appeal cases. I thank the noble Lords for their consideration of Court of Appeal cases but, after careful consideration, the Government’s position remains unchanged.
The Bill is unprecedented and constitutionally sensitive. It is therefore vital that we legislate carefully, respecting the separation of powers and the independence of the judiciary as far as possible. The Court of Appeal cases are excluded from the Bill because we believe the Government must tread carefully with judges in the senior appellate courts have considered a case. Some of these amendments seek to navigate a middle ground by excluding only cases upheld on appeal or only those considered after the landmark civil case of Bates v Post Office.
Although I understand and appreciate the compromise being sought here, the Government’s view is that these opinions are no more constitutionally appropriate than removing the full exclusion as proposed in the other amendments. Our view is that there is a line here that is not for the Executive to cross in seeking to reverse decisions of the senior appellate courts. We recognise that this approach may leave individuals in question concerned about the way forward for their cases. In cases where the Court of Appeal has upheld a conviction, the usual routes of appeal remain available to them, and the Criminal Cases Review Commission stands ready to consider these cases, should the individuals concerned wish to pursue a further appeal.