1 Friday 28 June 2024 2 (9.45 am) 3 GARETH IDRIS JENKINS (continued) 4 MR BEER: Good morning, sir, can you see and hear us? 5 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: No, I can't hear you actually. I can see 6 you fine but I can't hear you. 7 MR BEER: Can you hear me now, sir? I'll try once more. 8 Can you hear me now, sir? (Pause) 9 Can you hear us now, sir? 10 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: I can. 11 MR BEER: Thank you very much, sir. 12 This morning's questioning is going to begin with 13 questions from Ms Page. 14 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: Thank you very much. 15 Questioned by MS PAGE 16 MS PAGE: Do you remember going into the witness box in 17 Guildford Crown Court on 14 October 2010? 18 A. Yes, I do. 19 Q. Seema Misra was in the dock, she sits beside me now. Do 20 you recognise her? 21 A. Yes, I do. 22 Q. The judge will have been on the bench, yes? 23 A. Yes. 24 Q. The jury will have been opposite you, looking straight 25 at you. Did you know that the reason that the jury are 1 1 positioned in that way is so that they have the very 2 best view of the witness, so that they can see and hear 3 the witness in the best way? 4 A. I wasn't aware that that was why the court was arranged 5 that way, no. 6 Q. It's arranged that way because it was for them to weigh 7 up your evidence, wasn't it, the truth of what you were 8 saying? 9 A. I was aware that that was what they were trying to do, 10 yes. 11 Q. Do you remember taking the oath? Because that was the 12 moment after which you were bound to tell the truth, the 13 whole truth and nothing but the truth? 14 A. Yes, I remember that. 15 Q. Was it just like the day job, just like supporting 16 another ticket? 17 A. No, it wasn't. It was a very different experience from 18 what I was normally doing. 19 Q. Because you said earlier this week that you approached 20 giving evidence in the same way, and that's why you just 21 confined yourself to the narrow answers to the narrow 22 questions that you were asked; do you remember saying 23 that? 24 A. I remember saying that, yes. 25 Q. But, actually, you acknowledge it was very different to 2 1 the day job, wasn't it? 2 A. Yes, it was. 3 Q. It will have felt -- 4 A. Sorry, yes, it was. 5 Q. I'm so sorry. It will have felt very different. It 6 will have felt probably, I would imagine, quite 7 extraordinary to be there in the witness box with 8 Mrs Misra in the dock, knowing that her fate would turn 9 on what you said. Did it feel extraordinary? 10 A. It certainly felt different from normal, yes. 11 Q. Did you know that the trial was also a test for Horizon? 12 A. I'm not sure whether I did or not. 13 Q. By then, Horizon was an out-of-control monster, hundreds 14 of innocent people had already had their lives ruined to 15 protect it, but you don't accept that, do you? 16 A. I was not aware of that at the time, no. 17 Q. You told us yesterday, "As far as I was aware, all the 18 bugs had been fixed. That was my true belief at the 19 time and still is", and you confirmed that you rejected 20 the findings of the Horizon Issues judgment. 21 A. Yes, and I still stand by that. 22 Q. Isn't the truth that you knew that Horizon was a monster 23 and that it was causing harm? 24 A. No, that was not how I felt. 25 Q. You hid it, didn't you? 3 1 A. No, I did not. 2 Q. You answered a lot of questions yesterday about the 3 Misra trial which were effectively aimed at 4 understanding why you didn't tell the jury about the 5 monster, and you answered most of them with variations 6 of "I realise that now", "I should have done that, 7 I realise that now". 8 You had to say that, didn't you? 9 A. That's the truth. That's why I said it. 10 Q. In fact, you knew what you were doing. You threw mud in 11 the jury's eyes, didn't you? 12 A. I did not. 13 Q. Well, Mr Jenkins, in the 1931 film of Frankenstein, the 14 monster is an assemblage of body parts from various 15 corpses and they're brought to live by stitching and 16 bolting them together. I'm going to go through some of 17 the body parts that were stitched into Horizon and see 18 what you accept and what you don't accept. 19 So let's start, please, with cash accounts. If 20 I could ask, please, for EXPG0000001. It's Professor 21 Charles Cipione's expert report prepared for this 22 Inquiry. 23 Can we go to page 118, please. What I'm going to 24 take you to is his conclusions about his analysis of 25 some 57,000 PEAKs, PinICLs and KELs. Now, if we go to 4 1 17.1.3 please, and I'll start a little way in, where it 2 says that AI376 -- end of the first line: 3 "AI376 (Accounting Integrity) caught my attention. 4 Accounting integrity is a fundamental requirement of the 5 LHITS [that's one his acronym for the Horizon system]. 6 AI376 was one of the final AIs to be closed." 7 That's Acceptance Incidents, yes? 8 A. Yes. 9 Q. At 17.1.6, if we go down a little, it says: 10 "In January 2000, ICL Pathway states 'If pressed 11 POCL [Post Office] would agree that AIs 342, 372, 376, 12 378, 218, 391 are closed/incapable of further update. 13 Their Acceptance Manager is leaving [blah, blah, blah]'. 14 Further in the same report it states that 'The outturn 15 AI376 was 0.06% Cash Account Discrepancies, exactly 16 an order of magnitude better than the target ...'" 17 Now, did you know that AI376 was ultimately resolved 18 by an agreement that a small number of cash account 19 discrepancies would, in fact, be acceptable? 20 A. I don't know that I knew that at the time, I do know 21 that now. 22 Q. A bit further down, 17.1.9, Professor Cipione says this: 23 "Regardless, the fact that accounting integrity was 24 a persistent issue in the national rollout of the 25 [Horizon system] cannot have been the intention of the 5 1 sponsors nor the goal of ICL Pathway." 2 Do you accept that? 3 A. I'm not sure I quite understand what that means. 4 Q. What that means is that accounting integrity was 5 absolutely fundamental to an accounting system and the 6 fact that he saw, through this analysis, that it was 7 a persistent issue in the national rollout, he says, 8 well, that just can't have been the intention of those 9 who were designing or commissioning the system. 10 A. I think it was the intention that there was accounting 11 integrity in the system. 12 Q. But it wasn't the intention that that would continue to 13 be a problem holding up acceptance, was it? 14 A. I wasn't involved in the acceptance area and I wasn't 15 involved in the accounting side of things, at that time. 16 Q. Is that right? Because I could take you to 17 a document -- and I will if I need to -- which refers to 18 resolving AI376. It's a progress report by a fellow 19 called Roger Donato from August 1999. Do you know Roger 20 Donato? 21 A. Yes. 22 Q. It says there -- shall I bring it up for you? If we 23 could go, please, to FUJ00079162. We see at the top it 24 says it's a progress report and we can see it's prepared 25 by Roger Donato, dated 20 August 1999, and if we go down 6 1 please a little to paragraph 2.1, you're named here. It 2 says: 3 "Last week's activities: 4 "As part of the Acceptance discussions Pathway has 5 documented a plan to incorporate carry out 6 reconciliation processing in the TIP interface: 7 (documented by John Pope and Gareth Jenkins) ..." 8 A. Yes. 9 Q. "Pathway is not committed to producing a tool to 10 re-input lost transactions (though I expect it to remain 11 on the agenda -- Acceptance Incident 376)." 12 The same one we've just been talking about. So you 13 may not have been centrally involved but you must have 14 known, Mr Jenkins, that AI376 was an Acceptance Incident 15 about cash accounts? 16 A. I was aware there were Acceptance Incidents, I'm not 17 sure that I was that aware of the details but I was 18 aware that there was some work required in terms of 19 adding further reconciliation into the system. 20 Q. All right. Well, we can take that down. So you don't 21 accept that you knew that cash accounts were 22 a persistent problem through the rollout. Am I right? 23 A. I was aware that there were a number of problems but 24 I wasn't involved in the detail of the problems that 25 were actually occurring. My role at that point was with 7 1 the agent's side of things. 2 Q. Can we go back, please, to Professor Cipione's report, 3 I'm sorry to have had to take it down. EXPG0000001. If 4 we could go, please, to page 135. That figure, in the 5 middle of the page, is his review of the PEAKs, PinICLs 6 and KELs, and it's those that he's picked out where 7 there is a bug causing receipts and payments mismatches, 8 so in other words cash account problems. Do you see on 9 the right, "Development Code" was the cause of 10 33 per cent of them? Then we've also got various other 11 causes to do with development: low-level design, 12 development reference data, et cetera. 13 If we go a bit further down at 18.1.19, please, just 14 there: 15 "Based on this data I make the following 16 observation: 17 "A significant proportion of these [PEAKs and 18 PinICLs, that's his abbreviation] had defect causes that 19 were recognised as being related to the design or 20 development of [the Horizon system] (45%). This 21 indicates to me that there were acknowledged bugs, 22 errors or defects in [the Horizon system] that were 23 capable of giving rise to a payment and receipt 24 imbalances." 25 Do you accept what he says there? 8 1 A. I think this is referring to the very early days during 2 the rollout of Legacy Horizon. 3 Q. Well, it's over number of years and they were mostly 4 from the relatively early years but they go into the 5 early 2000s, so we're not talking just about rollout, 6 we're talking about going into the early 2000s here? 7 A. I think rollout didn't complete until about 2002. 8 Q. Well, we can find out the exact dates on that if you 9 like, but what we'll do, if I may, is ask you this: do 10 you accept that, in those early years of Horizon when 11 people were being prosecuted, a significant proportion 12 of the PEAKs and PinICLs which related to accounting 13 problems were down to the design and the coding of 14 Horizon? 15 A. I accept that is what Professor Cipione found out. 16 I wasn't involved at that time and wasn't aware that 17 people were being prosecuted at that time. 18 Q. If we go a little bit further down, please, at 18.2.4, 19 he says this about his review of the documents: 20 "... I make the following general observations: 21 "Many of these [PEAKs and PinICLs and KELs] seem to 22 have been raised as a result of internal 23 reconciliations." 24 So that was your area, wasn't it, the 25 reconciliations? 9 1 A. No, my area was to do with the harvesting of the 2 transactions that had been generated as part of the 3 reconciliation. 4 Q. "There does appear to be an earnest effort, on the part 5 of SSC, to investigate these issues, identify a root 6 cause, and mitigate future recurrences. 7 "The tickets show that different teams were involved 8 when investigating these issues. 9 "In the majority of these [PEAKs and PinICLs], it is 10 not evident that the identified fight issue was 11 resolved. 12 "In a majority of these [PEAKs and PinICLs] the root 13 cause is related to [the Horizon system]." 14 So the issues were not always resolved, Mr Jenkins. 15 A. I believe -- 16 Q. You believe they were, you say? 17 A. I believe they were by the time I got involved with the 18 counter system a few years later. 19 Q. You told us, when all these issues had been resolved, 20 all issues had always resolved, that was based on 21 informal chats, yes? 22 A. Yes. 23 Q. But if you chatted to any of the people involved in 24 these PEAKs and PinICLs and if they'd been honest with 25 you, they'd have said, "Well, you know, Gareth, 10 1 sometimes, despite my very best efforts, I just can't 2 get to the bottom of these accounting problems, and 3 I just have to close the ticket without a resolution". 4 Did none of them ever say that to you in these informal 5 chats? 6 A. I can't remember that sort of discussion, no. 7 Q. Did none of them ever say to you, "When I am stuck, 8 I just have to inject transactions into the branch 9 accounts to sort the problem out. Needs must. I know 10 it's not ideal. I haven't really got to the bottom of 11 the problem but at least the branch can balance and 12 I can move on to all the other tickets waiting in my 13 stack". 14 Did any of them ever say something like that to you 15 in those informal chats? 16 A. I don't think it would be quite in that way. It would 17 be a case of, when there was a problem, you would need 18 to make some adjustment to address the fact that that 19 problem would happen, but you would then need to 20 actually go and fix the underlying root cause of the 21 problem. A good example of that is what we were talking 22 about a day or two ago, in terms of the receipts and 23 payments mismatch. Not only did we have to actually fix 24 the root cause of the problem, but we -- but then 25 changes did need to be made to actually take into 11 1 account the impact that it had had on the branches. 2 Q. The point is, Professor Cipione tells us that they 3 couldn't always find the root cause of the problem, 4 Mr Jenkins, and they would just close the ticket anyway. 5 A. I understand that that is what he says in his report but 6 his report was only on the very early days of the 7 problem. I think things improved after that point. 8 Q. All right, well, let's just think about that and when it 9 might have improved and what we'll do is move to what 10 I call body part number 2, which is remote access. 11 Mr Beer asked you some questions about Mr Roll's 12 evidence on this subject but I don't think that he read 13 out a section of it, which was Mr Roll's explanation for 14 why SSC used the ability to inject messages at the 15 counter using the SPM's ID. I won't take you to it 16 unless you need me to. What he said was this: 17 "Without the correct user ID at the start of every 18 message, then there would have been errors, things 19 wouldn't have been processed properly, from what 20 I remember. So you wouldn't have gone in that way to 21 make changes to the message store." 22 So during the GLO, SSC witnesses did ultimately 23 admit that they injected messages at the counter, didn't 24 they? 25 A. Yes, I was aware of that. 12 1 Q. They must have had their reasons for doing that rather 2 than injecting them at the correspondence server, as you 3 said you believed was the proper routine? 4 A. Yes, and I did have that conversation with John Simpkins 5 as part of the preparation for the GLO. 6 Q. Did he agree with Mr Roll that the reason for doing it 7 at the counter was because, otherwise, there would have 8 been errors and things that wouldn't have processed 9 properly? 10 A. No, because there was a mechanism that, if messages were 11 injected at the correspondence server, that 12 an artificial user ID could be picked up for those 13 messages, so that they would process correctly through 14 the system. 15 Q. But he admitted that sometimes they would do it at the 16 counter, so there must have been a reason for that. 17 Sometimes, presumably, doing it on the correspondence 18 server, the proper-ish way, didn't work? 19 A. I didn't fully understand the details of the reason. 20 There was one specific example that he did explain to me 21 where it had to be done at the counter and it was 22 nothing to do with injecting a transaction. I can't 23 remember the other examples he gave to me but, as far as 24 that was concerned, it was sufficient for me to know 25 that there had been some injections at the counter to 13 1 realise that it had been done. 2 Q. Do you accept that one of the problems or one of the 3 possibilities of injecting transactions is that there 4 might be knock-on consequences, unintended consequences: 5 you tried to fix one problem by injecting a transaction 6 and then it causes another problem? 7 A. I accept that that's a possibility. 8 Q. But you say that, at the time, you knew nothing about 9 any of this: it was just a theoretical possibility? 10 A. That was what I understood, yes. 11 Q. Let's look at your witness statement, your fourth 12 witness statement, please, at page 33, paragraph 106. 13 Now, just before paragraph 106, you had set out the 14 explanation that you gave us here in the tribunal, in 15 other words what you've just said now, that you didn't 16 believe that they were using the theoretical ability to 17 inject at the counter until the GLO. But then in 106 18 you say this: 19 "In the years when Legacy Horizon was operational 20 (ie up to 2010), my understanding from my colleagues was 21 that, on the rare occasions it was used, the default 22 position was that substantive remote access was done at 23 the correspondence server. During this period, I may 24 have been told that substantive remote access had been 25 done at the counter on one or two occasions (although 14 1 I cannot now remember and cannot point to any examples 2 of this). My lawyers have looked at the Inquiry's 3 database but they have been unable to find any records 4 where I gave advice about substantive remote access at 5 the counter. However, I am aware that Anne Chambers 6 emailed me and others in 2007 and referred to a possible 7 case for 'writing a corrective message at the counter' 8 in relation to a particular problem she was dealing 9 with." 10 Then you cite the email reference: 11 "My lawyers have not found any reply from me on the 12 Inquiry's database and I am not mentioned on the 13 associated PEAK. It is difficult to say therefore what 14 I thought or understood in 2007 about what Anne was 15 proposing (ie whether she meant writing a message at the 16 correspondence server which would cause it to be 17 replicated to the counter or writing a message at the 18 counter itself). I do note though that in her email, 19 Anne remembers to taking the question up with Tony 20 [Jamasb] or Gary Blackburn of POL, so she was clearly 21 adopting an open approach to POL about the possible use 22 of substantive remote access. 23 "At this time, in 2007, I doubt that I would have 24 drawn, or thought a great deal, about any distinction 25 between substantive remote access at the counter and 15 1 substantive remote access at the correspondence server." 2 You wouldn't have thought about it, Mr Jenkins. You 3 wouldn't have thought about the distinction which you 4 now tell us is really rather important? 5 A. I agree with what I said in my statement, yes. 6 Q. Is that a truthful account, Mr Jenkins? 7 A. It is. 8 Q. It's rather at odds, isn't it, with the account that you 9 have wanted to give over the last few days, isn't it? 10 A. I don't think so. 11 Q. Well, you've wanted to give a tidy explanation. You've 12 wanted to say that you knew nothing about SSC injecting 13 transactions at the counter until the GLO, didn't you? 14 A. My memory is that I thought that the transactions had 15 been injected at the correspondence server because that 16 was much easier for SSC to actually do things and 17 I couldn't see any reason why they would need to do 18 things at the counter rather than at the correspondence 19 server. 20 Q. The truth is that you knew that injecting them at the 21 counter was tampering with branch accounts and you knew 22 that, if you admitted to that, it would not help your 23 position, because you had been providing witness 24 statements and giving evidence against Seema Misra, and 25 yet you knew that your Fujitsu colleagues not only could 16 1 but did tamper with branch accounts, didn't you? 2 A. I didn't feel that it made any significant difference in 3 terms of -- the accounts were being changed, whether it 4 was done at the correspondence server or the counter, 5 I just felt -- my understanding was that it was normally 6 done at the correspondence server because that was the 7 simples way of doing things. 8 Q. You knew, Mr Jenkins, as any sensible person would, that 9 it was essential for the safety of prosecutions to have 10 a tamper-proof evidential chain when presenting ARQ data 11 in court. You knew that, Mr Jenkins, didn't you? 12 A. No, I didn't. 13 Q. You knew, as everyone in SSC did, that the practice of 14 injecting transactions at the counter was wholly 15 contrary to being able to rely on Horizon as a source of 16 truth. You knew that, didn't you? 17 A. I didn't know that. 18 Q. You needed to be able to produce 100 per cent accurate 19 records of transactions that took place at the counter 20 in the branch but this practice corrupted that, didn't 21 it? 22 A. It didn't occur to me that had an impact on things. 23 Q. Failing to tell the court that you knew SSC were 24 injecting transactions at the counter was failing to 25 tell the whole truth, wasn't it, Mr Jenkins? 17 1 A. I didn't think that at the time. 2 Q. Let's have a look at the email which caused you to 3 devise this tortured explanation in your witness 4 statement. If we could go, please, to FUJ00142197, Anne 5 Chambers to you, 10 December 2007. You say in your 6 witness statement it was two others but, in fact, that's 7 not correct. Two others are copied in and you are the 8 person it is directed to: 9 "Gareth, 10 "We have a problem with a branch where a single SC 11 line was written for 100 euros (£484) with no 12 settlement." 13 She gives some technical explanation: 14 "... in the middle of two RISP transactions and 15 I suspect it's another oddity in the LFS counter code." 16 Note: another oddity in the counter code, 17 Mr Jenkins. She evidently expected you to know that 18 there had been more oddities, didn't she? 19 A. Um, I don't recall this discussion. I don't recall 20 that. 21 Q. But they'd all been fixed, had they, Mr Jenkins? 22 A. That was my understanding. 23 Q. She goes on with a little more rather technical 24 terminology, which most of us, I'm afraid, probably 25 won't understand, but if we go down to her paragraph 18 1 which begins: 2 "I don't know what to do about it. As it stands, 3 when they balance I think they will have a gain at the 4 branch. If we correct the POLFS feed so it nets to 5 zero, it will not be in line with the branch, and will 6 probably cause problems in future. 7 "This might be a case for writing a corrective 8 message at the counter but this has not been a popular 9 approach in the past. I could try talking to Gary 10 Blackburn or Tony [Jamasb]. 11 "Do you have any bright ideas?" 12 So yes, she was planning to tell Post Office about 13 it but she knew and you must have known that they 14 weren't going to like it. Do you accept that's clear 15 from the way she said this? 16 A. Yes. 17 Q. Did you know that, when she wrote this up for them later 18 in the OCP, the sort of mechanism that was used for 19 approving these injections, she stressed that what she 20 planned to do would not be visible to the branch, 21 Mr Jenkins; did you know that? 22 A. No, I didn't know that. 23 Q. But the main point, from your point of view is this: the 24 words are, in fact, unambiguous, aren't they? She was 25 proposing to write a message at the counter. She was 19 1 not proposing to write a message at the correspondence 2 server which could cause it to be replicated at the 3 counter, in the way that you suggest she might have 4 meant in your witness statement. 5 A. I took that as a loose language. I took that as being 6 a representation of doing it -- affecting the counter 7 accounts rather than the back end accounts. 8 Q. Loose language, Mr Jenkins, really? 9 A. Yes, yes. So what I was thinking that to mean was that, 10 when you inject a message at the correspondence server, 11 it has an effect on the counter, as opposed to making 12 a correction to the back-end system, which was the other 13 option she was talking about in terms of changing things 14 in POLSAP. 15 Q. This is just a complication or an obfuscation which you 16 have brought in to suggest that this email is somehow 17 ambiguous, isn't it, Mr Jenkins? 18 A. That is -- I don't know what to say to that. 19 Q. This email shows that you knew full well that Fujitsu 20 colleagues not only could but did tamper with branch 21 records, doesn't it? 22 A. I would not necessarily have taken that as being -- 23 putting in an injection at the counter at that point. 24 Q. You must have consciously hidden that knowledge when you 25 provided witness statements and gave evidence at Seema 20 1 Misra's trial, Mr Jenkins? 2 A. No, I -- the concept of injecting messages was not 3 something that occurred to me when I was doing that. 4 Clearly, that was wrong, but that -- I'd not thought 5 about whether messages were being injected by the SSC. 6 Q. All right, well, we'll move on to body part number 3: 7 bad error handling in the EPOSS code. Because there's 8 another reason why you don't want to admit to knowing 9 that transactions were inserted at the counter because 10 that's the unintended consequences point I was talking 11 about earlier, isn't it? If there were unintended 12 consequences, as a result of inserting transactions, you 13 wouldn't necessarily know about them. They were hidden 14 by definition. Yes? 15 A. I don't quite understand where you're getting at with 16 that. 17 Q. Horizon might have been failing silently all across the 18 system, mightn't it? 19 A. I don't believe Horizon was failing silently all across 20 the system. I believe that when Horizon had failures, 21 it was generating events that -- I accept the fact that 22 it wasn't necessarily informing postmasters that there 23 had been problems but I believed that there were events 24 there that were being tracked. 25 Q. If there were unintended consequences, silent 21 1 failures -- they're what we might call known unknowns -- 2 you knew that they were likely to be there but you 3 didn't know how to find them to fix them, did you? 4 A. I believed that the event trails would be left and 5 events would be picked up. There was a process in place 6 whereby events should be picked up and investigated. 7 Q. Well, let's just have a think about that in the context 8 of the evidence given by Gerald Barnes, one of your 9 colleagues in fourth line support. Yes? 10 A. Yes. 11 Q. I will try to give a fair summary of what he said on 12 this to avoid the time that would be taken if we went 13 through it in full, and I am sure I'll be corrected if 14 I've got this wrong. He said: 15 "Good error handling should be coded in from the 16 start. Really bad error handling allows a process to 17 'blunder on' even when it has hit a problem and that 18 means that the error is silent, at least to the 19 subpostmaster at the time." 20 What he said was, agreeing with you: 21 "It will leave a trace in the event log which 22 a diagnostician would be able to read but, because the 23 subpostmaster is not alerted to the error at the time, 24 no one would know where to look in the event log. Good 25 error handling ensures that when an error occurs, the 22 1 program aborts with a clear error message for the 2 subpostmaster to see and that way the process will not 3 'blunder on'." 4 The reason that's important, Mr Jenkins, is because, 5 if it does "blunder on", it may create potentially 6 incorrect results. What he said is it's far better to 7 abort and create no results than to "blunder on" and 8 create incorrect results that no one can identify 9 because the error was silent; do you see his logic, 10 Mr Jenkins? 11 A. I understand that, yes. 12 Q. Later in his evidence, he said this: 13 "On the whole, the EPOSS code did not have good 14 error handling." 15 In other words, there were a lot of silent errors, 16 Mr Jenkins. Then, even more than that, he said this: 17 after going through an example of a process that had 18 failed as a result of encountering transactions that the 19 SSC had inserted -- so the inserted transactions had 20 caused a process to fail -- he conceded that: 21 "... it was not possible to know how many other 22 processes had failed silently as a direct result of SSC 23 inserting transactions into the branch." 24 So the inserting capability that was intended to 25 correct accounting problems could perfectly well have 23 1 been causing many, many other uncountable numbers of 2 other problems in the system when the processes 3 "blundered on" and failed silently; what do you say to 4 that, Mr Jenkins? 5 A. I accept that it is a theoretical possibility. 6 Q. Known unknowns -- let's look at it this way: what are 7 known errors before they become known? 8 A. Well, until they're known, they are unknown, obviously. 9 Q. In some cases, Mr Jenkins, unknown errors which became 10 known errors had existed in the system for a long time 11 before they became known, correct? 12 A. That is a possibility. 13 Q. There were thousands of Known Error Log entries, weren't 14 there, Mr Jenkins? 15 A. I'm not sure how many Known Error Log entries there 16 were. I don't know the volumes. 17 Q. There were thousands, weren't there; you knew that? 18 A. I didn't know how many Known Error Log entries there 19 were. 20 Q. There's no way of knowing, Mr Jenkins, how many unknown 21 errors there were, is there? 22 A. My understanding was that the system was behaving well. 23 Q. You're not a fool, are you, Mr Jenkins? 24 A. I don't believe so. 25 Q. You would have known of the potential unintended 24 1 consequences of the SSC going off piste, wouldn't you? 2 A. I wasn't aware that the SSC were getting involved on -- 3 my understanding was it was very, very rare for the SSC 4 to need to inject any sort of transactions. Yes, you've 5 got -- you've shown me an example here but my 6 understanding was that it was a very rare occurrence for 7 such things to happen. 8 Q. Body part number 4: the EPOSS code itself. Professor 9 Cipione assessed the examples of EPOSS code that David 10 McDonnell used to draw attention to problems with the 11 EPOSS code back in 1998. I don't intend to call what he 12 says up, a few quotes will do. Take into example 1, 13 Professor Cipione said: 14 "This is terrible code. This is terrible code." 15 He said it twice: 16 "This has to be a joke. I mean, this has to be 17 a joke because this is a ridiculous set of code." 18 Taken to another example: 19 "It's just not the right structure and it indicates 20 to me that they don't understand what those particular 21 structures are." 22 Taken to another example: 23 "So either this is written by someone not so smart 24 in here or there's been multiple updates to this code. 25 Either way, it's a bad example." 25 1 When did you take over as the counters man, 2 Mr Jenkins? When did the EPOSS code become your 3 problem? 4 A. I'm not sure the EPOSS code became my problem. My role 5 was to do with actually designing the -- at the high 6 level, the way that the counter needed to work in terms 7 of impact, which would have been around 2004/2005, 8 something like that. 9 Q. But you would accept, wouldn't you, that, for the 10 counter to work, it has to work on the basis of the 11 EPOSS code, yes? 12 A. Yes. 13 Q. So when did the quality of the EPOSS code become your 14 problem? 15 A. Like I say, around 2004/2005. That sort of time. 16 Q. Do you say it had stabilised when you took it over? 17 A. I believed that it had. 18 Q. What safeguards did you put in place to assess that? 19 A. I didn't do anything specific about that. My 20 understanding was that it had been working well for some 21 time before I got involved with it. I accept that there 22 were these problems in the early days, which I hadn't 23 been involved in specifically, but there had been plenty 24 of time then for things to have been sorted out and for 25 it to be working stably. 26 1 Q. Did anyone tell you in 2004 about this history? 2 A. Not that I recall. 3 Q. So no one told you that it might be important to keep 4 an eye on this beast which had these sections of 5 dreadful code in? 6 A. Not that I can recall. 7 Q. Did you have anyone assessing the quality of the fixes 8 that were being put in under your watch, as it were? 9 A. I was relying on the competence of the designers and 10 developers who were actually doing the detailed coding 11 at that time. 12 Q. So no one assessed their work to ensure it was done to 13 a high standard? 14 A. Well, they were assessing each other's work. That was 15 part of their process. 16 Q. When they were assessing each other, did anyone raise 17 any concerns with you about the quality of the code or 18 the fixes? 19 A. I can't recall any examples of that. 20 Q. Do you say you can't recall but there might have been 21 some? 22 A. It is possible but I can't recall. My understanding was 23 that it was working well by that time. 24 Q. How many bugs were being addressed on a weekly basis? 25 A. I can't remember. 27 1 Q. Tens? Hundreds? Thousands? 2 A. I don't know. 3 Q. You don't know? 4 A. I don't know. 5 Q. Who was your line manager, Mr Jenkins? 6 A. It varied a lot over the time. 7 Q. What was their job title; what was their role? 8 A. Design Managers, Chief Architect. There was that sort 9 of role. 10 Q. What was your reporting line to the Board? 11 A. What do you mean by "the Board"? Do you mean the Post 12 Office Account Board or the Fujitsu Board, or whatever? 13 Q. The Fujitsu Board: what director were you sitting under? 14 A. I've no idea. This would have been about sort of seven 15 or eight levels above me. 16 Q. So, in other words, a very indirect reporting line, 17 then, all the way up to the Board; is that right? 18 A. Yes. 19 Q. How would anybody have raised any problems to the Board 20 if they were concerned about the quality of the EPOSS 21 code and the fixes that were going in to try to make it 22 better? 23 A. I've no idea. 24 Q. No whistleblowing procedures that you were aware of? 25 A. Not that I'm aware of. 28 1 Q. Body part number 5, Mr Jenkins: hardware failure. Would 2 you accept that, from the year 2000, you knew that when 3 hardware failed and was swapped out, there could be 4 problems with recovering transactions? 5 A. Yes, I was aware of that but I was also aware that it 6 didn't happen very often. 7 Q. How were you aware of that? 8 A. Again, informal conversations. 9 Q. Informal chats, I see. People said to you in informal 10 chats, "Oh yeah, no, we don't have recovery problems 11 after hardware failures very often. That's not 12 something that happens very much"; is that right? 13 A. That was how I understood things. 14 Q. I see. Well, I won't need to take you, then, to one of 15 the PinICLs from the year 2000, in which you yourself 16 dealt with a recovery problem and in which you said 17 this: 18 "This was another example of recovery having gone 19 wrong after a box swap." 20 Do you take my point from the way I emphasised the 21 word "another example"? 22 A. Yes, I understand what you're getting at there. 23 Q. You personally knew that there were plenty of examples 24 of recovery problems after box swaps, didn't you? 25 A. It depends what you mean by "plenty". Clearly, there 29 1 were -- it had happened more than once. 2 Q. You were aware of persistent problems with 3 synchronisation between counters, within a branch, after 4 a hardware failure. You knew that they were 5 a persistent problem, didn't you? 6 A. I knew they had been in the early days but I believe the 7 problem you're referring to did get fixed. 8 Q. Let's look at what you said about hardware in your Misra 9 evidence. Your third statement for the Seema Misra 10 trial, you attached the Horizon Data Integrity Report to 11 it, didn't you? 12 A. I did. 13 Q. In fact, what you did was a formal process that we 14 lawyers refer to as exhibiting your report. Did anyone 15 tell you what "exhibiting" means? 16 A. Just attaching a document, rather than cutting and 17 pasting it into the formal statement. 18 Q. It makes it part of the evidence, Mr Jenkins. Did you 19 understand that? 20 A. No, I didn't understand that. 21 Q. You told Mr Beer that you did this, you exhibited this 22 report, because you thought it gave a useful summary of 23 the sort of hardware failures that could occur that 24 could possibly cause loss of data. 25 A. Yes, I accept that. 30 1 Q. But you conceded that you'd, in fact, done nothing at 2 that stage to find out whether there had been any 3 hardware failures at Mrs Misra's branch? 4 A. Yes, I accept that. 5 Q. The fact is, your Data Integrity Report reassures, 6 doesn't it? It's intended to give comfort that there 7 won't be a loss of data if there is a hardware failure. 8 That's the point of it, isn't it? 9 A. It says that, in normal circumstances, there won't be 10 but it does accept the fact that potentially there could 11 be. 12 Q. The message really, by attaching it, was that "You, 13 Professor McLachlan, you can rule out the idea that 14 hardware failures might have caused discrepancies"; that 15 was the point of attaching it, wasn't it? 16 A. No, it was to show that there was a possibility of it 17 happening but otherwise that it was a very rare 18 possibility. 19 Q. On Tuesday when Mr Beer first asked you what you knew of 20 the duties of an expert you said, "I just thought I had 21 to answer the questions I was asked truthfully", yes? 22 A. Yes. 23 Q. You relied on that a lot in your answers when Mr Beer 24 asked you why you didn't reveal the complete picture. 25 You would say, well, you'd just answer the questions 31 1 that you were asked, yes? 2 A. Yes. 3 Q. That also applied to the way you approached your witness 4 statements for the Misra trial on the whole, isn't it? 5 A. Yes. 6 Q. But that's not what happened here, is it, Mr Jenkins? 7 The question that you were supposedly answering was 8 this: 9 "I have been requested to comment on the issue 10 raised by the defence in relation to a post office 11 called Callendar Square, Falkirk that was mentioned at 12 the Castleton trial." 13 No one had asked you about hardware, had they, 14 Mr Jenkins? 15 A. I can't remember. 16 Q. Well, they hadn't, had they? 17 A. I -- 18 Q. It was not one of Professor Cipione's questions, was it? 19 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: Sorry, not Professor Cipione. 20 MS PAGE: I'm so sorry, Professor McLachlan. 21 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: Yes. 22 A. I can't remember. 23 MS PAGE: Well, you were answering a series of his questions 24 in that statement and the one that you had just answered 25 when you attached this report was about the Callendar 32 1 Square bug. He had not asked you about hardware and he 2 had not asked you about data integrity. He had asked 3 you about the Callendar Square bug. Attaching your data 4 integrity report there was an attempt, wasn't it, to 5 answer an implied question which flowed from all of his 6 hypotheses. That implied question might have been 7 something like "Could any system failures have affected 8 Mrs Misra's branch accounts?" That was a sort of 9 implied question from all of the whole piece of work 10 that he'd been doing, the hypotheses he'd been putting 11 forward; do you accept that? 12 A. I'd not thought of it that way. 13 Q. No, you'd not thought of it that way. Well, the report 14 that you attached was specifically about data integrity. 15 So were you answering an implied question along these 16 lines: how do we know that the data underpinning 17 Mrs Misra's branch accounts has integrity? 18 Was that the question that you thought you were 19 answering? 20 A. I can't remember what -- the exact circumstances of what 21 I thought I was answering. 22 Q. What you did here, in truth, is you exhibited this 23 report to your witness statement as if it were providing 24 the wider picture showing what Horizon was really about. 25 That's what you were doing, wasn't it? 33 1 A. I can't remember. Sorry. 2 Q. You were stepping outside the narrow task of responding 3 to Professor McLachlan's hypotheses and questions, and 4 you were purporting to give the wider picture, "Don't 5 worry about data integrity, this is a good system. The 6 data is sound. The system couldn't have caused the 7 discrepancies". That's why you exhibited it, isn't it, 8 Mr Jenkins? 9 A. I can't remember exactly why I decided to exhibit it at 10 the time. 11 Q. Even though you told us, during the course of this week, 12 that the report had been created for a narrow purpose, 13 only intended to respond to the narrow hardware failure 14 scenarios that Post Office had asked you to deal with, 15 and then yet you then exhibit it to a witness statement. 16 Why did you do that, Mr Jenkins? 17 A. I can't remember. 18 Q. This was a deliberately and knowingly deceptive 19 reassuring report to exhibit to this statement in this 20 context, wasn't it? 21 A. I'm not sure that it was reassuring, particularly. It 22 did indicate that there were circumstances in which data 23 could be lost. 24 Q. You were throwing mud in Mr McLachlan's eyes, weren't 25 you, Mr Jenkins? 34 1 A. That is not what I was trying to do. 2 Q. Ultimately, that meant you were throwing mud in the 3 jury's eyes? 4 A. That was not my intent. 5 Q. Let's just remind ourselves of the question you were 6 asked which you didn't answer. It went like this: do 7 you know whether there are any known problems with the 8 Horizon system that Fujitsu are aware of? 9 The truthful answer to that question would have 10 covered all the body parts, wouldn't it? Cash accounts; 11 remote access; tampering; bad error handling; silent 12 faults across the system; the EPOSS code; the terrible 13 code -- the terrible code; hardware failures, persistent 14 hardware failures; recovering transactions that were 15 lost; failing to recover transactions that were lost. 16 A. That was not how I understood the question to be. 17 Q. That was not how you understood the question. No. 18 There was even a bit more, wasn't there, because 19 there was also the true bolt-ones, the Bank of Ireland 20 cash points; they were a catastrophe, weren't they? 21 A. I don't have any real knowledge about the Bank of 22 Ireland cash points and what the issues were with those. 23 Q. The Horizon Lottery terminals: they were a problem in 24 Mrs Misra's branch, weren't they? 25 A. I was not aware there were any problems with the Lottery 35 1 terminals. 2 Q. Bureau de Change: that was another disaster area, wasn't 3 it? 4 A. I'm not aware of any specific problems with Bureau de 5 Change. 6 Q. You hid all these issues and problems when you gave 7 evidence against Seema Misra, didn't you? 8 A. No. 9 Q. You did that, even though she was standing right there 10 in the dock in front of you? 11 A. I don't believe that I deliberately hid anything. 12 Q. Let's just take a quick final look before I finish with 13 how you reacted after she was convicted on the strength 14 of your evidence. We've already seen how, after the 15 trial, you were jokingly rather pleased with the 16 mistaken title of Professor, so I won't go to that. 17 What I'll go to is this, FUJ00156418. This is in 18 February 2011. It's from you to Penny Thomas. Now, if 19 we just scroll down a bit, it's a reply from her. She 20 says: 21 "Okay, Gareth. 22 "Did you watch the Inside Out programme last 23 evening?" 24 Let's go up to your reply. 25 "Yes, I did." 36 1 Do you remember that Inside Out programme? 2 A. Not in detail, no. 3 Q. Do you remember that it starts with Davinder Misra, 4 Mrs Misra's husband, who sits a little further along 5 from me, in tears, because his wife is behind bars? 6 A. I don't remember that, I'm afraid, sorry. 7 Q. This is what you said about that: 8 "I was pleased that Fujitsu wasn't mentioned. [Post 9 Office] have a significant problem! 10 "I also note that the screenshots were HNG-X 11 [Horizon Online] and not Horizon. 12 "I remember chatting to Mr Misra outside the court!" 13 Do you have anything to say about that, Mr Jenkins? 14 A. My feeling was then and is now that the issues to do 15 with this are down to the way that Post Office has 16 behaved, rather than actually faults in the Horizon 17 system, and that, I think, is what was behind what 18 I said there. 19 Q. Yet you told the judge that you being a Fujitsu man had 20 no impact on your evidence? 21 A. I don't believe that it did. I believe that I told the 22 truth as I understood it at the time. 23 Q. "I was pleased that Fujitsu wasn't mentioned." 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. You were a Fujitsu company man doing what Fujitsu needed 37 1 you to do: protect the monster. 2 A. I didn't think it was a monster. 3 Q. Let's go finally to one last document, please: 4 FUJ00156460. If we go to the bottom of page 1 and zoom 5 in, please, on paragraph 8a. This is you providing some 6 content for your appraisal. I should have shown you the 7 date, I'm so sorry, this is March 2011. 8 A. Yes. 9 Q. So this is your performance appraisal. 8a: 10 "I spent some time with POL supporting a series of 11 court cases where POL was prosecuting ex-postmasters for 12 theft where the postmasters were claiming a problem with 13 the system. Cases were: 14 "a. West Byfleet: For this case I spent some time 15 analysing a year's worth of transactions and explaining 16 to the defence expert how Horizon worked. I was 17 required to comment on the defence expert's reports and 18 spent a week at the court during the trial including 19 a full day in the witness box being examined and 20 cross-examined by the barristers. The defendant was 21 found guilty of Theft and Horizon was given a clean bill 22 of health." 23 You knew that the Misra trial was a test case for 24 Horizon, didn't you? 25 A. I realised that afterwards. I'm not sure if I did at 38 1 the time. 2 Q. You knew that your role was to help get that clean bill 3 of health, wasn't it? 4 A. My role was to tell the truth. 5 Q. You tailored your evidence accordingly, didn't you? 6 A. No. I addressed -- I attempted to answer as best as 7 I could the questions that I was asked. 8 Q. Never mind whether a byproduct of protecting the monster 9 was that a woman was sent to jail, Mr Jenkins: never 10 mind that. 11 A. I'm sorry for what happened to Mrs Misra but I feel that 12 was down to the way that POL had actually behaved and 13 wasn't purely down to me. I clearly got trapped into 14 doing things that I shouldn't have done but that was not 15 intentional on my behalf -- my part. 16 MS PAGE: Thank you, sir. Those are my questions. 17 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: Thank you very much, Ms Page. We will 18 break off now and we will resume again at 10.55. 19 (10.45 am) 20 (A short break) 21 (10.56 am) 22 MR BEER: Sir, good morning. Can you see and hear us? 23 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: Yes, thank you. 24 MR BEER: I think Mr Stein is next to ask questions. 25 Questioned by MR STEIN 39 1 MR STEIN: Mr Jenkins, I've got a number of questions for 2 you but can we travel back in time to the development of 3 the Horizon system. You were part of the team that was 4 working on what became the Horizon system; that's right, 5 isn't it? 6 A. I was involved with the agent side of things, rather 7 than the counter side of things at that time. 8 Q. Okay. Now, from your knowledge of that I want you to 9 help us with something that Mr Coombs -- that's Mike 10 Coombs, he's the former Horizon Programme Director at 11 ICL Pathway, and he gave evidence on the 1st November 12 2022 -- I want to ask you about something he said and he 13 if you can help. He was asked this question: 14 "Were you aware, during your time working as 15 Programme Director, that Post Office Counters Limited 16 were intending to place reliance upon data recorded on 17 Horizon to support the bringing of civil and criminal 18 proceedings against subpostmasters and office managers 19 suspected of fraud?" 20 Mr Coombs answer was this: 21 "I didn't have the faintest idea that they were 22 considering using information and I had no idea at all 23 they were considering taking the step of prosecuting 24 members of their own organisation." 25 Now, if we go back in time to the work you did do 40 1 that at least contributed to the overall system at that 2 stage and then perhaps the beginning of the Horizon 3 period, in around about, what, 1999/2000. At that time, 4 were you aware that Post Office was intending to place 5 reliance on the data recorded on the Horizon system to 6 support the bringing of civil and criminal proceedings? 7 A. I was aware at some time. I can't remember at what 8 stage. It was probably in the early 2000s but I'm not 9 sure exactly when. 10 Q. Right. Were you aware at that same perhaps early stage 11 that the Post Office was using the data from the Horizon 12 system in order to conduct audit visits, in other 13 words -- from the point of view of subpostmasters and be 14 stresses -- essentially, raids on their premises; were 15 you aware that it was being used in that way? 16 A. I can't remember at what stage that I got involved in 17 that sort of detail but it would be probably some time 18 in the early 2000s, but exactly when I can't remember. 19 Q. So at some point, this was to your knowledge, and you 20 think in the early 2000s? 21 A. Yeah. 22 Q. Can you help us with whether, to your knowledge, either 23 Fujitsu or the Post Office made sure that the design 24 parameters of the Horizon system were up for the task of 25 supporting civil actions and prosecutions? 41 1 A. Sorry, I can't help you with that. 2 Q. Is there anything, to your knowledge, that was done to 3 make sure that the Horizon system was good or fit for 4 purpose, the fit for purpose being the support of 5 proceedings against subpostmasters/mistresses, and 6 people working in their branches? 7 A. I believe I heard someone saying that they'd taken 8 advice as to whether the audit trail was something that 9 could be used in court proceedings but that's sort of 10 second, thirdhand type knowledge, but exactly when 11 I acquired that knowledge, I'm not sure. 12 Q. All right, so from your work, since before 2000 and then 13 you were still consulting for Fujitsu in 2022; is that 14 right? 15 A. I think my last actual consultation was just before 16 Covid in 2000 but I was still on a retainer until 2022. 17 Q. Okay. So for the period of time that we're talking 18 about, roughly -- certainly over 20 years, you're not 19 aware that there was a "Let's make sure that this 20 Horizon is up for the task of supporting prosecutions, 21 civil actions or indeed properly attending upon people 22 in audit"? You're not aware of anything that was done 23 to guarantee that the system was good for that; is that 24 fair? 25 A. That's probably fair. 42 1 Q. Now, we know from your evidence and from your statements 2 that you were very much part of the Litigation Support 3 system. I think you called it in your statement, 4 prosecution support, or something similar to that? Is 5 that what -- 6 A. Yes, I mean, I can't remember the exact term that was 7 used but, yeah -- 8 Q. Something like prosecution support -- 9 A. Yeah. 10 Q. -- seems to be what you say? 11 A. Yeah. 12 Q. Okay. Now, Terence Austin gave evidence in October 2022 13 and he was asked questions, which I will paraphrase, 14 which were about what training events and training 15 material was available in relation to the question of 16 support for litigation, prosecution support. Okay? 17 A. Okay. 18 Q. Let me take that in bits for you. Were there any 19 training events, opportunities, you know, hours in the 20 day set aside, parts of maybe a weekend or a day set 21 aside, for training purposes to do with the prosecution 22 support job? 23 A. Not as far as I was concerned. I don't know what the 24 people whose its full time job was to do, to support 25 that, people like Penny Thomas, and so on, but I wasn't 43 1 aware of any training. 2 Q. When you say not aware -- 3 A. I mean, I didn't have any training. 4 Q. Right. That's what I'm trying to find out -- 5 A. No, I've had no training in that and I realise now 6 I should have done but it didn't occur to me at the time 7 that I was lacking that. 8 Q. Were you offered any such training opportunities, you 9 know, opportunities to learn about systems in 10 litigation, either civil litigation or in criminal 11 litigation? Were you offered such opportunities to -- 12 A. No, I wasn't. 13 Q. Now, you've been asked in your statements about whether 14 you were provided with guidance, standards or protocols 15 or something similar that relates to investigations and 16 prosecutions. As we understand your statement, I think 17 it's your third statement -- I don't need to go to the 18 paragraph, I have a note of it -- your third statement, 19 which is WITN00460300, at paragraph 35, you say this you 20 "don't recall reading any of them at the time". Now, 21 the "them" you were referring to there was guidance, 22 policies, protocols about giving evidence, okay? 23 A. I'm not sure that I was aware that any such things 24 existed. 25 Q. Right. In a way, you're anticipating my next question. 44 1 A. Sorry. 2 Q. No, that's fine. Are you saying that you were not 3 provided with any of these manuals; is that what you're 4 saying: nobody brought them to your attention? 5 A. No. 6 Q. No? 7 A. No. 8 Q. You didn't ask to see any of these things? 9 A. No, I didn't. I realise now I should have done but it 10 didn't occur to me at the time. 11 Q. Who, within the Fujitsu organisation that you worked 12 for, should have been responsible, in your view, for 13 providing you with such materials? 14 A. I assume it's the Security Team or possibly some of the 15 lawyers that were behind that, so to speak. Though I'm 16 not sure that there were direct lawyers responsible for 17 the Security Team, which I think is another one of the 18 issues that I concede, looking back with hindsight. 19 Q. Within the Security Team, I've asked you questions about 20 training opportunities, events, manuals, guidance, 21 policies, all of those possible opportunities to enhance 22 your understanding of what you were about; who within 23 security should have provided you with such 24 opportunities? 25 A. I guess the Manager of the Security Team, that varied 45 1 over time. The one name I can remember is Brian Pinder, 2 but there were a number of Security Managers over the 3 time. 4 Q. Now, in your statements you discuss the question of 5 whether the PEAK, PinICL or KEL system was effective. 6 This is from your first statement, I think, 7 WITN00460100, paragraph -- I think it is 47, page 13. 8 You state this and, again, if I summarise this wrong or 9 badly then I'm sure that someone will correct me. You 10 say about the PEAK-PinICL system, that: 11 "Used properly [you] believed that it was a good 12 tool but only as good as the users handling it." 13 A. Yes, I accept that. 14 Q. You stand by that, do you? 15 A. Yes. 16 Q. Okay. So as far as it goes, the PEAK, PinICL, and you 17 include within that the KEL system, was okay, but you 18 can't speak to the quality of those people that were 19 operating it; is that fair? 20 A. Not quite. KELs, I had very little to do with. I saw 21 KELs as being primarily something to support the 22 Helpdesks, rather than something to use at the back end. 23 As far as the PEAKs were concerned, then that was down 24 to whatever anyone put on it. I believed that the guys 25 in the SSC were competent and were doing a good job of 46 1 things. So I don't know if that answers your question. 2 Q. It does, and you will recall being asked many a question 3 by Mr Beer about this question of belief: things that 4 you were told -- 5 A. Yes. 6 Q. -- and information that you had been supplied? 7 A. Yes. 8 Q. So on this question of belief that the people within the 9 system, operating the system and putting the entries to 10 the PEAK and PinICLs in, and the like, what did you have 11 to say in the fact that they were doing -- well, as 12 an example, quality assurance reports, reports to you 13 saying that, actually, there are these issues, we're 14 addressing them. This is regarding the inputting of 15 data. What do you have to provide a measurement of how 16 well they were doing it? Did you have any of that sort 17 of material? 18 A. No, I didn't. 19 Q. Just moving that on slightly further, what quality 20 assurance systems were embedded within the system to 21 assure the quality of the PEAK/PinICL process? So what 22 was there by way of, I don't know, comparison to other 23 similar systems, that type of comparative quality 24 assurance? 25 A. I don't know, is the simple answer. 47 1 Q. You say in your first witness statement, WITN00460100, 2 page 13, paragraph 47, as regards the system itself, in 3 terms of the PEAK/PinICL system and, I suppose, the 4 operation of the Horizon system, you say this: 5 "I have no point of comparison to offer the 6 Inquiry", because your work has only been, essentially 7 on the Horizon system. 8 Is that fair? 9 A. Yes, that's fair. 10 Q. Right. Were you aware of any industry standard or 11 benchmark being applied to the Horizon system? 12 A. There were standards in particular areas. So, for 13 example, when we interacted with the banks we had to 14 conform with banking standards, and things like that 15 but, in terms of it overall system, then no. 16 Q. If we bring all of this together, essentially what 17 appears to be the situation is that at no time were you 18 either given or did you ask for an overall measurement 19 of the quality of the Horizon system, its operation 20 through from the inputting of materials or data on to 21 the PEAK/PinICLs. That just simply wasn't something 22 that you had; is that fair? 23 A. Yes, I think that's probably fair. 24 I'd not thought of it that way before but, yes, 25 I accept what you're saying. 48 1 Q. Now, subpostmasters/mistresses, their branch managers, 2 their employees. Unless I misunderstand what you've 3 said about your work for Fujitsu, you've worked in this 4 country? 5 A. And I've worked abroad for brief periods as well. 6 Q. Brief periods. You've lived in this country for 7 essentially your life? 8 A. Most of my life, yes. 9 Q. You're as familiar with the Post Office branches as then 10 many people are. You know, you go to different parts of 11 the country, you see the small branches in small 12 villages. You're familiar with that. 13 A. I see that -- I'm not sure that I visit post office 14 branches that often. I probably visited more often the 15 last two or three years because the banks have closed 16 down and I have to use post office for banking money. 17 Q. You're aware that the small places sometimes have 18 grocery side to them and operate as more of a general 19 store? 20 A. Yes, I am aware of that. 21 Q. You're aware that, very often, not always, always, but 22 very often that they're run by families working and 23 living effectively in the same premises? 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. You're aware that there's, therefore, a reliance upon 49 1 the Post Office, I suppose, from the postmaster/mistress 2 point of view, for the Post Office to treat them fairly? 3 I'm sure that you would think that that should be what 4 was happening? 5 A. And that's what I would expect to happen, yes, but 6 I appreciate now that that isn't what has happened. 7 Q. I want you to help us with one aspect of the way the 8 postmasters/mistresses and, indeed, their branch 9 employees were dealt with by the Post Office. Were you 10 aware that the branches were told that they were liable 11 contractually for any shortfalls and they had to make 12 good those shortfalls? Were you aware that that was the 13 consistent message that was sent and given to 14 subpostmasters/mistresses and people working in 15 branches? 16 A. I'm certainly aware of that now. I'm not sure exactly 17 when I became aware of that. 18 Q. Again, that was going to be my next question. 19 A. Sorry. 20 Q. When did you become aware that subpostmasters/ 21 mistresses, people working in branches, were told, 22 "Look, if there's a shortfall, you have got to pay up 23 and make it good"? Help us understand when you knew 24 that. 25 A. I think I was aware of that when I was involved with the 50 1 prosecutions but I'm not sure exactly when I became 2 aware of that. 3 Q. Right. You understand that people working in branches 4 of the Post Office aren't necessarily computer experts; 5 you know that? 6 A. Oh, yes. 7 Q. You know that the data given to people working in 8 branches is, as it's been described by many witnesses, 9 relatively limited? 10 A. I'm not quite sure what you mean by "relatively 11 limited". 12 Q. Well, they don't have full access to the system that you 13 enjoyed? 14 A. My understanding was that, if someone was being 15 prosecuted, then they would be given access to the data. 16 I now appreciate that they weren't always -- that didn't 17 always happen. 18 Q. So the answer is, yes, you are, at least now aware -- 19 A. Yeah. 20 Q. -- that the people in branches were not given the full 21 access to the system that you enjoyed? 22 A. Oh, yes, I certainly accept that now, yes. 23 Q. Right. So this pressing of subpostmasters to pay up for 24 any shortfall, did that concern you, Mr Jenkins, when, 25 as you say, you knew that, you think, when giving these 51 1 statements? Did that make you think, "Hmm, that doesn't 2 seem quite right"? 3 A. I didn't understand it quite in those ways at that time, 4 is the issue, I think. 5 Q. Well, you either understand it, Mr Jenkins, or you 6 don't, don't you? You either go, "Right, I understand 7 that people are being told to pay up for shortfalls 8 irrespective of fault," or "I don't know that". You 9 seemed to be saying a minute ago that you did know that. 10 A. It's not something I'd really considered seriously at 11 the time and I accept, with hindsight, I should have 12 done. 13 Q. Well, you said repeatedly in your evidence -- and I'll 14 come to this again a bit later -- that you don't think 15 that the Post Office handled subpostmasters fairly. But 16 you knew that the Post Office was pressing people to pay 17 up irrespective of fault. That seems to be something 18 that was in your knowledge. How do you ignore that, 19 Mr Jenkins? 20 A. Well, I'm not sure what -- I'd not taken it as being -- 21 the without-fault bit of it is the bit that I'd not 22 really fully understood and comprehended at the time, 23 I think, is really what it comes down to. 24 Q. Let's try to work out what you're saying. You seem to 25 be saying that, whilst you were giving statements 52 1 supporting the prosecution role of the Post Office, that 2 you had some awareness that people were being told to 3 pay up for shortfalls but you didn't know perhaps how 4 that was being explained to the people in the branches; 5 is that what you're saying? 6 A. I was looking -- my approach was looking at how Horizon 7 was working, rather than the effect on postmasters, and 8 I appreciate that was wrong and I should have been more 9 concerned about the impact on postmasters. But my role 10 was, I saw, was more of a technical one and that's where 11 I was coming from. 12 Q. Do you regard yourself as being an uncaring person? 13 A. No, but I deal better with systems and things than 14 people. 15 Q. That doesn't mean that you -- 16 A. I'm not saying I'm uncaring at all. 17 Q. Yes, but despite -- 18 A. I just wasn't thinking things through, like I should 19 have done. 20 Q. Did you turn to anyone and say, "Well, I'd like to know 21 a bit more about what's going on in these branches"? 22 A. No, I didn't. 23 Q. Is it perhaps more likely to be the truth that none of 24 the work that you did for the Post Office in supporting 25 the prosecutions had even a glimmer of a care about the 53 1 subpostmasters and their branches? 2 A. I'd just not been looking at it in that way. 3 I appreciate I should have done but I was just looking 4 at things from the point of view of how Horizon was 5 operating. 6 Q. Turning to a different topic -- 7 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: Before you do that, Mr Stein, can I just 8 ask: 9 So far as you can recall, Mr Jenkins, were you aware 10 brought into a case before a decision to prosecute was 11 taken or was it, as far as you can recall, always the 12 case that you were asked to assist once a decision to 13 prosecute had been taken? 14 A. As far as I'm aware, a decision to prosecute had always 15 been taken long before I got involved. I can't say 16 that -- I can't be absolutely certain that was the case, 17 but from what -- 18 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: But that's your recollection. 19 A. That's my recollection, yes. 20 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: All right. 21 Sorry, Mr Stein. 22 MR STEIN: We know that, on occasions, call handler scripts 23 would advise subpostmasters to turn off the system. 24 I can give a reference if we need it and go to -- 25 A. I've seen such scripts now. I wasn't aware of the 54 1 scripts at the time. 2 Q. No. Now, the problem with turning off the branch system 3 is that it disconnects from the rest of the network; is 4 that right? 5 A. Yes, but with Legacy Horizon the whole system was 6 designed to be able to operate when turned off from the 7 rest of the network anyway and, certainly in the early 8 days, it was expected that most branches would be off 9 the network most of the time. 10 Q. The idea is that when actually relinked, in other words 11 turned back on or power restored, whatever it is, that 12 the systems would catch up with each other. 13 A. Yes. 14 Q. That's how it was planned? 15 A. Yes, indeed. 16 Q. But that's not a 100 per cent guaranteed system. It can 17 lead to problems with data transfer? 18 A. No, I would dispute that. I would say that the design 19 of the system was that it would catch up. If it was 20 just a simple case of turning the box off and on again, 21 then the data would all be caught up in time and that 22 was one of the main reasons why the Riposte product was 23 chosen by Post Office. 24 Q. There's some suggestion that there are different bits of 25 the Horizon system, that, in other words, if you have 55 1 a part of the system working in Leeds, that that might 2 relate to servers that relate to that area. Were there 3 different operational areas for Horizon? 4 A. I'm not quite sure what you mean. We -- with Legacy 5 Horizon, we had two data centres, in Wigan and Bootle, 6 and all the systems in the UK connected through to one 7 or other of those data centres, using the BT telephone 8 network in general, though I think there was some 9 differences in Hull because that's not on BT, but -- and 10 there were a few obscure offices that used satellite 11 systems, rather than the BT network when there wasn't 12 suitable BT coverage. 13 But the systems did, in general, all connect through 14 to the main data centres. 15 Q. So we've got -- so I can understand your evidence is 16 about this. Legacy Horizon, you've got essentially two 17 different servers? 18 A. No, we had two separate data centres, really for 19 disaster recovery, so I think the example that was used 20 was that if a Jumbo Jet landed on one of them the other 21 could carry on doing the work. Obviously that never 22 happened. So the idea was just to make sure we had two 23 data centres sufficiently far apart that they were very 24 unlikely to both fail at the same time. 25 Q. Would bugs, defects or errors affect every counter on 56 1 Horizon or could some affect only a limited number of 2 counters? 3 A. It depends on the bug. So yes, there could be issues to 4 do with what was happening in the background on the 5 boxes and things like that, could cause timing type 6 issues, and so on, and those were the more difficult 7 things to actually understand what was going on. But in 8 general, my understanding was that the system was 9 working well in the majority of branches. The problem 10 has been that in a few branches things didn't always 11 operate correctly. 12 Q. Why would it be possible for particular bugs, errors and 13 defects to affect a particular group of branches and not 14 the entire system if, going back to your evidence 15 a second ago, it's operating as one system? 16 A. To do with issues of timing and just minor differences 17 in terms of how the hardware operated all the sort of 18 sequence of activities, different postmasters would do 19 different sequences of activities and others, some typed 20 faster than others, and things like that. So it was 21 timing-type issues and things like that. So things that 22 were basically unpredictable. 23 Q. So correspondence, in other words similar things 24 happening at a similar time, could mean that particular 25 branches all doing that at a similar time could be 57 1 affected; is that what you're trying to say? 2 A. I think most issues were -- would -- that occurred were 3 affecting sort of just one or two isolated branches at 4 a time rather than group of branches. I don't think -- 5 I think what you're trying to suggest is that there may 6 have been a geographical grouping or something like 7 that. I'm not aware of issues that would affect things 8 like that. 9 Q. We know some bugs affected larger numbers and one or two 10 we know that -- 11 A. Yes, and particularly after a new piece of software got 12 rolled out, there may be some initial teething problems 13 that would get sorted out in a few days after that. 14 Q. Right. So there's no geographical suggestion that it 15 would affect a particular group of people, say, in 16 a particular county or something like that? 17 A. Not that I can think of. 18 Q. It's more about the way the system itself operates and 19 timing issues, you -- 20 A. And the sort of activities that were being carried out. 21 So there might be specific transactions that could cause 22 issues. 23 Q. As regards software updates, you've mentioned in your 24 statements that you believed that the Post Office was 25 aware of those software updates? 58 1 A. Yes -- 2 Q. Okay -- 3 A. -- they had to sign them all off. 4 Q. -- and that those software updates included references 5 to the bugs that had been fixed by them, that sort of -- 6 A. Yes. 7 Q. Right, okay. We've had the benefit -- when I say "we", 8 I'm instructed by a firm of solicitors that have been 9 involved with these issues now for well over a decade, 10 Howe+Co solicitors. We've had the benefit of some pro 11 bono advice, as allowed for by the Inquiry, in relation 12 to computer expert advice. Okay? One of the parts of 13 that advice that sticks with me is that, in the software 14 fixing world, you fix 20 bugs, errors or defects and 19 15 more crop up; is that sort of a familiar IT expectation, 16 that fix one bug, others crop up, because, necessarily, 17 it affects the system as you go forward? 18 A. I certainly accept the fact that fixing a bug can 19 introduce other bugs. I don't think I would go as far 20 as to say fix 20 and you get 19 new ones, but 21 I understand what you're getting at. 22 Q. You understand the point -- 23 A. Yes. 24 Q. -- and the problem? 25 A. Yes. 59 1 Q. How open was the Post Office in recognising bugs, errors 2 or defects to the Horizon system, in your mind? 3 A. I'm not quite sure what -- 4 Q. Well, did they seem to be interested, the Post Office; 5 were they welcoming; did they go "Thanks for telling 6 us"? 7 A. I wasn't actually involved in that direct communication 8 with Post Office but I -- I think one of the problems is 9 that -- from what I've realised now, looking back, is 10 that Post Office wasn't fully joined up, in that there 11 were some people in Post Office who were well aware of 12 these sort of issues but there were clearly other people 13 in Post Office who weren't. 14 Q. Outside of Fujitsu software -- I include within that, if 15 you like, the jigsaw puzzle that was the Horizon system 16 made up of other software from other companies -- so 17 outside of the Fujitsu software, what else, what other 18 hardware or telecommunications could cause data to be 19 lost or corrupted, in your mind? 20 A. I think it's a case of -- I'm not quite sure 21 I understand what you're getting at. In terms of the 22 branch accounts, then the branch accounts were all done 23 based on the Horizon system within itself. There were 24 then back-end systems that Post Office then used for 25 running their back-end business and Horizon was 60 1 responsible for feeding data into those back-end 2 systems. 3 Q. Hardware problems, could that cause difficulties with 4 branch accounts, in other words the terminals 5 themselves? That was capable of causing difficulties? 6 A. I suppose, I suppose it could have done but, yeah, I'm 7 not -- err, yeah. 8 Q. Now, we know from your evidence and we know from other 9 parts of the evidence in this case that there obviously 10 were these bugs, errors and defects. We know about the 11 support system at Fujitsu, and so on. Help us 12 understand a little bit more about the way that there 13 was communication to the subpostmasters/mistresses and 14 their branches. Was there bug-of-the-day system, or 15 a "Watch out for this, this could affect your system" 16 type notification from Fujitsu? 17 A. Not that I'm aware of. 18 Q. The people -- 19 A. Communication with branches, I think, was, in general, 20 Post Office's responsibility, rather than Fujitsu's. 21 Q. Well, was anything done within Fujitsu to provide the 22 information in the way that I've suggested? In other 23 words, that "We think it would be a jolly good idea if 24 the people that are operating their small businesses 25 were told about, you know, watch out for this problem"; 61 1 was there anything like that being done by Fujitsu? 2 A. I'm not aware of anything like that but I wouldn't have 3 been directly involved in any such communication. 4 Q. It would have been a good idea, wouldn't it, Mr Jenkins? 5 A. With hindsight, yes. 6 Q. You've stated a number of times, and I've touched on 7 this in the questions I've asked of you, about the fact 8 that the Post Office didn't support or help, you think, 9 in your mind, the subpostmasters. I'll give you some 10 quotes. Your fourth witness statement, WITN00460400. 11 You state that the NBSC has, for some subpostmasters, 12 not really helped and, in some cases, the advice made 13 things worse. 14 A. I understand that, looking back. I wasn't particularly 15 aware of that at the time but it's something I've 16 been -- I've learnt over the course of the last few 17 years. 18 Q. You said yesterday, at just 2.32 in the afternoon, that 19 the NBSC didn't handle referrals very well, referrals 20 being from the helpline at Post Office to Fujitsu? 21 A. That's something I now understand, yes. 22 Q. The problem, which is that if the Post Office isn't 23 handling their helpline very well, that means that 24 subpostmasters can be saying, "Look, I've got a problem. 25 I don't understand what's going on. The system just 62 1 doesn't work", or something like that. I can take -- 2 A. I understand that and I understand now that that is 3 exactly what was happening and I wasn't aware of it at 4 the time. 5 Q. And this information was not getting through to the 6 support line at Fujitsu; you understand that now? 7 A. I understand that now, yes. I didn't at the time. 8 Q. That's a problem, isn't it? 9 A. Yes, it is indeed. 10 Q. Well, explain why it's a problem, Mr Jenkins. 11 A. Because then people would -- when there were genuine 12 problems in the system, then we weren't being informed 13 about them and therefore couldn't actually fix them. 14 Q. Now, the support lines at Fujitsu were not only just 15 dealing with problems that were let through this Post 16 Office filter system to Fujitsu but they were also 17 seeking within the helplines to identify faults of 18 themselves that would come to their own attention; is 19 that right? 20 A. As I understand it, the distinction was that the Fujitsu 21 Helpdesk was primarily dealing with hardware issues and 22 business issues were to be dealt with by NBSC. But if 23 NBSC identified something as being a potential software 24 issue, then it would be passed over to the Fujitsu 25 Helpdesks, is I understand how the system was supposed 63 1 to work. But I wasn't actually involved in that side of 2 things then. 3 Q. At the very beginning of your evidence, Mr Beer was 4 asking you questions about whether there was a kind 5 of -- this is my summary of the way the questions he was 6 asking you -- but whether there was essentially a big 7 book, a list of problems that you could consult. 8 A. The nearest thing I think we had to that was the Known 9 Error Log, which was there to support the Fujitsu 10 Helpdesks but I don't think that was available to the 11 NBSC. But I'm -- I am not 100 per cent certain about 12 that. 13 Q. This failure in communication between Fujitsu and the 14 Post Office, this inability, it seems, to reconcile 15 a helpline system that is run by the Post Office with 16 the operation of the Fujitsu system; how on earth could 17 that come about, Mr Jenkins? 18 A. I don't know. That wasn't an area that I was 19 particularly involved in. 20 Q. Paragraph 51 of your first witness statement, 21 WITN00460100, you say this: you're describing your 22 impression that the Post Office did not provide enough 23 support to subpostmasters who were struggling with the 24 system and that your impression was that Post Office 25 blamed the subpostmasters rather than conducting further 64 1 investigations. 2 I think it may be useful if we, in fact, go to that 3 paragraph, paragraph 51, WITN00460100. So the paragraph 4 starts in relation to what POL could have done 5 differently. 6 A. I mean, this part of my statement is looking back on how 7 I see things now, not how I necessarily saw things at 8 the time. So this is looking back in 2023, rather than 9 what I was aware of at the time that I was working with 10 Fujitsu. 11 Q. "... my impression is that POL did not provide enough 12 support to [subpostmasters] when they were struggling to 13 use Legacy Horizon and Horizon Online. Instead of 14 investigating the issues that [subpostmasters] reported 15 (and trying to assist them), my impression is that POL 16 blamed them instead." 17 A. Yes. 18 Q. How did you come to this view, Mr Jenkins? 19 A. From what I've heard from the Inquiry and what I've 20 learnt from the Group Litigation that took place in 21 2018/2019. It's stuff that I've learnt after my 22 involvement with the design of Horizon. So this is 23 looking back, rather than what I knew at the time. 24 Q. Your impression is that POL blamed them instead; blamed 25 them in what way, Mr Jenkins? 65 1 A. Back to what you were saying before, that if money was 2 lost, then they were asked to pay up. 3 Q. Now, I'm going to ask you about a particular email that 4 was sent on 16 May 2013. I'll ask it to go on the 5 screen, please. Hopefully I've got the right reference, 6 POL00029587. If we scroll down this email, please, this 7 is from Alwen Lyons. Essentially, it says at the top 8 there "Paula", that will be Paula Vennells: 9 "... here are my speaking notes for your call with 10 Alice this afternoon ..." 11 Mr Jenkins, I know you were not privy to this email. 12 I'm going to ask you about one particular section, okay? 13 Now, you'll see as you go down to the bullet points that 14 it gets to the "The Good News is" bit and then if we 15 read across: 16 "The Good News is that where we have found to bugs, 17 [where we have found bugs] since [new Horizon] they have 18 been detected and put right with no loss for the 19 subpostmaster, and Fujitsu now monitor the suspense 20 account for any such problems." 21 All right? Now, this is an email in May 2013. 22 You've given evidence regarding suspense accounts and 23 you, in fact, when giving evidence, I think on the first 24 day, you asked Mr Beer to be careful about the way that 25 the term "suspense accounts" was being used. 66 1 A. Yeah. 2 Q. All right, so let's see if I get this right. The first 3 pre-IMPACT Programme suspense accounts were branch 4 suspense accounts; are you okay with that description? 5 A. Yeah. 6 Q. After IMPACT Programme, there's then the more 7 centralised suspense accounts; is that again right? 8 A. There were still suspense accounts in the branches. 9 Q. Okay. Help us with the way the system operated. 10 Fujitsu, is this correct, had access to the Post Office 11 Accounts; is that right? 12 A. I'm not quite -- 13 Q. So could look at what was in the accounts? 14 A. I'm not quite sure what you mean. I mean, Fujitsu was 15 able to look at any data that was going through the 16 system. 17 Q. Right. Well, it is saying here that, from May 2013, 18 Fujitsu now monitored the suspense account for any such 19 problems? 20 A. I don't understand what that means. I don't understand 21 what is being got at by that. 22 Q. What it might mean is that the theory was that Fujitsu 23 should keep an eye on suspense accounts to monitor the 24 rise of money being put into suspense which might 25 correlate to problems within the system? 67 1 A. I don't think that's what's behind there. As I say, 2 I don't know what that referring to. There was an issue 3 that was discovered in 2013 to do with some old data 4 from suspense accounts that came forward a year or so 5 later. I think it was being referred to as the local 6 suspense issue, that affected 12 branches on 14 7 occasions, and that was a problem that was detected in 8 2013. So it could be a reference to that. 9 Q. All right. Well, I'll move on. 10 Now, you've been asked a number of questions about 11 what you've described in your statement as the 12 boilerplate parts of statements that you gave. Now, 13 I'll take you to a particular paragraph of your 14 statement, WITN00460300, so that's the third witness 15 statement, paragraph 102 -- so WITN00460300, 16 paragraph 102. Right. Thank you very much. 17 So paragraph 102 there is from your statement, 18 you're saying this: 19 "[You're] aware that there is a question in the 20 Inquiry as to what the two 'boilerplate' or 'standard' 21 paragraphs that appear at the very end of the standard 22 Fujitsu witness statement ... actually meant." 23 Okay? That's what -- 24 A. Yeah. 25 Q. -- you're talking about and you've been asked a number 68 1 of questions about that. 2 A. Yeah. 3 Q. I don't want to repeat those questions. Okay? 4 A. Okay. 5 Q. What I want to do is just understand what's going on 6 here a bit more. Now, you said essentially that this 7 didn't and wasn't meant to mean that the Horizon system 8 was working at any particular level of integrity, that 9 wasn't what this was about; that's what you're saying? 10 A. I can't understand how the people who were signing these 11 statements would be in a position to say that. 12 Q. Right, okay. The people that you're talking about, that 13 signed these statements, include you? 14 A. Yes. 15 Q. Yes. Okay. So the people that signed these statements, 16 containing these paragraphs, you're saying you can't 17 understand how they could sign such declarations -- 18 A. Yeah. 19 Q. -- to warranty the integrity of the Horizon system? 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. Okay, got it. Fine. Now, when you're saying that 22 that's something you don't understand, help us a bit 23 more on that. Are you saying that these two paragraphs 24 you assumed were about the laptop or the computer that 25 you were writing things on, or about the audit data 69 1 production? Are you saying that you assumed that or you 2 knew that: which? 3 A. Assumed. 4 Q. Assumed. Right, okay. Now, help us understand a little 5 bit more about what you mean about this word 6 "assumption", then. You know that giving statements to 7 courts are important things, yes? 8 A. Oh, yes. 9 Q. You can affect those people's lives that you're giving 10 statements about, those people living in the small 11 businesses in various parts of the country, yes? 12 A. Yes. 13 Q. You knew that, and you knew that statements contain 14 a declaration at the top saying that "This statement is 15 true to the best of your knowledge and belief". 16 A. Yes. 17 Q. And you make it knowing that, if you say anything in it 18 that is effectively untrue, or wrong, you may be opening 19 yourself up to prosecution. You know that that's what's 20 on those statements, don't you? 21 A. Yes. 22 Q. You know you have to sign a statement at the bottom of 23 each page, yes? 24 A. In some cases, yes. 25 Q. Right. Well, you know you have to sign statements, 70 1 don't you, Mr Jenkins? 2 A. I'm not aware -- I believe that there are some 3 statements that were served in my name that weren't 4 actually signed by me. 5 Q. Okay, well, we'll come back to that one in a moment. 6 So when you are making a statement that's got this 7 important declaration at the top, saying that, if you 8 say something in the statement that you know not to be 9 true, that you could be prosecuted, how does that 10 reconcile itself with making an assumption about what 11 these two paragraphs mean? You don't really know, 12 you're just sort of guessing a bit? 13 A. I see now that it doesn't necessarily reconcile but I'd 14 not thought that through at the time. 15 Q. Just understanding your evidence, I think this has to be 16 true, you are saying that you would never have signed 17 paragraphs that warranted the working integrity of the 18 Horizon system? 19 A. I was happy that the Horizon system was working 20 correctly. I wasn't -- I wouldn't have said that it was 21 working correctly everywhere in all particular 22 circumstances but I didn't think that's what I was being 23 asked to say. 24 Q. Which is why you're saying you'd have never signed these 25 paragraphs to have meant that -- 71 1 A. Yes. 2 Q. -- and you don't think anybody else should have signed 3 paragraphs to say that the Horizon system was absolutely 4 tickety-boo at all times? 5 A. Well, certainly, the people who -- these paragraphs were 6 coming from the statement that was used to exhibit ARQs 7 and the people who were providing those statements 8 didn't have any knowledge of how the Horizon system was 9 working. All they knew was how the ARQ extraction 10 process was working. 11 Q. Do you find it a little odd that other people may say 12 that they also assumed that this just meant that they 13 were saying that the system producing the statements was 14 working okay; are you finding it a bit odd that everyone 15 is making the same assumption, without checking with 16 each other? 17 A. I realise now that I should have done more investigation 18 and tried to understand more what was being said, but 19 I didn't. 20 Q. What about having a natter with somebody like 21 Ms Chambers and saying "What on Earth does that mean, 22 why are we signing this"? 23 A. I didn't do that. 24 Q. Lastly, if we just touch, just very briefly, before 25 I finish on this entire question of your status as 72 1 an expert -- 2 A. Yes. 3 Q. -- giving evidence as an expert. You're saying, 4 essentially, that you know now that it has a different 5 status within the legal proceedings -- 6 A. Yes. 7 Q. -- that experts are allowed to give an opinion about 8 matters to which they have expert knowledge; that's one 9 of the big differences about being an expert. You know 10 that now? 11 A. I understand that now, yes. 12 Q. Because, otherwise, a factual witness, a witness that 13 just says, I don't know, "I saw a particular person 14 outside of a shop at a particular time", they're not 15 allowed to give an opinion as to what they think is 16 going on, they've just got to say what they've seen; do 17 you understand the difference? 18 A. I do now. I don't know if I did fully understand those 19 differences at the time. 20 Q. Now through the period of time that we're talking about, 21 there's Google, yes -- 22 A. Yes. 23 Q. -- and we should add that there are other search 24 engines! 25 A. Yes. 73 1 Q. Did you ever, as an example, Google, the question of 2 giving evidence in court proceedings? 3 A. No, I didn't. 4 Q. Did you ever speak to somebody else within your team and 5 say, "Well, has anybody ever looked up what we should be 6 doing in court proceedings"? 7 A. No, I didn't. Again, I should have done -- 8 Q. Did you ever ask -- yes -- 9 A. Again, I should have done but I didn't, yeah. 10 Q. Did you ever ask for advice about it? 11 A. Well, I did seek some advice in -- with -- from David 12 Jones, for example, back in February 2010, and there was 13 no suggestion that I needed to do anything special at 14 that time. 15 Q. So the odd situation that you were in, from your point 16 of view, which is giving evidence in court proceedings, 17 serious evidence affecting people in Post Office 18 branches, you didn't look it up? You didn't speak to 19 other people in your situation, like Ms Chambers, about 20 it; is that right? 21 A. Correct. 22 Q. Do you think you could have done more to help people in 23 this situation? 24 A. I clearly appreciate that now and I appreciate that 25 I did get things very wrong but I -- it was done through 74 1 ignorance rather than maliciousness. 2 Q. Looking back in relation to your employer, Fujitsu, what 3 should they have done better? 4 A. They should have given me some training in terms of what 5 I -- what they were asking me to do. 6 Q. And about the system itself, what should they have done 7 better? You must have thought about this, Mr Jenkins? 8 A. Sorry? 9 Q. You must have thought about this. What should Fujitsu 10 have done better? 11 A. I think the system as a whole was working well but it 12 clearly wasn't working perfectly, and I don't think 13 anyone ever suggested that it was. 14 Q. What should Fujitsu have done better, Mr Jenkins? 15 A. Probably not put me in the situation that I was put in. 16 Q. Lastly, Mr Jenkins, it was at the end of 2020 where, by 17 chance, I happened to be the person that was presenting 18 the evidence that related to the Clarke Advices in the 19 Criminal Court of Appeal, so end of 2020 when that 20 happened. 21 A. Right yes. 22 Q. That's when the Clarke Advices then started to become 23 part of discussion, generally -- 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. -- in relation to Post Office matters. Now, you were on 75 1 retainer until 2022? 2 A. Yes. 3 Q. You were saying, essentially, that you weren't doing 4 very much work from about 2020 onwards but you were 5 still theoretically consulting, if possible -- you 6 know -- 7 A. Yes. 8 Q. -- if they wanted you to? 9 A. Yes. 10 Q. After the time when the Clarke Advices started to become 11 part of the discussion within Post Office Inquiry 12 matters, as it became, did Fujitsu bring you to whatever 13 office and say, "Mr Jenkins, there has been this Advice 14 written by a chap called Simon Clarke that says you've 15 not told the truth or the whole truth to court 16 proceedings"; did Fujitsu bring you in and ask questions 17 of you about that? 18 A. They -- I was certainly sent a copy of the Clarke Advice 19 at the time and, after the Horizon trial, I was brought 20 in to discuss with Fujitsu lawyers to give my view as to 21 what had actually, you know, the outcome from the 22 Horizon trial that had happened in 2019, and that was 23 the reason for my last couple of consultancy meetings in 24 early 2020. 25 Q. Was there an internal inquiry by Fujitsu into the 76 1 question of your integrity, your honesty, your probity, 2 your credibility, when giving the statements going back 3 in time for the Post Office? 4 A. Not that I can remember as such, at least not one that 5 involves me. 6 Q. You've mentioned -- and I'm grateful to Mr Enright -- 7 that there were statements that were served in your name 8 that weren't actually signed by you? 9 A. Yes. 10 Q. Are those statements that you've seen during the course 11 of your preparation for your evidence in this hearing, 12 these hearings? 13 A. Yes, as I say, I can't remember exactly which ones I've 14 signed and which ones I haven't but I am not using that 15 as an excuse. It's just that it's been pointed out that 16 some of the statements that have been shown to me do not 17 have my signature on them. I'm not saying that I don't 18 stand by what they say; I'm just saying I -- my 19 understanding is that some of them were served before 20 I had actually signed them. 21 Q. Language is important. Your understanding is that some 22 were served, it seems, without them having been passed 23 by you, is that what you're saying, or are you saying 24 that some statements were served in court proceedings 25 that did not go via you: which? 77 1 A. I believe that I saw all of the statements. I'm not -- 2 what I'm saying is I haven't necessarily actually put my 3 physical signature on the bottom of each one of them. 4 I'm not -- I'm not tying to distance myself from 5 statements that were put in my name. All I'm saying is 6 that I hadn't necessarily actually physically signed 7 them all. 8 MR STEIN: Thank you, Mr Jenkins. 9 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: Is that it, Mr Stein? 10 MR STEIN: Yes, sir. 11 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: Thank you very much. 12 So Mr Moloney, is it appropriate to take our second 13 break now and then you can have your question time after 14 that break? 15 MR MOLONEY: Yes, please, sir. Thank you. 16 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: Fine. 17 So we'll start again, well, 12.05. Is that all 18 right with everyone? 19 MR BEER: Thank you, sir. 20 (11.52 am) 21 (A short break) 22 (12.05 pm) 23 MR BEER: Good afternoon, sir, can you see and hear us? 24 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: Yes, thank you very much. 25 MR BEER: I'll just wait for the room to settle down before 78 1 handing over to Mr Moloney. 2 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: All right. 3 Questioned by MR MOLONEY 4 MR MOLONEY: Thank you, Mr Beer. Thank you, sir. 5 Mr Jenkins, I've three topics to deal with you, 6 please. Just to start with a few general questions, 7 then a very short section on Mr Grant Allen's case and 8 then the most lengthy section on Mr Khayyam Ishaq's 9 case. 10 A. Okay. 11 Q. Okay thank you. Just the general questions to start 12 with. As your services were utilised in more and more 13 prosecutions, did you become more familiar with the 14 types of documents prepared for the purposes of criminal 15 proceedings, such as witness statements, case summaries, 16 defence statements, and so on? 17 A. I got to recognise a bit more about the type of 18 documents that I would be shown, so yes, I think that's 19 a fair comment. 20 Q. Yes. But it's a question rather than a comment, but -- 21 A. Well, yes, okay, yes. But yes. 22 Q. Entirely. Did you become more familiar with the 23 language used by lawyers in such documents? 24 A. I'm not sure that I -- I thought much about the language 25 used. I was just looking at them in terms of just 79 1 reading them in the same way as I would any other sort 2 of document. 3 Q. All right. Thank you. Did you become more familiar 4 with how cases might be conducted, the issues in the 5 case, and how the defence might seek to resist the 6 prosecution case and how the prosecution might seek to 7 rebut what the defence was saying? 8 A. I'm not sure, is the simple answer to that. I've not 9 done really any sort of comparison as to how things have 10 changed over time, particularly. 11 Q. Just to try and put it in more simple terms, did you 12 actually say, "Right, this is the point the prosecution 13 are making and this is what the defence are saying to it 14 and this is how the prosecution might rebut that"? 15 A. Yes, I suppose so. 16 Q. When you were involved in a case, writing a report, 17 meeting with counsel, did you ever consider how a bad 18 result in the case, a negative outcome on the issues in 19 the case, might have negative implications for Fujitsu? 20 A. No, I don't think I was considering that particularly. 21 I was just trying to address the questions that I was 22 being asked. 23 Q. Right. So you confined yourself, really, to answering 24 the questions that you were asked? 25 A. Yes. 80 1 Q. May I just -- the answer may be obvious because of the 2 answer you've just given but, just to repeat it -- when 3 you were involved in a case, writing a report, meeting 4 with counsel, did you ever consider how a bad result in 5 the case, a negative outcome on the issues, might affect 6 or have negative implications for Post Office? 7 A. No, I didn't really consider that. 8 Q. Okay. I'd now like to ask you just a few questions 9 about Grant Allen's case. He's one of the Core 10 Participants represented by Hudgells Solicitors. Do you 11 have the recollection of this case from having read the 12 papers in preparation for your evidence? 13 A. I've read the stuff about that, yes, as far as the 14 preparation, yes. 15 Q. So I'll just try and give a quick summary and then 16 you'll see if there's anything you disagree with? 17 A. Okay. 18 Q. So in January 2013, Mr Allen plead the guilty to 19 a single count of fraud by false representation. When 20 his branch had been audited, there had been a shortfall 21 of about £17,000 and Mr Allen told Auditors that they 22 would find a shortfall in excess of £10,000. He told 23 Investigators he'd inflated the balance in the branch in 24 order to cover losses he'd experienced and he thought 25 that the shortfall was associated with problems he 81 1 encountered with hardware not functioning properly, as 2 he moved over to the new system; do you remember that? 3 A. I didn't remember it was to do with moving over to the 4 new system; I thought it was to do with moving hardware 5 from one branch to -- one location to another. 6 Q. Absolutely. Now, can we look at POL00089427. That's 7 POL00089427. Can we please go to the final page to 8 start with, so we can scroll up to the penultimate page, 9 and keep going, and keep going. Thank you. 10 It's an email from Rachael Panter to you on 11 31 January 2013 and it follows on, really, in time from 12 an email that Mr Beer asked you about yesterday 13 afternoon when all the cases were set out and your 14 generic statements were going to be served in relation 15 to those cases? 16 A. Yes, I'm familiar with those sort of emails. 17 Q. Yes, entirely. So I'll read it, if I may: 18 "Hi Gareth 19 "Hope you are well. Just to let you know where we 20 are with a couple of cases. 21 "Grant Allen -- this case has concluded now so you 22 will not need to attend." 23 I will deal with what is said about Mr Ishaq here 24 because that will save time when I come to ask you about 25 Mr Ishaq. 82 1 A. Sure. 2 Q. "Ishaq -- Having served your report, the defence have 3 queried it and are claiming that Ishaq had to make false 4 entries in order for the figures to reconcile, as the 5 Horizon system kept malfunctioning. 6 "The trial is listed for 25 February 2013 for 3-4 7 days. Please could you make a note in your diary, as 8 you will be needed to attend to clarify our position 9 with Horizon." 10 If we could go down. Thank you: 11 "Our barrister has asked if you could read the 12 Defence Case Statement attached and make a list of your 13 initial thoughts on the assertions that he is making. 14 We may need you to add a few of those comments into your 15 report so that each issue is addressed. 16 "I have attached a copy of the case summary for your 17 assistance." 18 Then it deals with the case of Sefton and Nield, 19 which we don't have to spend any time on, and the usual 20 salutations. 21 A. Yes. 22 Q. We see from that that you were told that Grant Allen's 23 case had concluded -- 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. -- and Ms Panter refers to having served your report, 83 1 which of course follows on from reference in the 2 previous email that we saw about expert reports. 3 A. It was my generic witness statement, I believe, was what 4 was being served. 5 Q. Absolutely, which was described as an expert report from 6 you. 7 A. I thought of it as being an expert witness statement but 8 I won't quibble the terms. 9 Q. Okay. You reply in due course to this email, at 17.01, 10 so not long after. If we could go up the page, please, 11 and there we see: 12 "Rachael, 13 "I'm fine thanks. Hope you are too. 14 "Thanks for the update. I'll make a note of the 15 dates. No problem with them at present. 16 "I'll have a look at the Ishaq stuff and get back to 17 you. When do you need anything? I'm tied up all of 18 next week so I may not be able to get anything 19 formalised until the week of 11 February. Is that 20 okay?" 21 In fact, you were much quicker than that -- 22 A. Yes, I found a bit of space in my schedules during that 23 week but, yes, I was trying to set expectations. 24 Q. It's this I'd like to ask you about, Mr Jenkins, if 25 I may. You go on to say: 84 1 "What exactly was the conclusion of the Grant Allen 2 case? I was particularly concerned about his 3 allegations regarding the problems caught due to 4 refurbishment and comms issues being the reason for some 5 of his losses. Was anything said publicly about that? 6 We were quite concerned that this might set 7 a precedent." 8 Then you referred to the case of Mr Patel and Kim 9 Wylie, to conclude the email. 10 A. Yes. 11 Q. Who was "we" there, Mr Jenkins? 12 A. I guess it was "we," Fujitsu. I'm not 100 per cent 13 sure, about that would be -- it wasn't a royal 'we', if 14 that's what you mean. 15 Q. Well, that was one option, although you'd said "I" in 16 the previous sentence -- 17 A. Yeah. 18 Q. -- which rather precluded it being a royal 'we'. 19 A. Yes. 20 Q. So it was Fujitsu who were worried. Why would Fujitsu 21 be worried about a precedent being set in a case? 22 A. I think it was -- there was a suggestion that 23 a refurbishment had caused a loss and I'd not been given 24 the opportunity to investigate what was actually 25 happening, so I just wanted to sort of clarify exactly 85 1 what the outcome was, as to whether it needed further 2 investigation. 3 Q. Because if a refurbishment had been shown to cause 4 a loss or it had not been challenged that 5 a refurbishment had caused a loss, that might cause 6 problems for Fujitsu? 7 A. Potentially, yes. 8 Q. Yes. Specifically here, there is a reference to 9 "precedent" and that this perhaps could cause problems 10 in future cases? 11 A. Yeah, I guess so. 12 Q. Were you involving yourself, as it were, in strategy at 13 this point, Mr Jenkins, and not simply answering the 14 questions that were asked of you? 15 A. I didn't see it that way. 16 Q. Was there a risk of reputational damage to Fujitsu if 17 this had gone wrong? 18 A. I suppose there was a risk there but I was more 19 concerned in actually understanding what had actually 20 happened in that particular case and what the outcome 21 was. 22 Q. And what the possible detriment was? 23 A. I suppose that may have come into it. 24 Q. You were looking ahead with the interests of those who'd 25 been your effective employers for the whole of your 86 1 career? 2 A. Possibly. 3 Q. Can I move on, please, now just to look at the case of 4 Khayyam Ishaq, and could we please put up the case of 5 Hamilton, which has the Inquiry URN POL00113278, and it 6 is paragraph 214. There it is. 7 This is what the Court of Appeal said about the case 8 of Khayyam Ishaq in the judgment Hamilton and others at 9 paragraph 214, and it goes through to paragraph 218 for 10 the facts: 11 "On 7 March 2013, in the Crown Court at Bradford, 12 before HHJ Potter, Khayyam Ishaq changed his plea to 13 guilty to the theft of £17,863. On 22 April 2013, he 14 was sentenced to 54 weeks' imprisonment." 15 So what that means is that it's a sentence of 16 immediate custody, not suspended: 17 "215. The defence challenge to the Horizon system 18 was clear from a very early stage in the proceedings. 19 Mr Ishaq's solicitor had informed [Post Office] of the 20 issue and of the defence intention to instruct an expert 21 at an earlier Magistrates' Courts hearing on 25 July 22 2012. A defence statement of 29 August 2012 repeated 23 the defence challenge to Horizon and made a series of 24 disclosure requests targeted at the Horizon system. 25 "Mr Ishaq denied theft but admitted to altering 87 1 items on Horizon out of necessity in order to reconcile 2 the accounts and due to the system malfunctioning. The 3 defence sought any information relating to the 4 malfunctioning of the Horizon system generally (such as 5 the outcome of any enquiries or investigations or 6 internal memoranda record malfunctioning) and the data 7 produced by Horizon. The defence repeatedly sought 8 disclosure in relation to Horizon and instructed 9 an accountancy expert to analyse the accounts. 10 "[Post Office] produced evidence to demonstrate the 11 integrity of Horizon and relied in particular upon the 12 involvement of Mr Jenkins who provided witness 13 statements and contributed to a joint expert report. In 14 a served witness statement dated 15 January 2013, 15 Mr Jenkins defended the integrity of the Horizon system. 16 "On 5 February 2013, the defence made a formal 17 application to a judge for further disclosure on 18 Horizon. The application was refused. On 20 February 19 2013, the defence served an addendum defence statement 20 which alleged Horizon malfunction and set out reports of 21 technical faults which Mr Ishaq had made to the Horizon 22 Helpdesk. He had also made reports to the National 23 Business Support Centre about shortfalls and 24 discrepancies." 25 Paragraph 219, which is the next paragraph, simply 88 1 deals with Post Office's response to the appeal on 2 behalf of Mr Ishaq and points out about the absence of 3 analysis. 4 At the fifth line: 5 "The fact that Mr Jenkins provided witness 6 statements in itself suggested that [Post Office] did 7 not disclose the full and accurate position regarding 8 the reliability of Horizon. There was no proof of 9 an actual loss as opposed to a Horizon-generated 10 shortage." 11 So that's sets the factual background, as it were, 12 to the questions that I'd like to ask you, Mr Jenkins. 13 But just to add a little more, which I think you may 14 recollect of it, from the terms of your witness 15 statement, that Mr Ishaq had pleaded not guilty and was 16 due to be tried on 25 February 2013 in the Bradford 17 Crown Court but, although the trial started, his counsel 18 was not well and so the trial was adjourned until 19 6 March 2013. 20 A. Yes, I remember that. 21 Q. Then on 7 March he was re-arraigned and pleaded guilty. 22 In fact, you'll remember that because you went to 23 Bradford, didn't you? 24 A. On both occasions, I was in Bradford, yes. 25 Q. Absolutely. You had served a report in the case and, as 89 1 it says in the judgment in Hamilton and Others, Mr Ishaq 2 had served the defence statement setting out his defence 3 to the case and explaining why he took issue with the 4 prosecution case, and he'd also commissioned an expert 5 report from Beverley Ibbotson supporting his defence, 6 and you had a number of emails with Beverley Ibbotson 7 and did you meet her briefly, as well? 8 A. Met her briefly outside of the court on the first day of 9 the first trial but I'd not seen anything to do with 10 that report until that point. 11 Q. Yeah. In fact, you got it very late in the day, didn't 12 you? 13 A. I got it on the first day -- the morning of the first 14 day of the first trial, yeah. 15 Q. Absolutely. When at court, did you meet the prosecution 16 team, trial counsel, Mr Mark Ford? 17 A. I believe I must have done. 18 Q. The purpose of your email exchanges with the defence 19 expert, Beverley Ibbotson, prior to the part of the 20 trial, just prior to the start of the trial, was in 21 order that you could discuss each other's potential 22 evidence and produce a joint report that identified any 23 points of agreement and identified any differences 24 between you? 25 A. That's what I now understand, yes. I'm not sure it was 90 1 actually explained to me at the time, I was just given 2 the report and said, "Have a look at this, what do you 3 think about it?", or words to that effect. 4 Q. Right, because you did produce a joint ... 5 A. Yes. Well, I think it was called a joint report. 6 Basically what it was, it was Ms Ibbotson's report with 7 some comments interleaved with it that -- as to whether 8 I agreed or disagreed with what she was saying and, in 9 the event, on the whole, I agreed with most of what she 10 was saying. 11 Q. Entirely, and we'll come on to have a look at that 12 shortly. But, as you say, your views in relation to the 13 separate aspects of the report were incorporated into 14 Ms Ibbotson's report, in bold and italics. 15 A. Yes. 16 Q. We'll see that. First of all, I want to ask you about 17 the defence statement. Now, the essence of Mr Ishaq's 18 sense, as is made clear, was set out in his defence 19 statement and, for these purposes, can we look at 20 a document which contains quotes from his defence 21 statement and your comments upon those quotes. 22 A. Yes. 23 Q. You're aware of this document -- 24 A. I know -- I recognise your description of the document, 25 yes. 91 1 Q. This is POL00059602. We can see this is 1 February 2 2013, 9.31 in the morning. This is when you're 3 essentially commenting on this document. 4 A. Yes. 5 Q. Yes. We see the introduction explaining what you've 6 been asked to do, so this is about five weeks before 7 trial. If we could move up slightly so we can see the 8 full section on Defence Case Statement. Thank you. 9 So this is the first quote, as it were, from 10 Mr Ishaq's defence statement, reproduced in this 11 document for you to comment on. 12 A. Yes. 13 Q. Yeah. We see: 14 "This Defence Case Statement sets out in general 15 terms the defence of Khayyam Ishaq and the principal 16 matters upon which issue is taken with the [court]. It 17 is served for no other purpose." 18 It carries on five paragraphs, introducing the 19 Defence Case Statement, which you say: 20 "All of the above appears to be standard legal 21 preamble and doesn't require any comment from me." 22 Reflective of your familiarity with documents of 23 this nature? 24 A. Well, it was more a case of I didn't think there was 25 anything technical there and I assumed it was something 92 1 to do with the legal side of things that I didn't really 2 fully understand and, as I understood it, I was expected 3 to comment on the technical aspects, rather than the 4 stuff there. 5 Q. The next section is "General nature of the defence 6 case", and we see that as the heading. Here we see: 7 "The defendant is charged with theft of £21,168.64 8 ... 9 "Again no comment. I have not seen any of the 10 detail as to how this figure was arrived at. 11 "Note that I have been involved in a previous case 12 where the figure was disputed and was able to show why 13 the defendant had misunderstood the way the system 14 operated, due to the way they were trying to hide the 15 loss." 16 Then at paragraph 7, if you could scroll up a bit, 17 thank you: 18 "The nature of the Defence in relation to this 19 allegation is: 20 "There was no appropriation of monies. The Post 21 Office 'Horizon' software/hardware system had in the 22 past on numerous occasions malfunctioned causing 23 difficulties in reconciling sales, receipt and stock 24 figures. The defendant had reported the same to the 25 Post Office helpline seeking assistance but little or no 93 1 successful assistance was arranged to him despite the 2 said requests." 3 Your response here is: 4 "If the defence can specify some examples of this, 5 I am happy to investigate them. However I would contend 6 that the system doesn't malfunction without leaving some 7 trail to indicate what has happened. Without examining 8 the logs it is difficult to be any more specific. 9 "I think there are 3 possibilities here: 10 "The defendant has not understood of the way the 11 system operates and that the difficulties in 12 reconciliation have been due to the defendant's lack of 13 understanding of the system and the way in which it 14 operates. 15 "The defendant has stolen the money. 16 "There is a fault in the system. 17 "There is no evidence of a fault in the system (and 18 the fact that the system operates without issue in 19 12,000 other branches supports this fact), so I would 20 suggest that it is one of the other two. I can offer no 21 opinion in identifying which is the case. The Post 22 Office helpline is run by Post Office Limited and so 23 I am unable to comment on the assistance it did or did 24 not provide." 25 The system was faulty at times though, Mr Jenkins, 94 1 wasn't it? 2 A. I was aware of, at that stage, one fault that had 3 occurred after the pilot of Horizon Online, because this 4 case was to do with Horizon Online, if I remember 5 correctly, and that was the receipts and payments 6 mismatch issue that I think we discussed a day or two 7 ago, and I was confident that we knew the scope of that 8 and which branches that had actually affected. 9 Q. Yes, and it could cause problems that had to be 10 rectified, the system could do that. You knew that from 11 Horizon Legacy and Horizon Online was relatively new, 12 and you knew that any computer system could cause 13 problems which had to be rectified? 14 A. Yes, but, as I was saying there, that as we were talking 15 about Horizon Online in this case, that I wasn't aware 16 of any specific problems that would have affected that 17 particular branch. 18 Q. You had not, at this stage, examined the data? 19 A. And I make that clear at the time. 20 Q. But you were nevertheless venturing an opinion that it 21 is one of the other two, without having looked at the 22 data. 23 A. But I qualified that as saying that I'd not looked at 24 the data. 25 Q. You qualified it before you came to that conclusion 95 1 though, didn't you? You first of all said, "I've not 2 looked at the data but I think there are three 3 possibilities here", you say, and the two that it must 4 be are that the defendant must have misunderstood the 5 operation of the system or the defendant was a thief, 6 but you could not say which, and that was before you'd 7 looked at the data. 8 A. That's what I say. I had no reason to think there was 9 a problem with the system at that time. 10 Q. Without having looked at the data? 11 A. I have not -- I'd not been asked to look at the data and 12 hadn't been given the data at that stage. 13 Q. You say: 14 "Note that this is a common complaint." 15 What was a common complaint? 16 A. The common complaint was that, by then, I was 17 understanding that people were complaining about the 18 NBSC helpline not being very helpful. 19 Q. Is that part of your expertise? 20 A. No, it wasn't. 21 Q. If we could move to (iv), please, on this, if we scroll 22 down to (iv): 23 "The defendant contends that upon all core data from 24 the Horizon hardware/software system (used by the Post 25 Office Auditors) being provided to him the defence 96 1 should be able to demonstrate that all sales, receipt 2 and stock figures properly reconcile." 3 You say: 4 "Not sure I understand this. Is he asking to see 5 the detailed logs to do his own analysis? If so I would 6 suggest that he may need some help in understanding them 7 and in the past I've worked with defence experts to 8 provide that understanding." 9 You realise that the matters that were being raised 10 were the proper subject of expertise -- 11 A. Yes. 12 Q. -- not something that an ordinary person could be 13 expected to understand? 14 A. It was a case of explaining what the logs actually 15 meant, yes. 16 Q. Then could we please go down to the disclosure requests, 17 yes, and that's at 11(ii). It reads: 18 "All material to the knowledge of the prosecution in 19 existence (whether in the hands of the prosecution or 20 third parties) that reasonably supports (or is 21 reasonably capable of supporting) the contention that 22 the Post Office Horizon software/hardware system has 23 proved to be unreliable and/or inaccurate and/or 24 unstable and/or susceptible to malfunction and/or 25 otherwise prone to the production of erroneous results." 97 1 You reply: 2 "I am not aware of any such material other than 3 previous such challenges." 4 You were aware of material, weren't you, that 5 showed, whether or not it had been fixed, that, 6 actually, the Post Office Horizon software and hardware 7 system has proved to be unreliable and/or inaccurate? 8 A. I didn't have -- I was aware that Post Office had been 9 building up material of previous challenges but I didn't 10 have a complete set of that and that's really what I was 11 referring to. 12 Q. You knew about the problems during rollout? 13 A. But the problems during rollout would have not been 14 relevant because I had found out at what time this 15 branch had actually moved from Legacy Horizon to Horizon 16 Online, and it wasn't operating on Horizon Online during 17 that trial period. 18 Q. So you're saying that you've confined yourself to 19 Horizon Online here, and that you've not considered this 20 as a general request about Horizon software and 21 hardware. You've read Post Office Horizon Online 22 software and hardware system? 23 A. That is how I was taking that. 24 Q. You knew all about the problems during rollout. You 25 knew all about the problems with Riposte. 98 1 A. But this case was to do with Horizon Online and nothing 2 to do with Riposte. 3 Q. Yes. But this was an invitation to set out all you 4 knew, really, Mr Jenkins, wasn't it? 5 A. I didn't see it that way. 6 Q. Then down to (iv), please. We see there: 7 "The full results (whether provisional or final) of 8 all internal and/or external investigations and/or 9 enquiries and/or reviews (whether instigated by the Post 10 Office or any other body) into the correct functioning 11 of the Post Office Horizon hardware/software system ..." 12 You reply: 13 "Again, I do not have this information but 14 presumably Post Office Limited does. I am aware of 15 an ongoing investigation into this area by 16 an independent 3rd party which is due to report in 17 a couple of months' time." 18 That was the Second Sight investigation, was it? 19 A. Yes, yeah. 20 Q. When you met with Beverley Ibbotson, or emailed her, did 21 you tell her about the ongoing Second Sight 22 investigation? 23 A. No, I didn't know that I needed to. 24 Q. Having seen what Mr Ishaq was getting at in this case, 25 meeting with the expert, did you not feel that it might 99 1 be appropriate to tell her about what was going on with 2 Horizon at this time, when she was essentially raising 3 accountancy related problems in relation to Horizon? 4 A. I can see now that maybe I should have done but I didn't 5 think of that at the time. 6 Q. Then, finally for this, at (v): 7 "Any internal memoranda and/or guidance notes and/or 8 other material dealing with the correct or incorrect 9 functioning of the Post Office hardware/software system 10 ..." 11 You say: 12 "I don't believe that I have anything specific that 13 comes in this category. I assume that this is being 14 addressed by Post Office Limited." 15 Didn't you know about the Known Error Log? 16 A. That was not -- I'd not interpreted that question as 17 meaning that. 18 Q. Well, that identifies incorrect functioning of the Post 19 Office Horizon hardware and software system and gives 20 fixes, doesn't it? 21 A. Yes, I accept that now but I'd not seen that as being 22 what this question was about. 23 Q. So far as the answers you've given in this document are 24 concerned, did you appreciate that Post Office would 25 rely on your answers? 100 1 A. I don't think -- I don't think I heard anything further 2 from when I passed this response back to -- I think it 3 was Cartwright King, rather than Post Office, as such, 4 and I didn't get any further feedback in terms of 5 progressing this any further, that I can remember. 6 Q. Because we know, as we've seen from the terms of the 7 Hamilton judgment, that a disclosure request was made by 8 Mr Ishaq on 5 February, that's just four days after 9 this, which related to that material and the application 10 was refused by the judge. 11 Now, we don't have a transcript of that disclosure 12 application but do you appreciate now that, on the basis 13 of what you said, Post Office would be able to say that 14 it had no material to disclose? 15 A. I'm not sure that that, on the basis of what I said, 16 that they would be able to say that because what I'm 17 saying here is that Post Office probably does have 18 material that I didn't have personally and, therefore, 19 it was up to them as to what they should be disclosing 20 or not. 21 Q. What material were you thinking of, Mr Jenkins? That 22 Post Office would have? 23 A. I didn't know what they had. All I'm saying is that 24 I didn't think that I had anything that was relevant. 25 Q. Well, you're saying that "Post Office probably does have 101 1 material that I didn't have personally", are your words 2 and, therefore, it would be up to them -- 3 A. I think that's what I'm trying to say here, "Again, I do 4 not have this information but presumably Post Office 5 Limited does". 6 Q. What did you suspect they had? 7 A. I was aware of the work that Helen Rose had done a few 8 months earlier, in terms of cataloguing previous 9 challenges to Horizon. 10 Q. But wasn't that something that you were aware of as 11 an expert, that you should be pointing out here, in 12 terms of the answers to it? 13 A. That was not my material. That was Post Office's 14 material and, when I looked at that, I didn't recognise 15 a lot of the information in there. So I felt the Post 16 Office had a better picture than I had. 17 Q. Why didn't you say, presumably, you'll disclose the 18 Helen Rose Report? You knew about it, Mr Jenkins. 19 A. Well, I assume that Post Office knew about it as well 20 because they were the ones who had shown it to me. 21 Q. Well, precisely. But you were the person who was tasked 22 with being the expert in this case, Mr Jenkins, and you 23 knew about the Helen Rose Report, but you didn't tell 24 anybody. 25 A. I didn't know that I was expected to tell anybody about 102 1 it. I thought Post Office had that information and they 2 could tell people about it. 3 Q. In any event, matters progressed and the defence served 4 an expert report from Ms Ibbotson and, as you've 5 explained, you had email exchanges with Ms Ibbotson and 6 you met her briefly at court? 7 A. Yes. 8 Q. Could we now, please, have a look at Ms Ibbotson's 9 report and the contributions from you, that are 10 contained therein, the joint statement. This is 11 POL00059927. We can see there it's dated 26 February 12 2013. It's the report of Beverley Ibbotson and the 13 joint statement of Beverley Ibbotson and Gareth Jenkins. 14 Now, I assume, Mr Jenkins, that you read this report? 15 A. I did at the time, yes. 16 Q. Yes. I'd like to take you to particular sections of it, 17 if I may. First to page 4, and paragraph 1.10. Now, 18 there's a part of Beverley Ibbotson's report that says 19 here: 20 "I understand that my duty in providing this report 21 is to the court and this report is addressed to the 22 Court and not to those instructing me." 23 Did you read this as written by Ms Ibbotson? 24 A. That was part of her statement. I was commenting more 25 on the technical aspects that came later. 103 1 Q. No, of course. I'm asking you, though, whether or not 2 you read that? 3 A. I probably read it, yes. 4 Q. Did that inform your understanding of the section in 5 your generic statement that -- where you said, 6 "I understand that my duty in providing this report is 7 to the Court"? 8 A. I don't think I related the two together, at the time. 9 Q. Right. Then, at page 4, please, 1.11: 10 "In accordance with Part 33 of the Criminal 11 Procedure Rules and the Practice Direction supplementing 12 it, I set out my expert's declaration at the conclusion 13 of the body of this report." 14 Did it never occur to you that you might be subject 15 to the same duty? 16 A. It hadn't, until it was pointed out to me much later. 17 Q. When you read that, "in accordance with Part 33 of the 18 Criminal Procedure Rules and the practice directions 19 supplementing it, I set out my expert's declaration at 20 the conclusion of the body of this report", did you not 21 wonder what Part 33 of the Criminal Procedure Rules was 22 and the Practice Direction supplementing it? 23 A. No, as I say, this was all -- the first time that I saw 24 the report was the previous day. I'd spent most of the 25 evening analysing a whole load of data to be able to 104 1 address the issues, so that's what I was concentrating 2 on at this time. 3 Q. Can we please go to page 5, please, which is the next 4 page, and to 2.3. This is really the body of 5 Ms Ibbotson's report, dealing with the issues in the 6 case, and what had happened was that essentially there 7 was an audit, Mr Ishaq was suspended and there was 8 a difference between the shortfalls from when he was 9 suspended and a later check? 10 A. Yes, yes. 11 Q. Of course, you could see the obvious point that's being 12 made, which is how has this balance changed, this 13 shortfall, how has it increased, if Mr Ishaq has been 14 suspended? It reads: 15 "A repeat balance snapshot exercise was carried out 16 on 11 February 2011, 3 days after the defendant had been 17 suspended, at which time the shortfall was identified as 18 being £21,213.79." 19 Then what you say is: 20 "GJ agrees that these exhibits are clearly different 21 but is unable to explain the differences at this point. 22 GJ points out, however, that the difference is only 23 £45.15." 24 Why did you mention that, Mr Jenkins, about that 25 figure, that it's only £45.15? 105 1 A. Because I saw that as being small compared to the 2 £21,000 that was being talked about and, in the work 3 that I'd done in a fairly limited timescale, I'd been 4 unable to sort of track down exactly what -- why that 5 difference was. 6 Q. Wasn't that a matter for comment by the lawyers, rather 7 than you? 8 A. Possibly it was. I don't know. As I say, I don't know 9 what -- I'd been asked to actually look at this report 10 and I was agreeing with the fact that the figures were 11 different, but I was just pointing out that the 12 difference was only £45. 13 Q. Can we go to page 17, please, and to paragraph 3.29. 14 This case was all about reversals, wasn't it, 15 Mr Jenkins? 16 A. Yes, I think it was. I can't remember all the details, 17 I'm afraid. 18 Q. We see at 3.29, and of course the issue is, a central 19 issue is, who was responsible for the reversals? 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. Yeah. We see Ms Ibbotson dealing with that issue and 22 something which perhaps undermined the assertion that 23 Khayyam Ishaq had been physically responsible for the 24 reversals. It reads: 25 "I have summarised, at Appendix G3, all reversals 106 1 between 9 September 2010 (start of branch trading 2 statement period 1) and 8 February 2011, which I have 3 further subcategorised by user ID and by product code. 4 As my analysis shows of the 248 reversals over the 5 period, 14 were made by Mr Dennis Watson, following the 6 audit on 8 February 2011, 173 were carried out under the 7 usernames associated with Mr Ishaq and 61 reversals were 8 carried out under the username associated with 9 Mr Liaquat." 10 You then say: 11 "[Gareth Jenkins] agrees that there were 248 items 12 and with the split on the total basis as above. GJ 13 points out that if only 4 product lines are analysed (as 14 SB/21) then other than one transaction all were carried 15 out by under name KI001 or KIS002. BI agrees." 16 Was this part of your expertise, to be able to 17 identify who made the reversals? 18 A. I was identifying what the logs said had been done in 19 terms of the reversals. So I'd been looking through the 20 transaction logs for the branch for that. As I say, 21 I can't remember the analysis I did now but I had spent 22 was of the previous evening going through the logs 23 looking to see what these reversals were and trying to 24 marry them up with what was mentioned in the report here 25 by Ms Ibbotson. 107 1 Q. But that was a fact for the investigator and the 2 prosecutor, not expert evidence from you, wasn't it; 3 that's not part of your expertise? 4 A. That's what I'd been asked to look at. 5 Q. Then, just finally, looking at this report, could we go 6 to page 19 and the expert's declaration. This is the 7 expert's declaration that Ms Ibbotson had referred to in 8 the early part of her report that is in accordance with 9 Part 33 of the Criminal Procedure Rules and the Practice 10 Direction. Could we just look at 5.12, thank you. If 11 we could move all of that up. Thank you very much. 12 "I understand that ..." 13 Then at (b): 14 "... the Court may at any stage direct a discussion 15 to take place between experts ..." 16 Did you understand, when you had a discussion with 17 Beverley Ibbotson, that you were essentially as two 18 experts discussing the issues in the case? 19 A. I was aware that I was there as an expert on 20 understanding how the Horizon system operated. 21 Q. Yes. At (c): 22 "... the court may direct that, following 23 a discussion between the experts, a statement should be 24 prepared showing those issues which are agreed and those 25 issues which are not agreed, together with a summary of 108 1 the reasons for disagreeing." 2 What did you think your joint statement was about? 3 A. I think it -- I think it was actually -- looking at that 4 now, I think it was fulfilling what it says at (c) 5 there. 6 Q. Yes. Then at (f): 7 "... I have read Part 33 of the Criminal Procedure 8 Rules and I have complied with its requirements." 9 Beverley Ibbotson is saying, as part of her 10 declaration, that she's read Part 33 of the Criminal 11 Procedure Rules and "I have complied with its 12 requirements". She says that in the context of it being 13 mentioned that the court can direct a discussion to take 14 place between experts and that the court can direct 15 a joint statement. She says "I have read Part 33 of the 16 Criminal" -- and she's declared this, "and I have 17 complied with its requirements". 18 Did you not wonder whether or not that was something 19 you ought to have done? 20 A. No, I didn't because, as I say, I was concerned about 21 analysing the data and commenting on the technical 22 aspects of the report, and that's all I thought that 23 I needed to be doing. 24 Q. Did you read this? 25 A. I'm not sure. 109 1 Q. You read the report but did you -- you're not sure? 2 A. The bit of the report that I was concentrating on was 3 the analysis of the -- what had been taking place in the 4 branch. 5 Q. Yes. At (g): 6 "I confirm that I have acted in accordance with the 7 Code of Practice for Experts." 8 Did you ever ask anybody about whether or not there 9 might be a Code of Practice for Experts? 10 A. No, I did not. 11 Q. You had been party to a joint statement with Charles 12 McLachlan in Mrs Misra's case, as well, hadn't you? 13 A. Yes, I probably had. 14 Q. Yes. Mr Beer took you to your notes on the expert 15 report in the case of Wylie? 16 A. He did. 17 Q. You were also looking at that in February 2013, shortly 18 before you came to consider the work of Beverley 19 Ibbotson. 20 A. I can't remember the chronology but I won't argue with 21 you. 22 Q. You'd received a letter from Bond Pearce at the earliest 23 stages of your work on Litigation Support, before 24 working on the Castleton case. 25 A. I have no recollection of that, and -- but as it was 110 1 established a couple of days ago, I clearly had seen 2 that letter. 3 Q. All of those documents contained the same or similar 4 aspects to that which is contained within Beverley 5 Ibbotson's report. You'd become familiar with the 6 language of documents, legal preamble, format of 7 documents. Why did never occur to you that any of this 8 might apply to you in your role as somebody giving 9 expert evidence on behalf of, essentially, Fujitsu and 10 Post Office? 11 A. I don't know. Clearly it should have done but it 12 didn't. 13 Q. Is it because you knew you could not be -- you couldn't 14 sign this because you weren't independent, Mr Jenkins? 15 A. I-- I'd just not thought it through. 16 Q. Because you knew that you were part of the prosecution 17 team batting for Post Office and Fujitsu? 18 A. That's how they were treating me. 19 Q. So you couldn't sign this expert's declaration, could 20 you? 21 A. I was never asked to. 22 Q. Even if you'd looked at it, you couldn't sign it, could 23 you? 24 A. Well, I've certainly never seen Part 33 of the Criminal 25 Procedure Rules and I certainly haven't seen the Code of 111 1 Practice for Experts, so on that basis I definitely 2 couldn't have signed it. 3 Q. Because you were considering matters of strategy, such 4 as this would have been an unhelpful precedent? 5 A. I wouldn't call that a matter of strategy. 6 MR MOLONEY: That's all I ask. Thank you, Mr Jenkins. 7 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: Thank you, Mr Moloney. 8 Now, where have we got to? It's -- well, 12.53. 9 There are potential questions on behalf of Ms Sinclair; 10 is that correct? 11 MR BEER: Yes, sir. Might I suggest that we break until 12 1.55 and take those questions then? 13 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: Fine. Certainly, then. That's what 14 we'll do. 15 MR BEER: Thank you very much, sir. 16 (12.53 pm) 17 (The Short Adjournment) 18 (1.55 pm) 19 MR BEER: Good afternoon, sir, can you hear and see us? 20 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: Yes, I can, thank you very much. 21 MR BEER: Thank you, I think it's Ms Allan on behalf of 22 Ms Sinclair next. 23 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: Right. 24 Questioned by MS ALLAN 25 MS ALLAN: Good afternoon, Mr Jenkins, can you see me? 112 1 A. Oh, sorry, right. 2 Q. Hello. My name is Christie Allan. I represent Core 3 Participant Susan Sinclair, who is a wrongfully 4 convicted subpostmistress and the first to successfully 5 appeal her conviction in Scotland, which only happened 6 in September last year. 7 In the various witness statements that you've 8 provided to the Inquiry to date and in your oral 9 evidence this week, you've described the use of 10 case-specific witness statements in cases such as Seema 11 Misra and Hughie Thomas, and you've described the use of 12 generic witness statements in a number of criminal cases 13 thereafter, up until December 2013. 14 Am I correct in my understanding that you estimate 15 that you provided witness statements, in one form or 16 another, for approximately 15 Post Office prosecutions 17 in total? 18 A. I can't remember the number. I thought it was less than 19 that but I won't argue with the figure. It's that sort 20 of order of magnitude. 21 Q. So thereabouts. 22 A. Yeah. 23 Q. 15 or thereabouts? 24 A. Yeah. 25 Q. Of these 15 or thereabouts cases, approximately how many 113 1 times did you attend court to give oral evidence at 2 trial as an expert witness? 3 A. Only -- I only gave oral evidence in one case. 4 Q. Of that one attendance at court, how many times -- or on 5 that one occasion, was your independence called into 6 question, given your employment with Fujitsu, which was 7 commercially contracted by Post Office? 8 A. I'm not quite sure what you mean by that, sorry. 9 Q. On the one attendance -- I'll repeat the question -- on 10 the one attendance that you did appear at court, am 11 I right in thinking that your independence was called 12 into question at trial, given your employment with 13 Fujitsu, which was commercially contracted, of course, 14 by Post Office? 15 A. I'm not sure that it was -- I was just asked was 16 I biased because I worked for Fujitsu, or words to that 17 effect. 18 Q. So how was the issue of your independence overcome at 19 trial? 20 A. I'm not quite clear. I was just asked what was my -- 21 the fact that I worked for Fujitsu relevant by the judge 22 and I said I didn't think it was, and that was the end 23 of it, as far as I'm aware. 24 Q. And that's, I think, the point where you were called 25 "the Fujitsu man" at trial? 114 1 A. Yes, that's right, yes. 2 Q. Thank you. Given that the Core Participant who 3 I represent was prosecuted in accordance with the 4 criminal justice system in Scotland, I want to now turn 5 to focus on the position in Scotland. Firstly, what was 6 your understanding of the legal procedure for Post 7 Office Prosecutions in Scotland and the involvement, 8 therefore, of the Crown Office and the Procurator Fiscal 9 Service? 10 A. At the time I had no knowledge. I do understand that 11 the Scottish system is different from the English one 12 but that's the level of my knowledge, I'm afraid. 13 Q. Okay, thank you. Is it right to assume that you never 14 provided oral evidence in a Scottish criminal 15 prosecution? 16 A. Correct. 17 Q. What was the extent of your involvement in providing 18 evidence in Scottish cases as to the functionality or 19 integrity of Horizon, if any? 20 A. I don't believe I was involved in any Scottish cases but 21 I can't be 100 per cent sure of that. 22 Q. On that basis, as far as you're aware, was your generic 23 witness statements, and/or your Horizon integrity 24 reports, relied upon in such cases? 25 A. Not that I'm aware of. 115 1 Q. Just finally on this topic, to the best of your 2 knowledge, was anyone else from Fujitsu, or indeed Post 3 Office, involved in providing evidence in Scottish 4 cases? 5 A. I don't know, is the simple answer. 6 Q. Thank you. 7 If we could just move on to another topic, at 8 paragraph 10 of your fourth witness statement, you refer 9 to Post Office's instruction of Second Sight in 2012 as 10 a good thing and state that you believed that 11 an independent review would conclude that Horizon was 12 sound, but they might also provide recommendations for 13 improvements, which you would welcome. 14 You also note that you understood the need for 15 an independent review of Horizon, given the criticism of 16 it in the media. Were you concerned by the growing 17 criticisms of Horizon in the media? 18 A. I wasn't concerned about it. I just wanted -- I felt it 19 was a sound system, and I was -- welcomed the 20 opportunity to actually show that it was. 21 Q. So, therefore, did you consider the impact of these 22 concerns and public criticisms of Horizon as having any 23 bearing on the witness evidence that you provided in 24 criminal cases, whether in the past or indeed going 25 forwards in considering you carried on your role in 116 1 prosecution support until 2013? 2 A. I think the last case I was involved in was about the 3 same sort of -- I think it was the case of Mr Ishaq that 4 we talked about this morning, was the time that I first 5 became involved with Second Sight. So they seemed to 6 coincide, I think. 7 Q. Would you consider that the impact of these emerging 8 public concerns and criticism of Horizon had any impact 9 on the way that you conducted your evidence at that 10 point? 11 A. No, I just continued to explain what I thought I knew 12 about the system. 13 Q. Thank you. If we move on, at paragraph 28 of your 14 fourth witness statement, you state that you recall 15 suggesting that Post Office should provide information 16 to Second Sight about the receipts and payments mismatch 17 bug and the suspense account bug. Given that we're 18 talking about Second Sight, I assume that you made this 19 suggestion around the time of Second Sight's instruction 20 in 2012? 21 A. Yes, I believe so. I can't remember exactly. I think 22 it was probably 2013 by then, rather than 2012, but yes. 23 Q. By this time, was the existence of these bugs accepted 24 as being within the common knowledge of Fujitsu and Post 25 Office, if not the defence teams and the accused? 117 1 A. Yes, I believe so. I wasn't aware that there was any 2 secret about them between Fujitsu and Post Office. 3 Q. So why did you feel the need, therefore, to make this 4 point to Post Office, if Post Office already knew about 5 such issues and that these were indeed within the common 6 knowledge? 7 A. I thought they were -- I thought it was a good example 8 of how we were able to identify a problem, diagnose the 9 problem and fix the problem, and work out its full 10 extent. 11 Q. So that would be beneficial for Second Sight's 12 instruction? 13 A. Yes. 14 Q. Why, when you've maintained throughout your evidence to 15 the Inquiry this week, that past problems and bugs in 16 Horizon were not relevant for inclusion in your 17 case-specific and generic witness statements, nor did 18 you deem them relevant to the purposes of your Horizon 19 Integrity Reports, did you now, in 2012 to 2013, 20 consider these issues relevant to disclose for the 21 purposes of Second Sight? 22 A. Because I saw this as being a much broader issue and, 23 again, I was seeing that as good example of how we were 24 able to diagnose and identify and fix problems. 25 Q. It was a broader issue, as opposed to the disclosure in 118 1 criminal cases? 2 A. Yes. 3 Q. Thank you. I have just one final question for you. In 4 your evidence to the Inquiry this week, you were asked 5 by Mr Beer why, when you were not the lead engineer for 6 the Post Office Account, nor were you the only one 7 involved in the maintenance and development of Horizon, 8 that Post Office relied on you specifically to provide 9 evidence relating to the integrity of Horizon in 10 criminal prosecutions? I note that your answer was you 11 had a fairly good overview knowledge of Horizon, due to 12 your role on the agent team, your work in middle 13 account, back end and IMPACT, so you had a detailed 14 knowledge of how counter operated and a good overview 15 knowledge of how Horizon worked, but that you were not 16 the only person who could be used as an expert. 17 You stated that, despite some email correspondence, 18 where other names within Fujitsu were suggested, for one 19 reason or another, it was you in the end that was picked 20 to support Post Office in this way. Indeed, you 21 confirmed, when asked by Dave Jennings in 2009, whether 22 there was anyone else that could cover this activity as 23 well or instead of you, your answer was: 24 "Should? Then probably yes. Could? Then probably 25 no." 119 1 Do you therefore consider that you had a monopoly, 2 in terms of the availability of alternative experts who 3 were able to speak to the integrity of Horizon, which 4 effectively contributed significantly, perhaps, to 5 what's been suggested as the Post Office's over-reliance 6 on your services in the criminal prosecutions of 7 subpostmasters, and indeed again in a Group Litigation, 8 notwithstanding the criticisms of you five years 9 previously? 10 A. No, I disagree with that. There was an example, for 11 example, at the beginning of February, when I was 12 getting fairly heavily involved with the case of 13 Mrs Misra, I was off sick for a few days and there was 14 a question about, well, if I'm off sick, who could take 15 my place? And there was an email discussion about 16 suggesting some alternative names to get involved 17 instead of me. 18 Q. Out of interest, who were those alternative names? 19 A. I think the name that was mentioned was someone called 20 Dave Jones. 21 Q. To the best of your knowledge did these get involved 22 in -- 23 A. No, he didn't because I came back from my sick leave 24 after that. I was only off for about two or three days, 25 as it turned out, but people didn't know that at the 120 1 time. 2 Q. But you would disagree that you maybe had the monopoly 3 in terms of experts available to speak to those issues? 4 A. Yes. 5 MS ALLAN: Okay, thank you, Mr Jenkins. That's the end of 6 my questions? 7 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: Thank you, Ms Allan. 8 So Mr Beer, do I take it had those are the questions 9 on behalf of Core Participants, other than any questions 10 to come from Mr Jenkins' own representative? 11 MR BEER: That's right, sir. 12 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: So, Ms Dobbin, do you want to ask any 13 questions? 14 MS DOBBIN: I do sir, if I may. 15 Questioned by MS DOBBIN 16 MS DOBBIN: Mr Jenkins, as you know, I represent you in 17 these proceedings. I'm going to stand up because you're 18 quite far away from me and it's easier for me to see you 19 if I do. 20 A. Okay. 21 Q. All right? I hope you can hear me as well. 22 A. Yes. 23 Q. All right. Mr Jenkins, when I ask you these questions, 24 I'm going to ask you that you try and answer as best you 25 can, unclouded by everything that you know now. Okay? 121 1 A. Okay. 2 Q. I'll ask you to do your best with that. Yes? 3 A. So what you're saying is, in terms of what I knew at the 4 time, as opposed to what I know now? 5 Q. Yes. 6 A. Okay. 7 Q. Exactly, Mr Jenkins. The first thing that I wanted to 8 go back and ask you about was the email that you were 9 sent in 2006 in the Castleton case, on 6 June 2006. Do 10 you recollect that? 11 A. Is this the one in preparation for the meeting the 12 following day? 13 Q. Yes, it is. Exactly. So this is the one where it 14 appears that you were sent the quite technical document, 15 the Part 18 reply, that set out various things that 16 Mr Castleton was particularising in his case. Yes? 17 A. Yes, I remember the email you're talking about. 18 Q. You know that it also appears that you were sent the 19 letter as well from November 2005. Yes? 20 A. I now understand that, yes. 21 Q. All right. Now, before I go back to that, I just want 22 to go to your statement, if I may, and this is your 23 third statement, at paragraph 249. I'm going to ask 24 that that be brought up. That's WITN00460300. If we 25 could just go over the page. Thank you. Can you see 122 1 that, Mr Jenkins? 2 A. Yes. 3 Q. I think you set out at paragraph 249 -- and perhaps it's 4 easier if I read it -- that: 5 "Until I saw the documents provided to me by the 6 Inquiry, I had virtually no memory of being involved in 7 the civil proceedings between POL and Mr Lee Castleton 8 ..." 9 Yes? 10 A. Yes. 11 Q. "... bar perhaps one or two conversations." 12 If we go over the page, it sets out that: 13 "The Inquiry has referred me to 27 documents to 14 assist my recall of it but nonetheless I have little 15 memory of my involvement. I am reliant upon these 16 documents to help me to reconstruct what happened. My 17 lawyers have alerted me to a number of additional 18 documents on the Inquiry's database to which I refer 19 below. Having read all of this material, I believe that 20 my actual involvement in the case was fairly limited. 21 I neither signed a witness statement nor gave evidence 22 in court." 23 Yes? 24 A. Yes, I agree. 25 Q. Is that right, Mr Jenkins: that you don't really have 123 1 very much memory of the involvement that you had in that 2 case? 3 A. Correct. 4 Q. And that you've been dependent on the documents to try 5 to help you reconstruct, as you say, what happened? 6 A. Yes, indeed. 7 Q. All right. If we go, just dropping down please, to 8 paragraph 252, and this is just to pick up the thread 9 and orientate you, you set out -- if we see the second 10 line -- that you were: 11 "... invited to attend a meeting with POL's 12 solicitors on 6 June. My lawyers have shown me an email 13 from Brian Pinder dated 5 June 2006. This email 14 attached an agenda for the next day's meeting ..." 15 I think that's what we now know to be the letter, 16 yes? 17 A. Yes. 18 Q. "... and a scanned extract from a document which 19 recorded issues which Mr Castleton had experienced ..." 20 Yes? 21 A. Yes. 22 Q. You had set out there: 23 "I probably read both attachments in advance 24 although I don't recall doing so." 25 Is that right? 124 1 A. Yes. 2 Q. Okay. So have you any memory, for example, of reading 3 the Part 18 reply or the sort of technical document that 4 was sent to you with that email? 5 A. No, as I say, I have a vague memory of going to 6 a meeting but that's about it, and clearly having read 7 the notes of the meeting, then I clearly, at that 8 meeting, answered some technical questions and that 9 other document attached there seemed to have similar 10 technical questions. So that's all I'm basing my memory 11 on. 12 Q. All right. Now, on the morning that you started to give 13 evidence, so before we knew the correct position about 14 what had been sent with the email, Mr Beer asked you 15 questions about what you would have done if you'd 16 received this letter in 2006. Yes -- 17 A. Yes. 18 Q. -- you recollect that? You said -- and if anyone wants 19 the reference it's the transcript for 26 June, internal 20 page 73, line 5 -- that you would have skimmed through 21 it; is that right? 22 A. Yes. 23 Q. All right. I wonder, then, if we could just turn to 24 this document, the email that you were sent ahead of the 25 meeting, and that's FUJ00152601, and I think we've 125 1 looked at this, Mr Jenkins. 2 A. Yes. 3 Q. Again, it's just to help you orientate yourself in time. 4 We see there: 5 "Please be advised of the email regarding the 6 meeting tomorrow and attachments." 7 Yes? 8 A. Yes. 9 Q. We've seen that and that's the email that directed you 10 towards the scanned document; is that right? 11 A. Yes. 12 Q. If we just look very quickly at this scanned document, 13 please. That's FUJ00152602. If we just scroll through 14 that document, please. 15 Thank you. If we could just keep scrolling through, 16 and keep scrolling through. 17 So I think it carries on, Mr Jenkins, to about 18 page 8, yes? 19 A. That seems to be it, yes. 20 Q. Yes. So I think eight pages of quite, perhaps dense 21 sort of technical information or queries set out; is 22 that right? 23 A. Yes. 24 Q. All right. Is that the document, is that the 25 information that you would have been interested in, in 126 1 order to prepare for the meeting the next day? 2 A. I think so, as best as I can work out from what I've 3 seen of what happened at the time. 4 Q. Did you understand that that's why you were being 5 invited to the meeting, to help contribute in relation 6 to that information? 7 A. That is -- yes, I think so, from seeing what is said in 8 the covering email and so on, yes. 9 Q. Exactly. Now I'm showing you these documents to see if 10 I can just put you again, just back in time, Mr Jenkins, 11 but, at the point that you were sent these, had anyone 12 actually mentioned to you that you might be any sort of 13 witness in this case? 14 A. I don't believe so but I can't be 100 per cent sure. 15 Q. There are no emails to that effect, are there? 16 A. Not that I've seen. 17 Q. Had anyone suggested to you that the meeting was to 18 consider whether anyone might be a witness in this case? 19 A. Again, I have no recollection of that. 20 Q. And that's not reflected in the email that you were sent 21 either, is it? 22 A. No. 23 Q. We've seen an attendance note of the meeting, haven't 24 we? 25 A. Yes. 127 1 Q. You've been through that attendance note, I think, 2 haven't you, for preparing -- 3 A. Yes, I have. 4 Q. -- for the inquiry. There is no suggestion in that 5 attendance note, is there, that there is discussion 6 about anyone being a witness in that case? 7 A. I can't remember that. 8 Q. All right. Well, perhaps you'll take it from me -- 9 A. I'm happy to take it from you, yes. 10 Q. All right. In fact, if we look at POL00071138, this is 11 an email from Mr Dilley the solicitor, and that was sent 12 on 27 June 2006. 13 A. Yes. 14 Q. If we just scroll down a bit to the witnesses of fact, 15 we see your name there, don't we? 16 A. Yes, that's me. 17 Q. Then if we just look at the next line, it says: 18 "We will also have one or two expert witnesses on 19 the IT and accountancy side." 20 Correct? 21 A. Yes. 22 Q. Thank you. It's right, isn't it, when Mr Dilley came to 23 draft a witness statement for you, Mr Jenkins, it was 24 a witness statement of fact, wasn't it? 25 A. I believe so. As I say, at the time I had no concept of 128 1 the difference. 2 Q. All right. Well, let's have a quick look. FUJ00122284. 3 Perhaps if we could just go to the last paragraph in 4 that witness statement. 5 Okay, we've seen this, this first part of it, 6 Mr Jenkins. You can see it says, "Witness statement". 7 If we go to the last paragraph, please, paragraph 38, 8 that was drafted for you by Mr Dilley, wasn't it? 9 A. Yes. Well, I assume so at least. 10 Q. I think we know from the emails, Mr Jenkins, that it 11 was. 12 A. Yeah. 13 Q. That's not in dispute. 14 A. Yeah. 15 Q. He sets out there what it was that he wanted or he was 16 proposing that you say. Yes? 17 A. Yes. 18 Q. He sets out -- I'm not going to through all of it: 19 "There are no grounds for believing that the 20 problems Mr Castleton says he experienced with his 21 computer would have caused either theoretical or real 22 losses." 23 Correct? 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. We can see what you say underneath that: 129 1 "Not sure I can agree to this without looking more 2 closely at what has gone on." 3 Correct? 4 A. Yes, that's right. 5 Q. Then we -- sorry, Mr Jenkins, I didn't mean to cut 6 across you. We can see that it was proposed that you 7 sign that as a witness of fact, correct? 8 A. Yes. 9 Q. It just says: 10 "I believe the facts in this ... statement are 11 true." 12 Yes? 13 A. Yes. 14 Q. You can see that. Thank you, that can be taken down. 15 When you were taken to the letter about expert 16 duties, the one from November 2005 -- 17 A. Yes. 18 Q. -- Mr Beer put this to you: 19 "If we scan through the letter just slowly -- 20 I think you will have read it carefully overnight -- the 21 letter doesn't refer, would you accept, to the provider 22 of a report from Fujitsu as being an expert witness." 23 Yes? 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. Mr Beer then took you through the letter, didn't he? 130 1 A. Yes, he did. 2 Q. In fact you agreed with him that that's what the letter 3 said, yes? 4 A. Yes. 5 Q. In fact, I think we see, if we go to the letter, that it 6 refers to that twice. I'm going to ask if we go to it, 7 FUJ00152573. I'm going to go to the second place where 8 it mentions it, but if we go, please, to the final page 9 of it, page 3 -- sorry, it's page 14 of the document. 10 If you could just scroll down, please, and if 11 perhaps we could just pause there. So for example, it 12 says at paragraph 7, doesn't it, Mr Jenkins, if we look 13 at the paragraph there, that the report should: 14 "Contain a declaration that it's been prepared in 15 accordance with the Code of Guidance on Expert 16 Evidence." 17 Yes? 18 A. Yes. 19 Q. If we continue scrolling, please, to paragraph (5). So 20 this immediately under "Duty to the Post Office" it sets 21 out: 22 "In performing all of your duties, for which the 23 client will pay, you will owe a duty to the client to 24 act with the professional standards of skill, care and 25 diligence adhered to by experienced and competent 131 1 consultants acting as expert witnesses." 2 Correct? 3 A. Yes, I see that. 4 Q. All right. Now, that shows you, doesn't it, Mr Jenkins, 5 that two people can read a document like this, or 6 perhaps skim over it, and miss important points, yes? 7 A. Yes. 8 Q. Even someone as forensic as Mr Beer can miss that, yes? 9 A. Yes. 10 Q. Or not understand it, correct? 11 A. Yeah. 12 Q. All right. I'm just going to ask if that be taken down, 13 please. 14 Now, the Inquiry saw, when it was decided that you 15 wouldn't be a witness in that case, Mr Pinder emailed 16 you on 4 September, didn't he? 17 A. Yes, I believe there was an email around that sort of 18 time. 19 Q. All right. If we look at FUJ00154733. We didn't come 20 back to this again yesterday, Mr Jenkins, when this was 21 revisited, but if we just look at what it says again, so 22 Mr Pinder is telling you why you're not going to be 23 a witness. Yes? 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. "He states that although you will probably [be] a good 132 1 witness, it is for evidential reasons ..." 2 Yes? 3 A. Yes, I saw that. 4 Q. You saw that. Then you said: 5 "Fine (I won't [even] try [and] understand what this 6 means!)" 7 Yes? 8 A. Yes. 9 Q. Now, I know this was about 18 years ago, Mr Jenkins, but 10 again, reading that email now, does it assist you as to 11 whether, had you read the November 2005 letter, you had 12 digested its contents or understood it in any way? 13 A. I don't think so because, as I say -- as I say there, 14 I won't try and understand what that means, talking 15 about opinion evidence and expert evidence, and it 16 didn't really have any meaning for me then. 17 Q. All right. Now, you've been asked about what guidance 18 you sought about being a witness, haven't you -- 19 A. Yes. 20 Q. -- in the course of the past few days. I wanted to ask 21 you about one of the occasions, proximate to this, when 22 you did ask for guidance. Yes? 23 A. Okay. 24 Q. If we could go, please, to FUJ00152616. If we could 25 scroll down, please, and scroll down again, please, and 133 1 keep scrolling down. Okay. If we could just stop 2 there. So this was an email that you were sending to 3 Ms Matthews; is that right? 4 A. Yes, it looks like that, yes. 5 Q. So one of the Post Office Investigators, correct? 6 A. Yes, as I understand it. 7 Q. If we just look there, we can see that this is an email 8 about arrangements. Yes? 9 A. Yes. 10 Q. You say to her: 11 "Do you have any idea as to how much time will be 12 involved and exactly what is required? I've never been 13 to court in any capacity and my knowledge of such things 14 is based on films and TV (which I'm sure are 15 inaccurate!)" 16 Yes? 17 A. Yes. 18 Q. If we just scroll up, please, and she answers you and we 19 can see this is on 12 July, isn't it? 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. We see a couple of paragraphs down: 22 "All witnesses will have to be present on the 1st 23 day of trial unless the defence has agreed [their] 24 statement and don't wish to ask any questions about that 25 evidence. It's pretty much as you see on the TV really 134 1 but remember that you will have sight of your statement 2 prior to taking the stand can only be asked questions 3 specifically about your statement." 4 Yes? 5 A. Yes, I see that. 6 Q. Was that pretty much the height of the sort of guidance 7 that you were given about being a witness when you 8 sought that guidance? 9 A. Yes, I think so. 10 Q. Now, that was in July 2006, yes? 11 A. Yes. 12 Q. So that was a few months after the conference that had 13 taken place in June 2006, wasn't it? 14 A. Yes, the following month, yes. 15 Q. Again, does that throw any light, Mr Jenkins, on what 16 you understood about giving evidence in court, do you 17 think? 18 A. Well, it shows that I didn't have much idea about what 19 was involved. 20 Q. Right. I'm going to move on, if I may, in time, 21 Mr Jenkins, to 2010, and to Mrs Misra's case. Okay? 22 A. Okay. 23 Q. Now, some expert reports have been put to you, yes -- 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. -- and you've been asked the question why didn't they 135 1 trigger you to think "Does this all apply to me? Am 2 I subject to these sorts of duties?" Yes? 3 A. Yes, I've certainly been asked that. 4 Q. I wanted to ask you this: in the years that you provided 5 support to Post Office and its prosecutions, did those 6 type of reports ever trigger any lawyer to send to you 7 formal instructions as an expert in any case? 8 A. I don't believe so. 9 Q. Did those sorts of reports trigger any lawyer to tell 10 you that the evidence that you were giving was opinion 11 evidence and that you were therefore subject to those 12 sorts of duties? 13 A. Not that I can recall. 14 Q. Did they ever trigger any lawyer to tell you that your 15 response should be in the form of an expert report? 16 A. No, I believe all -- the only things I ever produced 17 were witness statements. 18 Q. Did they ever trigger any lawyer to sit down with you 19 and actually explain what expert duties are and what 20 they mean? 21 A. Not that I can recall. 22 Q. Did they ever trigger any lawyer to explain to you or to 23 say to you that you were in the same sort of category as 24 these experts? 25 A. Not that I can recall. 136 1 Q. Did they ever trigger any lawyer to say to you that your 2 statements ought to bear an expert declaration? 3 A. No, I don't believe they ever did. 4 Q. Did any of that ever happen, Mr Jenkins? 5 A. I don't believe so. 6 Q. In the case of Mr Ishaq, Mr Jenkins, I think it's right, 7 isn't it, that you went to trial on the first day 8 without having been provided with Ms Ibbotson's expert 9 report; is that right? 10 A. That's my understanding of things from looking at the 11 email documentation, and I do recall meeting with her on 12 the first day of the trial in Bradford. 13 Q. It was an accountancy report, wasn't it? 14 A. I believe so, yes. 15 Q. You had to ask Ms Ibbotson for all of the appendices to 16 her report because you didn't have them; that's right, 17 isn't it? 18 A. I believe so. I got emailed the report and I think 19 later on I had to ask her for the appendices so I could 20 try to do some sort of analysis to try and correlate her 21 figures against the ARQ data that I'd happened to have 22 with me because I'd asked for it. 23 Q. All right. The email that sent you her report was in 24 fact a blank email, wasn't it? 25 A. Yes, I believe it was. 137 1 Q. Did you have to work into the night on the first day of 2 trial in order to be able to respond to her report? 3 A. Yes, I think it was about 9.00/10.00 in the evening when 4 I sent my response to her report to her. 5 Q. Did you have to, as I understand it, do a reconciliation 6 exercise -- 7 A. Yes. 8 Q. -- overnight, in order to be able to, as it were, agree 9 with her report; is that what you had to do with the 10 material that you'd been provided with? 11 A. Yes, I had to go through the ARQ -- I can't remember all 12 the details now but I didn't start looking at the ARQ 13 data until I'd got that and I'd spent quite a bit of 14 time, both in the afternoon and in the evening, going 15 through the ARQ data to try to agree the figures that 16 she had in her report and try and work out where she'd 17 got her figures from. 18 Q. Did it occur to you, Mr Jenkins, to object or to say 19 that that wasn't a very fair way of treating you, to 20 expect you to come along to a trial on the first day and 21 to do all of that and to be expected to get on top of 22 her report? 23 A. I just thought I'd try and get on with it and do the 24 best that I could with the limited information that 25 I had. 138 1 Q. We've seen, and Mr Moloney asked you about this, that 2 you were also sent a Defence Case Statement in 3 Mr Ishaq's case, yes? 4 A. Yes, that was sort of a week or two before that, 5 I believe. 6 Q. The fact that a lawyer sent you, a witness in a case, 7 the Defence Case Statement, did that make you think that 8 that was all right, that that was the sort of thing that 9 a lawyer could do? 10 A. Yes, I'd been sent Defence Case Statements before. So 11 I thought it was the normal thing to do. 12 Q. Did you think that it was all right to comment on 13 disclosure requests that were being made to Post Office? 14 A. It didn't occur to me to question it. 15 Q. Did you have any responsibility for Post Office's 16 disclosure obligations? 17 A. I didn't think I had. 18 Q. Did anyone properly explain to you the sorts of duties 19 that Post Office owed as a prosecutor? 20 A. No, I didn't understand what disclosure meant or -- and 21 what responsibilities anybody had to do with it. 22 Q. All right. I'm going to move on, then, if I may, 23 Mr Jenkins, to ask you about the boilerplate paragraphs 24 that appear in Penny Thomas' witness statement, yes? 25 A. Yeah. 139 1 Q. All right. So I wanted to start then, if I could, 2 exactly as Mr Stein did, with your statement at 3 paragraph 102. That's your third witness statement, 4 okay? Do you have that? 5 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: Did you say page or paragraph 102, 6 Ms Dobbin, sorry? 7 MS DOBBIN: Sorry, sir, it's paragraph 102. I apologise if 8 I said that. Page 33. 9 Okay, Mr Jenkins, do you see that? 10 A. I see that in front of me now, yes. 11 Q. All right. I'm not going to read all of this out, I'm 12 just going to ask you to look at paragraph 102. And you 13 see the heading above that, yes? 14 A. Yes. 15 Q. If we just scroll through, you see at paragraph 103, 16 Mr Jenkins, you set out there the understanding on the 17 part of some witnesses to the Inquiry that those 18 paragraphs in Penny's statement were about how Horizon 19 was working, yes? 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. If we go on to paragraph 104, I don't think we need 22 worry about that. If we scan through to paragraph 105, 23 yes -- 24 A. Yes. 25 Q. -- and you set out there about why you didn't think they 140 1 could give an opinion on the operation of Horizon, yes? 2 A. Yes. 3 Q. Paragraph 106: you set out that their witness statement 4 was concerned with the production of ARQ data, correct? 5 A. Yes. 6 Q. Now, I want to ask you about this and I'm going to come 7 on to Mr Thomas' case as well but, if we look at 8 paragraph 107, you were taken to this. You were 9 explaining that there was no guidance, as it were, as to 10 what the standard paragraphs were supposed to mean, 11 correct? 12 A. Correct. 13 Q. You set out that you could see from the communications 14 in Mr Thomas' case that you raised a question about 15 these paragraphs, yes? 16 A. Yes. 17 Q. I'll come back to that and the question or the query 18 that you raised. If you just read through that. 19 A. Yes. 20 Q. Have you read that to the end of the paragraph, yes? 21 You set out: 22 "In Mr Thomas' case, I think my concern was that 23 I could not include these paragraphs because I had not 24 extracted the ARQ spreadsheets that my draft statement 25 was referring to. By this ... I could not speak to the 141 1 computer which had extracted the spreadsheets as working 2 properly. I deal with the contemporaneous evidence 3 about this ..." 4 Yes? 5 A. Yes. 6 Q. I just wanted to remind you of the background against 7 which you were asked questions about this. All right? 8 A. Yes. 9 Q. So I wonder then if we could go to Penny Thomas' 10 statement and this is at FUJ00122139. If we could go to 11 the final two paragraphs, please, I think, Mr Jenkins, 12 you might recognise this. I think Ms Thomas asked you, 13 and then I think some other people, to look at her 14 witness statement? 15 A. Yes. 16 Q. Is that right? Sorry, if we could go to the penultimate 17 page, please. So we see, don't we, those two paragraphs 18 at the end of her standard statement. Yes? 19 A. Yes. 20 Q. Is that the standard statement by which the ARQ data 21 would be produced? 22 A. I believe so. 23 Q. I think she's made some notes there, that may not 24 matter; do you see that? 25 A. Yes, I can see that. 142 1 Q. I just wanted to be clear about this, Mr Jenkins. If we 2 just -- yes, that's fine. 3 In terms of what you understood the first paragraph 4 to relate to and what computer it related to, can you 5 explain that? 6 A. I think it's the computer that's actually doing the 7 extraction of the audit data. So I think there's 8 a comment there about the "AW", so that would be the 9 audit workstation. 10 Q. Where she has said: 11 "I hold a responsible position in relation to the 12 working of the [Audit Workstation]." 13 A. Yeah. 14 Q. I just want to ask you about your understanding of that 15 paragraph and what was meant by it? 16 A. It was to do with the computer, on which she was 17 actually doing the extraction, working properly. 18 Q. Why did you not think, or what was the basis for your 19 belief, that she was not speaking to the Horizon system 20 in that paragraph? 21 A. I didn't feel that she understood the way that the 22 Horizon system worked at all, so therefore was not 23 qualified to be able to talk about whether the Horizon 24 was working or not. That wasn't her background or 25 expertise. 143 1 Q. If we then go to Mr Thomas' case, it's right, isn't it, 2 that those paragraphs appeared in a draft of your 3 statement, yes -- 4 A. Yes. 5 Q. -- and we've seen that. Perhaps if we just go to that, 6 first of all, and look at your comment on it. So this 7 is FUJ00122204. If we just go to the end of that, 8 please. Sorry, if we just go up, please. All right, 9 we've seen this before, yes? 10 A. Yes. 11 Q. Those were your highlighted paragraphs, yes? 12 A. Yes. 13 Q. Just noting what you say there: 14 "I'm not sure that the yellow bit is true. Can this 15 be deleted? All I've done is interpret the data in the 16 spreadsheets that you have emailed to me." 17 Yes? 18 A. Yes. 19 Q. I'm going to look, then, in a bit more detail about what 20 your concern was but can you, just before we do, explain 21 what it was that was concerning you to make that 22 comment? 23 A. Well, this is saying that I'd actually extracted the 24 data, which I hadn't. 25 Q. Yes. Do we see, if we go to FUJ00122218, and if we 144 1 scroll down a little bit, and if we just look at that 2 second paragraph, Mr Jenkins. So ARQ queries, I won't 3 read them all out: 4 "... requested information in relation to Gaerwen 5 ... I was asked to produce information relating to 'Nil' 6 transactions during the periods specified. I have 7 provided three spreadsheets which I now produce ..." 8 Then I think this is where you make your comment, 9 isn't it? 10 A. Yes, so I'm saying I'm not sure about this, I've had 11 nothing to do with producing those spreadsheets. 12 Q. "All I've done is make some statements based on what are 13 in the spreadsheets. I assume that Neneh or Penny 14 produced the spreadsheets, but I have no personal 15 knowledge as to what was included with then or what was 16 excluded, [and we've seen this] for all I know you could 17 have typed them up from scratch." 18 Yes? 19 A. Yes. 20 Q. So it's quite hard to discuss this without having the 21 boilerplate paragraphs in front of us but, perhaps if we 22 go back to FUJ00122204 -- sorry -- and to the final two 23 paragraphs, please. 24 All right. So having looked at that, and your 25 concern as set out in the other -- it's a draft, 145 1 I think, at around the same time, isn't it, Mr Jenkins? 2 A. Yes, yes. 3 Q. Again, can you just help us. Having looked that, help 4 us understand, then, when you were looking at the first 5 part of the standard statement, again, just to 6 understand what your concern was in relation to the 7 computer and what computer you were referring to? 8 A. I wasn't sure about that. My main concern was with the 9 second part, the second paragraph, rather than the 10 first. 11 Q. That was to do with producing the records? 12 A. Producing the data, yes. 13 Q. All right. In terms of the first part, the improper use 14 of the computer, did you understand that to refer to the 15 Horizon system? 16 A. No, I did not. 17 Q. Can you just explain why you didn't think that that 18 related to the Horizon system? 19 A. Because this was a standard paragraph that I could see 20 had been used by Penny and I knew that she was in no 21 position to talk about how Horizon was working or not. 22 Q. When it appeared in your witness statement, did you 23 understand it to be concerned with the production of the 24 material that comprised the ARQ data? 25 A. Yes, yes, particularly in relation to the second bit as 146 1 well, which was talking about generating the ARQ data. 2 Q. Was that something that you could speak to without 3 having undertaken that process yourself? 4 A. Well, no, I couldn't speak about generating ARQ data 5 because I had no access to it myself. 6 Q. Were the spreadsheets that you were talking about and 7 discussing in this witness statement, had they come from 8 the ARQ data in the first place? 9 A. I can't remember exactly what the spreadsheets were but 10 they would have come from the ARQ data. I can't 11 remember exactly what extracts they were. 12 Q. All right. I think what -- and this is the bit that 13 I wanted to try and understand, Mr Jenkins, and in fact 14 what you did in order to try and remedy the concern that 15 you had, it appeared from what you were saying yesterday 16 in your evidence that you went to the PEAK system; is 17 that right? 18 A. That's what it said in the final version of the 19 statement, so I assume that must have been what I did 20 because I can't actually remember what I did at the 21 time. But the fact that my final version of the witness 22 statement talks about having extracted the information 23 from PEAK, then that must have been what I'd done. 24 Q. I think you mentioned yesterday that you obtained the 25 message store from PEAK; is that right? 147 1 A. That -- yes, exactly how I did that, I can't remember 2 now, but that's what it said in the statement so that 3 must have been what I did. 4 Q. Again, just to try and understand, if you'd got the 5 message store, what is the message store? 6 A. The message store is the raw data which is actually put 7 on to the ARQ system from which the ARQ spreadsheets are 8 extracted. So I would have extracted similar sort of 9 spreadsheets from the message store but using tools of 10 my own, rather than the standard tools that Penny and 11 Neneh would have used on the ARQ workstation. 12 Q. Can you just, in terms of why -- or was that a more 13 reliable way of obtaining the data than simply relying 14 on the spreadsheets that had been produced for you by 15 someone else? 16 A. Thinking about it, it's probably less reliable because 17 the ARQ data in the audit server had a better auditable 18 means of proof that it came from the right place, rather 19 than what I did from PEAK. But I'd not thought that 20 through properly at the time. 21 Q. All right. But in terms of what it allowed you to do, 22 did it allow you to look at the kind of preserved 23 record? 24 A. Yes, it was the same underlying data that would have 25 been on the audit server that was there on the PEAK 148 1 data. So, yes, in terms of extracting the data, it 2 should have been the same data. It's just that -- yeah. 3 Q. So it allowed you, as it were, to undertake that 4 process -- 5 A. So I could do the extraction process myself, yes. 6 Q. All right. At the time, did that meet your concerns 7 about -- 8 A. Yes, it did, because I'd actually done the extraction of 9 the data myself rather than relying on Neneh or Penny 10 doing it on my behalf. 11 Q. All right. Now, I think we know, after all of this 12 happened, that Ms Matthews then came to take a witness 13 statement from you; is that right? 14 A. So I understand. I have no actual memory of meeting 15 Ms Matthews but, clearly, from the various emails around 16 then, that must have happened, yes. 17 Q. I think we can tell, can't we, that she did come to 18 visit you to take the witness statement from you? 19 A. I believe so yes. 20 Q. All right. Just a point that we didn't really touch on 21 in your evidence but I wanted to ask you was why it was 22 that you were content to take out of the statement the 23 reference to system failure, yes? 24 A. Yes, okay. 25 Q. Can I just ask you a basic question about that. Was 149 1 what was being referred to as a zero transaction 2 a failure in the Horizon system? 3 A. No, it wasn't. 4 Q. What was it a failure in? 5 A. It was a failure in the end-to-end banking system. So 6 the things that I was referring to as system failures 7 were failures in the communication, either between 8 Horizon and the banks or between the banks, because, in 9 effect, when doing a banking transaction, what Horizon 10 connected to was Link, which then communicated with the 11 specific bank that was associated with the transaction 12 concerned. So those response codes would have been ones 13 that were generated by the banking system, rather than 14 by Horizon itself. 15 Q. All right, thank you. I'm going to move on, Mr Jenkins, 16 if I may, to a separate issue and that's the initial 17 question that you were asked in the case of Mrs Misra. 18 All right? 19 A. Okay. 20 Q. If we could go, please, to FUJ00152930, at page 2. 21 All right, we've looked at this, if we could scroll 22 down, please. Okay, so this is the question that we've 23 looked at a few times, Mr Jenkins: 24 "When Gareth completes his statement could he also 25 mention whether there are any known problems with the 150 1 Horizon system that Fujitsu are aware of. If none could 2 this be clarified ..." 3 Yes. 4 A. Yes. 5 Q. Scrolling up to your reply, or the reply that was sent, 6 you having provided the information. So if we look at 7 (3), that's where you say: 8 "This is where I'm reluctant to make a clear 9 statement. I am aware of one problem where transactions 10 have been lost in particular circumstances due to 11 locking issues." 12 Yes? 13 A. Yes. 14 Q. That question and your answer to it goes to Mr Jones in 15 Fujitsu, yes -- 16 A. Yes. 17 Q. -- Mr Singh -- 18 A. Yes. 19 Q. -- from Post Office, Mr Longman, the Investigator -- 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. -- and it also went to Mr Tatford as well, didn't it? 22 A. I believe so. 23 Q. You having provided that information, Mr Jenkins, did 24 any of those individuals respond to that information? 25 Did anyone ask you, "Could you explain more about, for 151 1 example, the locking problems to which you've referred"? 2 A. I'm not aware of anyone asking for any clarification on 3 that. 4 Q. Did anyone ask you if they could speak to you about that 5 in order to understand more about what you were talking 6 about in respect of the locking issues? 7 A. I don't believe so. 8 Q. Or did anyone ask if they could speak to you about the 9 process that you undertook to look at the event logs 10 that you were referring to in that response? 11 A. I don't believe so. 12 Q. Did anyone, for example, in Fujitsu say, "Well, this 13 question is asking what Fujitsu knows, that might 14 require a broader response, but that ought not to lie on 15 your shoulders, for example, Mr Jenkins"; did anyone say 16 anything like that? 17 A. I don't believe so. 18 Q. Did anyone from Prosecution Support speak to you at that 19 point in order to discuss or explore with you what might 20 be required? Was there any of that sort of 21 conversation? 22 A. I don't believe so. 23 Q. Now, I think it's right, Mr Jenkins, that you insisted 24 that the data be obtained for Mrs Misra's branch, yes? 25 A. I did. 152 1 Q. I think you had to press over a period of about five 2 weeks or so, maybe longer? 3 A. It was about a month later that the data became 4 available. 5 Q. Now, I think at some point, this is on 4 March -- and 6 perhaps we can go to this, this is FUJ00153027. 7 Mr Jenkins, you were sent a number of communications? 8 A. Yeah. 9 Q. I don't have time to go to them all, so I'm just going 10 to go to this one. All right, and if we just scroll 11 down, please. I think this is from Mr Singh and we just 12 see set out there: 13 "Thank you for your email ... What has been 14 requested [are the] transaction logs ..." 15 I'm not going to read all of this out, Mr Jenkins, 16 but if you just read it, the first paragraph -- 17 A. Yes. 18 Q. -- and then perhaps a bit of the second paragraph, yes? 19 A. Yes. 20 Q. Can I just ask you, having received that further 21 instruction of sort, Mr Jenkins, what did you understand 22 that your task was, or what you were being asked to do 23 after that? 24 A. To respond to the reports that Professor McLachlan had 25 produced and to make my comment on his theories. Now, 153 1 that actually talks to rebutting or answering them. My 2 approach was to just respond to them with what I -- with 3 what I thought how they reflected on the Horizon 4 system's operation. 5 Q. Then at paragraph 1, to look at, as well, "errors within 6 the Horizon system for the transaction log period"; what 7 did you understand that -- 8 A. Looking at the associated NT events associated with the 9 periods for which I had the transaction logs. 10 Q. All right. I'm just going to try to break that down 11 a bit. So you received this, yes? 12 A. Yes. 13 Q. You understand that you've got to look at the report, 14 yes? 15 A. Yes. 16 Q. And that you need to look at the NT events. Yes? 17 A. Yes. 18 Q. Why were you looking at the NT events? 19 A. Primarily to see whether there was anything in there 20 that would reflect that something had been going wrong 21 with the Horizon system in the period for which we had 22 the NT events. 23 Q. All right. Now, you said yesterday, and this is at 24 page 27, line 19: 25 "I thought that what I needed to do was a thorough 154 1 review of NT events." 2 Yes? 3 A. Yes. 4 Q. I just want to start with a general question: how 5 important are NT events for the purposes of diagnosing 6 the sorts of bugs at a branch that might cause 7 discrepancies? 8 A. That tends to be where you'd find that there would be 9 a problem. 10 Q. All right. Did you get the NT events for the whole of 11 the period under indictment -- 12 A. Yes. 13 Q. -- 2005 to 2009? 14 A. I think I'd received those about a week or two earlier. 15 Q. All right. So a four-year period, yes? 16 A. I believe so, yes. 17 Q. All right. What work was done on the NT events, 18 Mr Jenkins? 19 A. I think, initially, Anne Chambers had a review through 20 them and passed me an email of what she had actually 21 found there, which I then had a look at, and I believe 22 I looked at the events myself. 23 Q. All right. Was that exercise confined to just looking 24 for Callendar Square events? 25 A. It was looking for anything that looked out of the 155 1 ordinary. 2 Q. I should ask you the question: did you find anything out 3 of the ordinary when you did that exercise? 4 A. I can't be specifically remember that I found anything 5 out of the ordinary but I'm sure, if I had, I would have 6 noted it. 7 Q. All right. Now, it been suggested to you that you could 8 have looked, for example, at PEAKs or perhaps KELs for 9 this period as well, in order to look at the ARQ data in 10 relation to that as well, yes? 11 A. I believe I did make some enquiries as to what PEAKs had 12 been raised associated with that branch over that period 13 but I can't be absolutely certain that did so. But 14 I believe that I -- it's the sort of thing that I think 15 I would have done. 16 Q. All right. Would you have obtained assistance from 17 looking at other KELs, for example -- 18 A. I -- 19 Q. -- or other PEAKs related to the same broad period of 20 time? 21 A. I would tended to have looked at PEAKs rather than KELs 22 and I was relying on the fact that -- I think we 23 mentioned at some point the concept of having a master 24 PEAK, when there was a problem affecting multiple 25 branches. So, therefore, I thought that a search of 156 1 PEAKs looking for the specific branch would identify if 2 there'd been any problems associate with that branch. 3 Q. Right. Had that check been done? 4 A. I believe so but I can't be absolutely certain. 5 Q. All right. There's been focus about things that you 6 didn't do in the Misra case. I just wanted to ask you, 7 if I may, about some of the things you did do, okay? 8 A. Yeah. 9 Q. I'm going to set the NT events to one side. 10 So you had the transaction logs, yes? 11 A. I did. 12 Q. I think that that came to about 500,000 transactions, 13 yes? 14 A. Something like that, yes. 15 Q. I think is it right you were looking at that to test it 16 against Professor McLachlan's hypothesis? 17 A. Yes, I was. 18 Q. Did you also get the raw message store? 19 A. Yes, I did have the raw message store. 20 Q. Did you do some work on that to look at failed credit 21 card debits, as well? 22 A. I think I did that from the ARQ data, rather than the 23 raw message store. 24 Q. All right. What about transaction corrections, did you 25 look at those as well? 157 1 A. I looked at those again in the ARQ data, and I believe 2 that I also, at some stage -- I think this may be 3 a month or two later -- I was sent a spreadsheet from 4 Mr Longman of the transaction corrections that had been 5 generated from the back-end POLSAP system, and I did 6 a self-correlation between the report that he gave me of 7 transaction corrections and those which appeared in the 8 message store. 9 Q. All right. Did you look at pouch reversals as well? 10 A. I did. 11 Q. Did you also seek to do an analysis of the daily cash 12 movements? 13 A. I did. 14 Q. All right. Was that a type of reconciliation exercise? 15 A. It would have been, except for the fact that the daily 16 cash declarations didn't seem to match at all the sort 17 of movements of cash within the day and, therefore, it 18 made it difficult to try and pin down where losses had 19 actually occurred. 20 Q. All right. Now, just coming back to the Callendar 21 Square point, you made a statement referring to the fact 22 that you had checked the system events -- 23 A. Yes. 24 Q. -- in relation to that, in March, on 9 March 2010; 25 correct? 158 1 A. I made a statement -- yes, yes. 2 Q. Having mentioned and said that you had undertaken that 3 exercise and looked at this statement -- the system 4 events -- did anyone say at that point "We need to get 5 a copy of the system events" or "Can you provide those"? 6 A. I don't believe so. 7 Q. So was it a surprise, or had you expected that Professor 8 McLachlan had been provided with those? 9 A. I was surprised when it came to the trial that he was 10 asking me for them because I thought that, if he was 11 interested in them, he would have been given them 12 earlier but -- which I think is effectively what you're 13 asking. 14 Q. All right. I understand. All right. So in terms of 15 all of -- and also, sorry, I forgot to ask you about 16 this, you did have the PEAK, and that was also provided 17 to Professor McLachlan as well; is that right? 18 A. The Callendar Square PEAK? 19 Q. Sorry, the Callendar Square PEAK. 20 A. Yes, again, I don't think I provided it to him until the 21 time of the trial and, again, I was surprised that he 22 hadn't been given that sort of information -- 23 Q. All right? 24 A. -- because he'd been asking about it. 25 Q. You were asked many questions about the PEAK as well, at 159 1 the trial, weren't you? 2 A. I was. 3 Q. All right, well, we will come back to that. Just on 4 a similar point, Mr Jenkins, may I also ask you about 5 this: in terms of the ability of Fujitsu engineers to 6 detect bugs and to be knowledgeable about them, were 7 there systems within Fujitsu intended to pick up 8 whenever, for example, unusual events were generated, or 9 whenever there were bugs that caused discrepancies? 10 A. Yes, there was a group called SMC -- I forget exactly 11 what it stands for -- but they were monitoring events 12 from the overall system both at the counters and the 13 data centres, and they were monitoring these 24 hours 14 a day, seven days a week. It was the only part of the 15 operation that actually operated on a 24/7 basis. 16 Q. So was that part of the systems in place then, by which 17 Fujitsu knew and understood about bugs in the system? 18 A. It was, yeah, yeah. 19 Q. All right. In terms of all of the work that you did 20 over the years working on the Horizon system, are those 21 the sorts of mechanisms that you were familiar with and 22 knew about? 23 A. I knew about them. I don't know that I knew the detail 24 of exactly what was going on but I was aware that these 25 sort of things were in place. 160 1 Q. In terms of the work that you were doing, were Fujitsu 2 systems picking up whenever things were going wrong, or 3 discrepancies were arising? 4 A. That was my understanding and that was the purpose of 5 this sort of monitored, yes. And there were also 6 reconciliation systems in place that were picking up, 7 for example, failed banking transactions and things like 8 that. And there daily reports being produced that were 9 being monitored and checked for, and there was a group 10 that actually did that on a -- daily checks and things 11 like that. 12 Q. All right, so these are systems in place, yes -- 13 A. Yes. 14 Q. -- as opposed to sort of conversations with people -- 15 A. Yes. 16 Q. -- about whether or not bugs might come to light? 17 There's been a focus, Mr Jenkins, on what your state 18 of mind was during the time, particularly in Mrs Misra's 19 case, yes -- 20 A. Yes. 21 Q. -- and how you approached prosecutions. I want to ask 22 you about the information that you provided to Professor 23 McLachlan, and if we can go to FUJ00153157, and if we 24 could go to page 2 of that, please. If we could just 25 scroll up, please. Okay, sorry, if we could just go up. 161 1 Sorry, keep scrolling down, I apologise. Thank you. If 2 you keep scrolling until we get to Jarnail. Thank you. 3 So Mr Jenkins, this was an email that was sent by 4 Ms Hogg on 22 July 2010, yes? 5 A. Yes. 6 Q. "As a result of the meeting that took place between 7 Charles McLachlan and Gareth Jenkins as directed by the 8 judge, we now need to have: 9 "access to the system in the Midlands ..." 10 Yes? 11 A. Yes. 12 Q. "... access to the operations at Chesterfield ..." 13 Yes? 14 A. Yes. 15 Q. "... access to the system change requests ..." 16 Yes? 17 A. Yes. 18 Q. "... Known Error Log ..." 19 A. Yes. 20 Q. "... and new release documentation to understand what 21 problems have had to be fixed." 22 Yes? 23 A. Yes. 24 Q. So I think we can tell from that, can't we, Mr Jenkins, 25 that you were the person that provided Professor 162 1 McLachlan with that information, yes? 2 A. Yes, I believe so. 3 Q. If we scroll up, and keep scrolling up, please, and if 4 we just scroll down a bit, please. Thank you -- sorry, 5 if we could go to the body of that email. Sorry, yes, 6 thank you. If you keep it there. 7 So this is Ms Thomas reflecting the views that, or 8 reflecting why it is or how it came to pass that you 9 provided that information; is that right? 10 A. Yes, I believe there's a separate email in which most of 11 that text has been cut and pasted from, from me to Penny 12 Thomas. 13 Q. I'm just going to look at page 3, "System Change 14 Requests". 15 "Basically he was asking to look at all system 16 faults. I suggested that as we kept all testing and 17 live faults in the same system, and there was around 18 200,000 of them, then that wasn't going to get him very 19 far." 20 Yes? 21 A. Yes. 22 Q. So just to be clear about this, Mr Jenkins, you told 23 Professor McLachlan not just about the Known Error Log 24 but you told him that there were 200,000 faults on this 25 system, yes? 163 1 A. In effect, though many of them were from the testing 2 systems, and so on, but that's really a reference to the 3 PEAK system. 4 Q. So you were quite clear with him, weren't you, that 5 those were the sorts of numbers of fault in the testing 6 and live system, yes? 7 A. Yes. 8 Q. Do you understand, then, that the defence applied to get 9 disclosure of those materials from Post Office? 10 A. That's what this email chain seems to be showing, yes. 11 Q. I think it's right, it's not contentious, that Post 12 Office refused that, yes? 13 A. So I understood. 14 Q. I think you can see from your paragraph at the end that 15 he's "fishing"; you don't personally support the 16 requests but they seem "harmless", yes? 17 A. Yes. 18 Q. So you didn't see any harm in he being able to obtain 19 the information that was set out or -- 20 A. No. 21 Q. -- the access that he wanted -- 22 A. Yes, I didn't see any need to stop him actually looking 23 at that sort of information, no. 24 Q. I think it's right that Fujitsu did start a scoping 25 exercise in order to be able to explain, or to be able 164 1 to set out, all of the changes that had been at the 2 counter; is that right? 3 A. Yes, we came up with a cost for actually doing that but 4 it would appear the Post Office had already, by the -- 5 long before we'd actually done that costing exercise, 6 Post Office had rejected the requests. 7 Q. All right. But, again, was there any problem with 8 putting that information together and providing it, if 9 Post Office had wanted that to happen? 10 A. Well, there was a problem in terms of time and effort 11 for doing it but there wasn't a technical problem in 12 terms of actually providing that information, and, in 13 fact, Post Office should have had all that information 14 themselves anyway because all these change requests 15 should have been signed off by Post Office at the time. 16 Q. All right. Thank you. 17 Right. I'm going to turn then, if I may, to 18 a different subject, Mr Jenkins -- 19 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: Ms Dobbin, I understood from Mr Beer that 20 around about an hour was a reasonable estimate of your 21 questioning. I think you've probably had a generous 22 hour. Can you give me some idea of what you have in 23 mind? 24 MS DOBBIN: Sir, I'm almost finished. It's probably just 25 about ten minutes more. 165 1 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: All right, okay, that's fine. 2 MS DOBBIN: Mr Jenkins, I want to ask you then about the 3 evidence you gave when it came to Mrs Misra's trial. 4 A. Okay. 5 Q. I'm just going to pick up the transcript and ask if we 6 go to that, please. That's at POL00029406. All right, 7 if we could go -- and let's just orientate ourselves. 8 We can see that this is the transcript, Mr Jenkins, 9 yes -- 10 A. Yes. 11 Q. -- of 14 October? 12 A. Yes. 13 Q. If we just go, please, to page 8. We saw a little bit 14 of this yesterday but we didn't go the full way down 15 this page but, if we just look at C, you were being 16 asked, weren't you, "Can a computer system be perfect", 17 yes? 18 A. Yes. 19 Q. If we go, please, to page -- 20 "Can a computer system be perfect?" 21 You were saying: 22 "No, I don't think so." 23 Correct? 24 A. Correct. 25 Q. That's something that the transcript comes back to, 166 1 Mr Jenkins; I don't have time to go through all of it. 2 I am just going to pick out some bits, if I may. So if 3 we look at page 58, and go to the letter D. We looked 4 at this yesterday, Mr Jenkins, and this is the bit where 5 you set out that you were doing a high level analysis, 6 yes? 7 A. Yes. 8 Q. Was this you being candid and open about this sort of 9 investigation that you had carried out, yes -- 10 A. Yes. 11 Q. -- that you couldn't exclude, is that right -- 12 A. Correct. 13 Q. -- that there was a computer issue, correct? 14 A. Correct. 15 Q. I think we can see, if we go on, first of all if we look 16 at page 91. Sorry, if we start at page 90 at letter G. 17 You explained, didn't you, and you were questioned about 18 the fact that you didn't know about the Callendar Square 19 bug at the time, correct? 20 A. Correct. 21 Q. If we go over the page, you explained, didn't you -- we 22 can see that from letter A -- that you wouldn't know 23 about every call that's been raised, yes? 24 A. Correct. 25 Q. And accepting that Callendar Square was the failing by 167 1 the computer, yes -- 2 A. Yes. 3 Q. -- by the Horizon system? 4 A. Yes. 5 Q. Now, I won't go on with that but you were questioned 6 about that and about it not being the fault of the 7 subpostmaster. Yes? 8 A. Yes. 9 Q. If we go to page 94, this is where we see you being 10 questioned about the PEAK -- 11 A. Yes. 12 Q. -- in Callendar Square, yes? 13 A. Yes. 14 Q. I think that goes on for some time, yes? 15 A. Yes. 16 Q. If we go to page 96, you were also asked questions about 17 the Known Error Log as well, yes -- 18 A. Yes, I am. 19 Q. -- at letter C. At 106 -- this goes on for some time, 20 this topic -- from line F onwards, we can see the 21 reference to the Callendar Square PEAK, can't we? 22 A. Yes, it seems to be. 23 Q. "A few of these errors seem to occur every week at 24 different sites. So it's not just isolated ..." 25 Yes? 168 1 A. I'm not quite sure where we are on that. 2 Q. I'm so sorry. Letter G. 3 A. Yes. 4 Q. That's taken from the PEAK, isn't it? 5 A. Yes. 6 Q. That's what you're being questioned about? 7 A. Yes. 8 Q. Again, coming back to the idea it's been generated by 9 the computer, yes? 10 A. Yes. 11 Q. If we look at page 123, again, I think you were asked 12 questions, we can see, if we look at letters E and F -- 13 A. Yes. 14 Q. -- yes -- that there could be problems that you weren't 15 aware of, yes? 16 A. Yes. 17 Q. If we go to 124, please, and if we look at the letter 18 E., and you say in your evidence, don't you, Mr Jenkins, 19 that you couldn't even say. I'm just looking at the 20 answer: 21 "I've no way of knowing whether any money loss was 22 due to theft. I don't even know that money was lost." 23 Yes? 24 A. Correct. 25 Q. Indeed, I think at page 114, that you also agreed about 169 1 defence questions about mismanagement of the branch as 2 well. So if we look at the very bottom of page 114, 3 that there would appear to be mismanagement to the 4 financial running of this Post Office. You agreed and 5 said: 6 "That's certainly what it looks like." 7 Yes? 8 A. I've not quite got to -- which letter are we at? 9 Q. I'm so sorry. Bottom of page 114. 10 A. And then it goes over the page, are we? 11 Q. The top of page 115, please. 12 A. Yes. 13 Q. Do you agree, Mr Jenkins, that at a number of points -- 14 and I'm afraid I can't go through the whole of the 15 transcript -- might be thought that you gave evidence 16 that wasn't helpful to the prosecution case. 17 A. Indeed. 18 MS DOBBIN: Can you see that? 19 Thank you, if you wait just one moment. 20 Thank you, sir, I'm grateful for being able to ask 21 questions. 22 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: Thank you. 23 Mr Beer, is that it? 24 MR BEER: It is. 25 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: Well, thank you, Mr Jenkins, for making 170 1 a total of five witness statements, at least two of 2 which can properly be described as extremely detailed, 3 and thank you very much for giving oral evidence over 4 four days. 5 So we will adjourn now until Tuesday, when we well 6 hear from Mr Parker. 9.45 as usual, Mr Beer? 7 MR BEER: That's right, sir. I think there might be 8 an amendment to that. It might be -- and we'll discuss 9 this at the end of the day with you, I suspect -- that 10 only one day is required and that day may be Wednesday. 11 So the Core Participants and the public interested in 12 the proceedings should keep an eye on their emails and 13 the website respectively, just in case there is 14 an update. 15 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: All right. Well, I look forward to 16 further discussions with you about it. 17 MR BEER: Yes. We will speak in a moment, sir. 18 SIR WYN WILLIAMS: Fine. 19 MR BEER: Thank you. 20 (3.20 pm) 21 (The hearing adjourned until 09.45 am on 22 Tuesday, 2 July 2024) 23 24 25 171 I N D E X GARETH IDRIS JENKINS (continued) ..............1 Questioned by MS PAGE .........................1 Questioned by MR STEIN .......................39 Questioned by MR MOLONEY .....................79 Questioned by MS ALLAN ......................112 Questioned by MS DOBBIN .....................121 172