I get that, and I also get the "crunch time" effects software development more than any other role. Well done to your colleague for completing that task btw, it's never easy having to hit a deadline when you have upper management breathing down your neck. No developer should ever have to push out buggy code to meet a deadline, and that is where the problem lies. As you said, it's one thing in covering up buggy code (or in some cases commenting it out all together), and saying "oh it got past the compilation phase fine so it's going to work". That's not fair on the developer or the users of the software but under stressful conditions this can happen. Time scaling major projects especially in the public sector needs to be drastically improved. I am sure you probably know this, but one small error can cascade down to many. If one function is buggy and returns the wrong result, then any other function it calls will also return false positives. At the end of the day, if your in charge of a large development project, make sure the time scale is correct and you give your staff breaks and time to DEBUG code as much as possible. It's impossible to release 100% correct software (look at the state of the games industry) but giving developers time to check and stress test code will result in happy customers, less need to update it in the future. I know it's different for all companies, but if your not going to be generous on how a project is planned, it should be given to a team and management who are willing to make sure they develop and release a project that will be as stable as can be.
Not saying you’re wrong but that sounds a bit 'perfect world' though @SkylaRose Everyone works to deadlines and, in the public sector, imperfect and often limited budgets. Core public services can’t just not be provided while developers sit around coding indefinitely, searching out perfection that'll never come. Plus in this instance while it was an important piece of financial software we’re not talking life and death like a manned spacecraft or a ventilator in a hospital. There’s an element of risk appetite in the mix here – if the Post Office had acknowledged the issues with Horizon at launch and taken the hit on its balance sheet (which in turn, is the taxpayer’s balance sheet) because it was in the greater good to have something 90% workable in place rather than nothing, I don’t see an immediate issue with that. Rather than pushing the blame to the front line users, the scandal would have been completely avoided. Bit surprised you say well done to @sydney_horn 's lazy colleague who in the end didn’t fix the issue but simply overwrote the warning the issue was producing too! Sounds completely unethical to me.
You make some fair and valid points there. Maybe my mis-judgement was coming purely from working within the Space Industry where "perfection" is literally (as you said, life or death). I do understand that deadlines exist for a reason and it's important they should be met. What bothers me the most about it though is when you read stories about workers (in all sectors) being put under pressure with unfair constraints. We've all had it, at school you had to get an essay done on time and handed in. I think my overall argument perhaps is little bias in that respect, and I do acknowledge that everybody deals with stress differently. It still doesn't excuse the faulty code and the fact they knew about it and even worse, covered it up. I don't know how big the Horizon codebase is, but it seems like these errors were pretty critical and proves developers were not given the time to properly debug and test the code. Updates and patches are all well and good (and can be expensive) but the less errors in the original release will result in less cost and frustration later down the line. Management should of never covered up such mistakes in the first place. Catch it early, get it fixed early. People don't lose their jobs (and lives).
It will be interesting if the enquiry asks why the Benefits Agency dropped Horizon in 1999 some five years into the project. It might be a red herring, but it might be that those reasons that lead to abandonment, should have raised concerns at the Post Office end of the project.
There seems to be an unwillingness esp. from higher ups to listen to genuine experts or accept blame and accept responsibility. Because being so high up one must be infallible anyway. This attitude is incredibly pervasive in multiple fields of corporate and political governance and the reason why we continually gave enormous **** ups all the time which these higher ups always try and cover up. While continuing to earn their obscene salaries and bonuses.
Privatisation has benefitted a few unscrupulous greedy shysters. The amount of public money that has continued to be used to support supposedly private companies in the form.if subsidies gives the lie to private us always better. Maybe for asset stripping and making mire peoples lives miserable versus a few shareholders.
"Project Sparrow" The utter b'stards. The very Reverend Venells chaired the Committee with full government oversight in 2014 https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/cy/r...ee Update and Options Paper redacted.pdf.html
Just reinforces the point about these psychopaths always diverting blame onto those least likely to defend themselves. Vennells among others should be behind bars.
Latest from Private Eye. Sorry, for the non-stellar quality of the snap conversions but they are readable. It arrived in the post today, 2 days late, delivered at 5-15pm. We've only had 2 deliveries this week, Royal Mail closed the St Ives sorting office on Tues and now the regular (or should that now be irregular) post has to be sorted and collected fron Huntingdon. None of the staff who have left recently have been replaced and the general post is now delivered whenever. What a total shambles. Mandelson and New Labour drew up the plans for privatisation and Cameron/Cable and co finished them off and gleefully sold us all down the river. What utter Kuntz the lot of them.
Yer, the Cornish imposter. Up to recently, we had 2 regular posties in 30+ years. The first was a former Batman of the Squadron Leader (RAF Catering Corps arf), who lived a couple of doors away, and for the last 20 odd years, it was a former classmate of my missus. He finally had enough last year and left. The constant internal re-organisations and middle managers who kept trying to change things for the sake of change's sake, just to leave their particular mark, finally took its toll. You got to know your Postie and he would keep a watch out for people on their own, old folk etc, a public service task that had no monetary worth to the bosses of the Royal Mail.
This story is almost unbelievably cruel in its impact on a family. Mother dead. Kids in care or homeless.
Kerrist... the Tories truly are the gift that keeps on giving: Kemi Badenoch accuses Post Office chair she sacked of seeking revenge Business minister criticises Henry Staunton after he claimed the government wanted to stall payouts to scandal victims Also, what's that: 'Call me Dave Lord' "...knew..." about the PO closing its secret investigation into Horizon when he was PM? Cameron government knew Post Office ditched Horizon IT investigation
Who likes to see a lawyer suit wriggle? Quick live on YouTube now. WodderWick Williams the PO lawyer being read his own memos and pretending not to know anything about law, can't remember or doesn't know. Getting absolutely slaughtered. He appears to be a Kiwi and is really, really sweating now... Erm...umm...errrr...can you repeat the question again ummm... https://www.youtube.com/live/snNyoUdMIT8?si=iyD7y8KR6sjIsmG_
When are they going to cover what happened when the RM was sold off on the stock market and which people in Government knew exactly what had been going on? The fact they are dragging their heels over compensation is disgusting and offering paultry amounts too. Hopefully some of these scumbags get to go to court in front of a jury.
I love a public enquiry me. It really draws back the curtain on these big shot suits. It was the exact same with the Grenfell Enquiry. Nobody knew anything, nobody had any responsibility for anything and their daily work duties seemed to be mainly wandering around, writing the occasional email, attending a meeting here and there and going home early. Rod is the Head of Law and Brand ot something. Some high falluting title and no doubt a high falluting wage to go with it. But it turns out he's just one of at least 3 heads of law and brand, Rod isn't sure how many there are. Also he repeatedly emphasises that he knows nothing at all about criminal law. Despite having been a brief for decades in New Zealand, Noo Yoik and here. Civil litigation is his thing. Although he wouldn't say he was an expert in that either. Has some experience, yes he admits that, but not an expert. No,.no. And criminal law is completely outside his competency. Knows nothing about it. Not the first thing. Sorry. As for what be actually does during the working day, he's a little bit vague. He certainly does NOT give the post office legal advice. Certainly not. That's outside his competency. What he does do is gather together legal advice from OTHER sources and present them to the management. "So you're a sort of collator then?" he was asked. "Yes, that's right". Another part of these big shot jobs is toadying up and bullying down. One particular email exchange is particularly vomit inducing. Rod: If these sub-postmasters don't like Horizon, then they can do one. Big Boss: Bunch of thieving, no good degenerate crims they are. Got their sticky hands in the till, half of 'em I shouldn't wonder. Rod: Oooh, you're the only one here Sir who is more cynical than me! Big Boss: I'll take that as a compliment! Rod: That's how it was intended Sir.. (slurp, kiss, slobber).. When read this exchange, Rod felt it was unfair. It was just a casual internal exchange of emails between colleagues and not reflective at all of the general PO attitude towards sub-postmasters. So it was "top bantz" between mates then? Asked the QC. "Yes, that's right.." replied Rod, wriggling in his chair and twisting a pencil round and round in his hands nervously. The unfortunate fact is that this will be all the punishment these people will get - same as Grenfell. They'll be back at their desks, doing nothing and drawing 6 figure salaries on Monday.
The sell off happened well after the scandal started so I imagine the stock price would have been massively different if there had not been a conspiracy to cover up the scandal. We already know certain members of government knew about the scandal, how far up did it go?
Ah I see. Maybe I'm wrong but the bit sold off (Royal Mail delivery, sorting of mails and parcels etc) wasn't directly involved was it? They kept the cover-uppy Post Office part in public ownership.
No idea about which parts were sold off to be honest, I thought it all was but the brand name would have been tarnished if the scandal had been more widely covered at the time.
I was astonished at Rodric's inability to accept any personal involvement/responsibility for virtually every aspect he was taken through by the impressive Jason Beer KC yesterday as his ill-expressed defences, justifications and unguarded e-mail remarks were forensically dismantled as he wriggled like a worm on the end of a fishing rod. I actually think the nervous shifting in his seat, playing with his pencil, the inappropriate giggling and smiling each time Beer skewered his non-answers and repetitious 'I don't remembers'/I don't recalls/Sorry can you repeat the questions', showed up someone attempting to distance himself from the PO hierarchy and realising that while he had been playing fast and loose with people's lives and livelihoods - and revelling in their discomfort by following the orders of the likes of the appalling Vennells and Van de Bogerd - he had made a series of bad choices and had fallen in with a culture for the last 10+ years and was front and centre for persecuting innocent people and finally realises he wished he hadn't. It's possible he retreats back into the shadows to carry on with the PO's bidding and earning large sums as their legal 'collator' - but unlike some of the more arrogant witnesses who have tried to fight back at the Inquiry, step forward David Mills former Chief Exec a great example of someone with no time for the Postmasters who he considers unfortunate collateral damage ("You nee d to remember, I had to save the PO from insolvency...I'm not clever enough to challenge the robustness of Horizon") - I'd imagine Rodric will reflect on his time there as a disaster and know he'll need to live with the consequences of his actions or lack of actions for the rest of his life. Wouldn't be surprised if he's mentally digging an escape tunnel now. Not a happy prospect as he finds himself as part of the collateral damage inflicted. Getting an admission on the exchange about 'top bantz', the contempt in Beer's voice as he used the term was a killer for our legal eagle but delicious and justifiable for the PMs and all of us rooting for a semblance of justice. I might be overthinking this but if Vennells and Co were watching this unfold yesterday they will be wondering even more this morning where this will all lead for them soon.
I'm very upset that I haven't received at least one @Keighley grammar bonus point for my post above yours which includes: "...unlike some of the more arrogant witnesses who have tried to fight back at the Inquiry,...". Come on K, credit where credit's due!
Profuse apologies. I have been examining a PhD today. I did not detect any grammatical errors, so naturally the student passed!
I once was pulled up for in a viva (and the f**ker put in his examiner's report) my "...use of a sans serif font..."
Ooh! Ooh! You can't start a sentence with "And". That's an offence, that. You're in clear violation of the hard, firm and immovable laws of our beautiful language which have remained cast in stone and unchanging for milenia.
