Fujitsu suspends bidding for UK public contracts after Post Office scandal

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Fujitsu has suspended bidding for UK public contracts pending the conclusion of a public inquiry into the Post Office Horizon scandal.

Alex Burghart, Cabinet Office minister, told MPs that the government had on Thursday received a letter from the Japanese company “voluntarily undertaking not to bid for government contracts”. The undertaking does not cover any extensions to existing contracts, according to government officials.

Fujitsu developed the flawed accounting software at the heart of the Horizon affair that resulted in more than 700 sub-postmasters being convicted of charges including theft, fraud and false accounting in cases brought by the Post Office between 1999 and 2015.

The public inquiry into the scandal, which started taking evidence in May 2022, is currently hearing from Fujitsu staff, including senior executives. It is expected to conclude hearings this summer but Sir Wyn Williams, the chair of the inquiry, has not yet set a date for publishing a final report.

Fujitsu’s move followed growing pressure on the government to block the IT services company from bidding for public sector contracts as anger grew over the scandal, which led to one of the biggest miscarriages of justice in modern British history.

The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the decision to suspend bidding for public contracts.

But earlier on Thursday in a statement issued from its headquarters in Tokyo, Fujitsu backed a promise made by its Europe chief executive, Paul Patterson, to contribute to the £1bn ministers have allocated to compensate sub-postmasters “based on the findings of the inquiry”.

At a parliamentary committee hearing on Tuesday, Patterson told MPs: “We were involved from the very start, we did have bugs and errors in the system and we did help the Post Office in the prosecution of…