FORMER sub-postmaster and Conservative MP Duncan Baker has said that “actual punishment” needs to be handed out in the wake of the Post Office Horizon IT scandal.

He told GB News: “It’s total common sense that there needs to be some actual punishment handed out.

“Now on the one hand again, something I’ve called for many times, is that they [Fujitsu] should be made to contribute towards the compensation and that is an ongoing conversation.

“From the dispatch box, the minister has said many times that they will do that. But equally, we have to recognise the position they’re in, in getting government contracts.”

In a discussion with Bev Turner and Andrew Pierce, he continued: “It is not easy on every street corner to find a multinational corporation capable of delivering IT services to the tune of what Fujitsu can deliver.

“Yes, of course there are other competing businesses that can do it, Microsoft, Oracle and the like…but there should be some kind of rectification.

“This sort of scale of problem has occurred and somebody gets away scot-free and that’s why I keep repeatedly saying we have to get to criminal proceedings, but we won’t be there yet.”

He added: “When I was a sub-postmaster, most of the problems were then eradicated in the Horizon software. But to those friends and colleagues before me, they won’t be getting closure until prosecutions and sentences actually are handed out.”