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Panorama
1953 · TV series · documentary · 30 min episodes · 74 seasons
Current affairs programme, featuring interviews and investigative reports on a wide variety of subjects.
3 positive5 neutralfrom 8 commenters
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8 comments on Hacker News
It wasn't ignored by the rest of the press. Private eye was one of many outlets, an important one granted, but the story was repeatedly reported on and investigated over the years by the local papers, Computer Weekly, TheRegister, the BBC, ITV, The Guardian, etc. Indeed Nick Wallis, an independent journalist, has covered it very closely for a very long time (including a special in an issue of PE):
https://www.postofficescandal.uk/
The scandal has hit the headlines many, many times across all the outlets, particularly in 2019-21 with the litigation and appeal cases. It was the subject of an episode of BBC Panorama in 2015 (fronted by Nick Wallis).
But it all comes to nought. The victims are still out of pocket and still have criminal prosecutions. If the media are to blame, then so is the judiciary, and so is the government, who have had it in their power to provide financial redress. And of course the Post Office and Fujitsu are the culprits.
If you're in the UK, the Panorama documentary on this from 2022 is really worth watching - https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m0016t20/panorama-the-post-office-scandal
"comparatively, very few episodes. Especially places like the UK"
OK - Fawlty Towers: 12 episodes. Now, look up the Two Ronnies, Morecambe and Wise, Victoria Wood, Absolutely Fabulous, French and Saunders, Lenny Henry, Monty Python's Flying Circus, Ben Elton, The Fast Show, ... oh and I'm watching Dawn French doing current stand up right now. Jo Brand, ... oh this is getting boring and I've missed out loads. That's just a few comedians.
We have a few soaps that have stood the test of time too and a few current affairs programmes that have been around for a while: Coronation Street, East Enders, Have I got News for you, QI, The Archers, Panorama.
The BBC alone has been running for quite a while and I'll finish with an honourable mention for Blue Peter.
I haven't really refuted your argument but then that was pretty arse to start with. Gave me an excuse to reminisce for a while 8)
If Fujitsu knew about the fault internally and failed to notify the Post Office, they are to blame too.
Whether they notified the Post Office or not though, the Post Office certainly knew. They not only shared emails about the problem within the organisation, they engaged in a cover up.
There’s a good BBC Panorama documentary on the scandal that was released more than a year ago.
BBC's Panorama[1] may qualify. One recent episode includes the IT bungle[2] at the retail company connected to the recently privatised Royal Mail which lead to dozens of false fraud convictions and hundreds of jobs falsely lost by firing with supposed cause or stress over accusations. The show goes back to 1953.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006t14n
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horizon_(IT_system)
For UK-based visitors, it's alongside the release of a Panorama episode on Amazon:
Panorama, Amazon: What They Know About Us: https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000fjdz
Yeah - kind of. The BBC's Panorama show (kind of linked to BBC News, but long documentaries) has had special access to his rehabilitation over the last year, that special airs tonight.
Talking to people who have come to the UK from Europe and America I've been told many times that we are lucky enough to have some of the best television in the world. I'm very happy to pay my license fee and contribute towards the BBC. We do have some very excellent documentarians Adam Curtis being one of my personal favourites.
It may be that I'm something of a spoilt brat complaining about my toys being taken away, I grew up with excellent weekly factual documentary strands like Panorama and Arena, and Tomorrows World which was not a documentary but a fondly remembered weekly science show, now cancelled and not replaced. During the last decade the overall frequency and quality of these shows has declined very sharply.
Documentaries used to trust their audiences, but now quality is apparently judged by viewing figures alone the public service content of any channel has to fight against entertainment programming and they've slipped too far towards entertaining the audience viscerally rather than mentally.
Documentaries are now filled with fluff and sensationalised content and do not treat the audience with the respect they once did. A brief example being a 2010 Panorama doc about CERN and the LHC which felt like it consisted solely of asking as many scientists as possible 'Is the LHC going to cause the Earth to be eaten by a black hole'; For an hour.
[edit] I tend to think this is happening mainly in sci/tech programming, the humanities are still well covered.
Also I realise this might sound like I'm complaining about factual programming as entertainment. I realise that it should entertain and be accesible to an audience new to the material. I'd just like it if they remembered to slip in some facts now and again.