Post Office (Horizon System) Offences (Scotland) Act 2024

Final provisions

7 Consequential provision

(1) Except as otherwise provided by section 3, a person whose conviction is quashed by section 1(1) is to be treated as if, on the coming into force of this Act, the conviction had been quashed by the High Court on an appeal by the convicted person.

(2) In section 133 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988 (compensation for miscarriages of justice), the reference in subsection (5) to a conviction having been quashed (or set aside) on an appeal out of time includes a reference to a conviction having been quashed by section 1(1).

8 Ancillary provision

(1) The Scottish Ministers may by regulations make any incidental, supplementary, consequential, transitional, transitory or saving provision they consider appropriate for the purposes of, in connection with or for giving full effect to this Act.

(2) Regulations under this section may—

(a) modify any enactment (including this Act),

(b) make different provision for different purposes.

(3) Regulations under this section—

(a) are subject to the affirmative procedure if they add to, replace or omit any part of the text of an Act,

(b) otherwise are subject to the negative procedure.

9 Interpretation

(1) In this Act—

• “conviction” means—

  (a)

  a conviction by or before a court, or

  (b)

  a finding in any criminal proceedings (including a finding linked with mental disorder or in respect of which an admonition or absolute discharge is made) that a person has committed an offence or done the act or made the omission charged,

  and “convicted” is to be read accordingly,

• “Horizon system” means any version of the computer system known as Horizon (and sometimes referred to as Legacy Horizon, Horizon Online or HNG-X) used by the Post Office, other than the version referred to as HNG-A,

• “postal services” has the same meaning as in the Postal Services Act 2011 (see section 27 of that Act),

• “Post Office” means any of the following—

  (a)

  the Post Office,

  (b)

  Post Office Limited or Post Office Counters Limited (registered number 02154540),

  (c)

  Royal Mail Group Limited, Consignia Public Limited Company or Royal Mail Group plc (registered number 04138203),

• “post office” means any premises or vehicle in Scotland from which postal services are provided (whether alone or with other services) directly to the public,

• “post office business” means the business of providing postal services (whether alone or with other services) from a post office,

• “relevant offence” has the meaning given by section 2.

(2) Nothing in this Act affects any power of a court to quash a conviction to which this Act does not apply.

10 Commencement

This Act comes into force on the day after Royal Assent.

11 Short title

The short title of this Act is the Post Office (Horizon System) Offences (Scotland) Act 2024.