Dan Rogerson
Main Page: Dan Rogerson (Liberal Democrat - North Cornwall)(10 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
Dan Rogerson (North Cornwall) (LD)
It is a pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Neath (Mr Hain). I disagree with some of his conclusions but share his concern for the rural network. He set out well the potential problems that areas such as his and mine face.
I also congratulate the hon. Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Katy Clark) on securing the debate, which is important and timely given that, as she said, the timetable for making progress on Royal Mail has been set out for the financial year. Although that is what the motion largely refers to, it is inevitable that Members have spoken a lot about post offices, because they are so crucial to our constituents. I will be no different, because I want to discuss the importance of the post office network, which is a key part of the proposals. I also want to talk about issues relating to the universal service obligation that have already been raised by hon. Members.
The constituency of North Cornwall contains 65 parishes. During the previous Parliament, when we had a formal programme of post office closures, it had 70 parishes, so it has shrunk since then. However, it is still a big rural area without a single railway station and where people rely on services that are close to them, wherever possible. It is a huge source of anxiety to them if they feel that a service that provides access to the wider world is going to be withdrawn.
We have also had issues with the provision of broadband, which the hon. Lady mentioned, and I am delighted that the coalition Government have made it a priority to invest in that. Investment in Cornwall is at a particularly advanced stage, because convergence programme money from the European Union has allowed us to get ahead of the game. Many areas in my constituency were so-called not spots where not only did they not have fast broadband, but they did not have broadband at all and were still on dial-up. That was a source of consternation to a few people who had decided to relocate to the constituency to run a business, which was welcome, only to find when they tried to connect to broadband that it did not exist. I am delighted that we are making progress on that front.
Postal services are vital too. That is partly due to the growth of online activity, including shopping. I am sure that many hon. Members visit postal workers at Christmas. Rather scarily, this will be my ninth year of doing so. There has been a huge growth in the number of packages that the Royal Mail delivers on behalf of a number of well-known companies that have hit the headlines and been debated in this Chamber for other reasons, namely their tax practices. That brings work to the Royal Mail and shows again how important it is. If the universal service obligation were undermined, people would be disadvantaged.
Dr Whiteford
My constituency shares with the hon. Gentleman’s the unusual distinction of having no railway stations. It also has problems with its broadband provision. He is making the excellent point, which it is important to emphasise, that such basic infrastructure makes the post office all the more vital to those communities. Does he agree that it is important to see the post office as part of the essential infrastructure?
Dan Rogerson
Absolutely; the hon. Lady is quite right.
Many hon. Members have visited the North Cornwall constituency, including the Prime Minister. Some Members may have seen the pictures in the national media. [Interruption.] He is braver than I am; I would not want to see pictures like that of me in the national media. However, we welcome him and his contribution to the local economy. There are many hamlets within the 65 parishes, so we are talking about lots of communities. If people visit the rural communities of North Cornwall, they will see lots of cottages with the name “The Old Post Office” on them. That is a mark of how many post offices we have lost.
During the last Parliament, from 2005 to 2010, we received a tough deal under the post office closure programme. For example, many of the villages around Bude lost their post offices. They are still suffering from that. I could point to a number of successful voluntary schemes that have brought back local community shops and post offices. The scheme in Blisland predates the closure programme. The community there came together and provided an excellent facility that has an internet café as well as a shop and a meeting place. In St Tudy, where the post office closed, the community recently got together to apply for funding for a new building. That went up incredibly quickly, which is testimony to the hard work of the community. In other places, the publican has provided the post office. The Tree Inn in Stratton, which again is near Bude, has brought the post office back to the community of that market town.
Mr Alan Reid (Argyll and Bute) (LD)
I agree with my hon. Friend on the importance of local post offices. Does he agree that the Department for Work and Pensions has an important role to play by giving business to the Post Office? It is essential that the Post Office card account contract continues and that post offices are used as places where people who do not have access to the internet can apply for universal credit. Does he agree that it is important that the DWP gives that work to the Post Office?
Dan Rogerson
Ministers have felt under pressure to ensure that they provide a level playing field to all people who want to provide such services, but there is no question in my mind that only the post office network has the reach to provide services such as the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency contract and to tick all the boxes in terms of accessibility.
Neil Carmichael
It is very generous of the hon. Gentleman to give way. On the services provided by rural post offices, does he agree that the organisation’s strong brand is a good reason why it should introduce banking and mortgages, as it is doing? Those are powerful reasons to maintain the network and justify the Government’s confidence in it.
Dan Rogerson
The hon. Gentleman is right. We must look at the positives. The hon. Member for North Ayrshire and Arran raised a lot of fears, some of which are natural, but we must look at how justified they are. We must ensure that we are not speaking in political terms to draw the attention of the media and to provide a subject on which to campaign, but that we look at the reality. That is why I am delighted that the Government have invested money in the network as part of the programme.
Katy Clark
Does the hon. Gentleman accept that the way TNT operates in London is the reality of what we are likely to see in the future?
Dan Rogerson
The hon. Lady made good points about employment practices, which I think will be of concern to people looking at employment in that sector. However, we are talking about the universal service obligation, and we will probably not find TNT falling over itself to provide alternative services in many areas of the rural network that we are talking about. I am confining my remarks primarily to the rural network, although I accept what she says about zero-hours contracts, which is a debate for another time.
Dan Rogerson
Let me make a little progress and then I will give way.
I was listing the sorts of approaches that people have taken. In my constituency, the community at St Eval was shaped by RAF and Royal Navy housing, and Trevisker probably would not have been built were it not for the service community. That community has now largely left, and the MOD shut down buildings, took away the old NAAFI and so on, which put the post office under threat. Again, the community came together and put forward a good proposal with Cornwall council. It now has a lease on one of the former United States navy buildings to keep those services in the community. That is vital and we are looking to the future of those services as the buildings get sold off. Hopefully such proposals will play a part in shaping the future of that community.
Interaction with other services is also important. A lot of villages may have a small school that is clinging on, although there are of course pressures regarding the viability of such schools, which we all want to protect. The village pub may also be under threat, and those services support each other. If families come to collect children, they might go into the post office at the same time, or if they are going to the shop they might also go into the pub. Such things all support a viable set of services and businesses in the area, and the post office plays a big part in that.
Post Office Local provides an exciting opportunity for many businesses, and a new way of securing the future viability of the service. In some places, however, the sub-postmaster is looking to sell the business, and there is a concern that if they can sell it only as a local, finding a buyer may not prove such an easy prospect. We must get reassurance on that issue to ensure that in villages where a lot of community support has gone into the business, those gains are not lost as the post office moves to the local model.
Much of the motion is about postal services and it is right that the House debates such issues as we are the guarantors of the obligation to provide that service across the country. I was struck by the comments of the right hon. Member for Neath (Mr Hain), who mentioned Royal Mail’s applications to vary some of those conditions, and that the regulator, through discussion and consultation, had decided that that was not the way to go. I do not necessarily think that whether those services are in the private sector—in whatever form—or in the public sector is the ultimate guarantee. That is for us in this House to provide, and the universal service obligation is now protected in law. On the variation of those conditions, we have a prominent role in consultations on whether such things should be changed.
Katy Clark
Does the hon. Gentleman accept that we are talking about a framework that will mean less money is available for Royal Mail, which will mean it will not be able to provide the services we have all been talking about? Parliament must have a framework through which Royal Mail is able to survive and post offices to flourish. Is that not what we are debating?
Dan Rogerson
Absolutely, and for some time regulators in other privatised industries have been looking at what is viable and what is not—water bills are a massive issue in my part of the world, and we have had a long debate about what is necessary for investment in the service, what is an acceptable level of profit, and what will be provided. Ofcom’s role is crucial.
Dan Rogerson
I apologise but I am afraid I do not have time to give way to the right hon. Gentleman.
All parties must look at our future commitments to protect the universal service obligation. I sense that any party that signalled it was abandoning support for that obligation would not prosper electorally, and those of us in rural areas will argue strongly that as we move into a new era for postal services those services must be protected in law. We will campaign vigorously for any variations in that and interact with the regulator to secure them. I think we can have a viable postal service that will hopefully be a lot more protected than it was, sadly, under the previous Government.