Postal Services Bill

Debate between David Mowat and Michael Connarty

Wednesday 12th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Michael Connarty]

As I said, the new clause is intended to ameliorate the impact, not to negate it. I would prefer a permanent agreement that the Royal Mail and the Post Office would not be sundered by the Bill. It is an illusion that the market will allow things to become more efficient. I do not believe that.

[David Mowat (Warrington South) (Con)]

Will the hon. Gentleman explain how the Bill, which gives each of the 7,000 currently unviable post offices approximately £200,000 over the next four years to keep going, is an attack on their communities?

[Michael Connarty]

It might be useful to read the Bill. That is not in the Bill. It is an under-the-counter promise by the Government that they have set aside a sum of money. That is no different from the sum set aside in the past by the Government every time they carried out a reorganisation to sustain the unsustainable. It is clear that those post offices are not viable in the market. If those post offices and sub-post offices lose another £343 million, which is the cost per year if the business arrangement is broken, that is where the money will go. It will replace the money that should have come from the agreement. The money will be required to pay the people. At present 900 post offices are up for sale, apart from those that are temporarily closed, as the hon. Member for Colchester said.

It is important that we realise that, in this process, the Conservative-led Government, supported by the Liberals against their pledges in their own manifesto, are trying to move the Post Office and Royal Mail into a market and away from a controlled situation. There is talk now of the inter-business agreement. There will be talk later of the universal service obligation, which will also be destroyed by the Bill. In the USA, the arch-capitalist country, the postal service is permanently in the public sector. It will not be taken out of the public sector because it is seen as a public institution. We will follow a route that will cause us to destroy part of our institutions.

I do not believe that Members are kidding themselves. I am sure they have talked to their communities when a sub-post office has been closed and heard the anger when that happens. I am sure that they have talked to people when they lose their Crown office and get a second-rate service from a post office put into the back of a supermarket. People do not like it because it destroys the structures of their communities.