Post Office Closures

Kirsten Oswald Excerpts

Tuesday 19th October 2021 Westminster Hall

[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the effect of post office closures on local communities.

It is a real pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Betts, and I will add my own tribute to Sir David. He was a wonderful man and will be sadly missed by everyone across Parliament.

I extend my thanks to the Backbench Business Committee and to all the Members present. I am sure they will be speaking about how important and valued their local post offices and post office staff are, and about the effect of post office closures on their communities. This debate on the effect of post office closures on local communities is important.

I thank the Minister for attending. I am glad that he is still in post. It is imperative that the UK Government have someone overseeing the Post Office brief who understands it, who can see that the Horizon scandal is concluded satisfactorily, with all its victims and their families compensated, and who will ensure that the post office network continues unabated.

Post offices are at the heart of our communities. They are used most regularly by the most vulnerable members of society—the elderly, people with disabilities and those who are unable to work, for example—and more than nine in 10 people agree that post offices provide an essential service for them or others. Communities suffer when post offices close, whether temporarily or for good. Local residents and businesses suffer serious inconvenience. For some, the withdrawal of perhaps their only regular human contact causes real misery and hardship.

As chair of the all-party parliamentary group on post offices, and on behalf of all its members, I thank postmasters and post office staff—those key workers— across the UK, who have served us well throughout the pandemic. They have been a lifeline to many people through their work at the heart of our community.

The APPG on post offices is close to my heart, as the plight of sub-postmasters in Motherwell and Wishaw was one of the first campaigns I was involved in. We have no secretariat for the APPG and I am very grateful for the additional work that my staff put in to ensure that the APPG runs smoothly. We are a big-tent APPG, with MPs and peers from all political parties and none, and diverse organisations such as the National Federation of SubPostmasters, the Communication Workers Union, Citizens Advice, the Association of Convenience Stores, and the Countryside Alliance. All those organisations are testament to the importance of the post office network across the UK.

[Kirsten Oswald (East Renfrewshire) (SNP)]

That broad range of stakeholders my hon. Friend has just told us about reflects the fact that a broad range of communities are still focused on the need for post offices in their local areas. Does she agree that we must heed the asks of community organisations? Broom, Kirkhill and Mearnskirk Community Council is keen to secure post office services in its local area, because it knows how much they matter for the most vulnerable in our society, as she said.

[Marion Fellows]

I thank my hon. Friend for her intervention. What she says is absolutely true. I am sure that all of us present and further afield would vouch for the real feeling for post offices across the entire UK. In fact, I have been known to say in the APPG that the reason I took on its chairmanship was to ensure that there was a network of post offices in an independent Scotland—that network is right across the UK.

We have also spoken to franchisee representatives, and we hold regular meetings with the CEO of Post Office Ltd and the Minister. Recently, the APPG decided to be less reactive and more proactive in its approach to sustaining the network. The APPG is currently compiling a Post Office action plan, to provide an outline vision for the network going forward. I hope the UK Government and Post Office Ltd will carefully and seriously consider the proposals put forward by members.

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[Jamie Stone (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Betts. I congratulate the hon. Member for Motherwell and Wishaw (Marion Fellows) on bringing forward this important debate, which is very pertinent to my constituency. I want to touch on the tragic death of Sir David. When I arrived four years ago, I remember that he was one of the very first to be a friendly face and greet me. That is all I will say, but that sort of thing stays with you the rest of your days. I mourn his passing, as does my party.

In 1616 it was under the rule of a Scottish king, King James VI of Scotland and I of England, that the Scottish postal service was set up, so we rather led the way. Shortly after the restoration of his grandson King Charles II in 1660, the network of post offices in England was set up. So, once again, a Scottish king showed the way. We have had huge trouble with closures of branches, as others have said, but I will not repeat their remarks. I am going to use one example—the village of Balintore in Easter Ross. When the aforementioned retail business pulled out, we were left with the prospect of having no post office whatsoever. I say to the Minister that I give absolute credit to the people working at the post office for their valid attempts to secure some other arrangement, and they have done it in conjunction with the local Seaboard Memorial Hall. We are going to have a post office—thank God—once again in the village of Balintore. It is not just Balintore but Shandwick and Hilton, and a lot of people live there—believe you me.

It was great that this particular community had a vibrant hall committee that was willing to step in and see whether it could meet halfway with the post office in order to take up the service. They did that, but the trouble is that, looking at my vast constituency—if the Boundary Commission for Scotland has its way, it will get vaster still—not every community has a whole committee or some sort of organisation that is willing to step into the breach to take on that role. Therefore, it is patchy. To use a hackneyed phrase, it is a bit of a postcode lottery in terms of where people live. For the record, I say, “Well done, Balintore,” but it is not so easy to replicate that.

The final point I want to make in my brief contribution is that in a remote part of Scotland, such as my constituency, the post office network is part of the fabric of society, as others have mentioned. People say, “Oh well, the young people can go online,” and so on, but it is not quite as simple as that. Post offices are important to young people as well, and I think we have come to appreciate the value of the face-to-face aspect of the post office through the pandemic.

[Kirsten Oswald]

The hon. Gentleman is making a really important point. The post office has a place right at the heart of our community, especially in difficult times, in my constituency, which is not remote. Tariq Chishti of Netherlee post office has received an award for going above and beyond during the pandemic to support people who were having real difficulty. The staff at Barrhead post office, which I visited recently, have done the same. The Minister should really take heed of the hon. Gentleman’s point about the community at large—all of the community—requiring this service and benefiting from it. That is at the heart of the debate.

[Jamie Stone]

I thank the hon. Lady for that very useful intervention. Her point is very well made indeed.

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[Kirsten Oswald (East Renfrewshire) (SNP)]

It is very kind of you to call me to speak, Mr Betts. Thank you. I was not down to speak in this debate—

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

Oh, I am sorry.

--- Later in debate ---

[Kirsten Oswald]

—but I am very happy to speak and to wax lyrical about my local post offices. As you have called my name, Mr Betts, I ask for your indulgence to speak briefly.

This is an incredibly important topic, and I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Motherwell and Wishaw (Marion Fellows) for asking for this debate, and to the Backbench Business Committee for allowing us to have this discussion. We often talk about post office closures in the all-party parliamentary group on post offices, which, as my hon. Friend said, is a wide-ranging APPG. That really speaks to the great significance of post offices in all our communities.

I do not want to labour points that others have made, but as a Member representing a constituency with a number of population centres, all with their own diverse needs and geographies, I know that the importance of post office services to my constituents cannot be overstated. I have constituents who live in rural areas where it may be difficult for them to get to a post office, and the closure of post offices in some of these outlying areas has created significant difficulty, particularly for elderly and vulnerable people.

My hon. Friend the Member for Inverclyde (Ronnie Cowan) raised the issue of the “stop-start” nature of post office services and the impact that has on communities. It has caused significant concern in Clarkston in my constituency, for example. We have a post office operating there now, which is very welcome, but it has been something of a movable feast over a number of years.

I mentioned that I had visited the post office in Barrhead. I will dwell on that briefly, because it was really fantastic to go out and meet the people working in the post office, and to see what they do day to day in terms of helping people and providing access to cash. The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) talked about constituents receiving real individual support from the people working in the post office, and I saw that for myself when I visited the post office in Barrhead, which is a great shop as well as a post office—if anyone is in the area, I absolutely recommend going along. That human contact and personal knowledge of customers was evident there. We cannot afford to lose that. Even in that big, thriving town, access to cash is an issue. We have many elderly and vulnerable residents, and we need the support that the Barrhead post office provides for our community.

I mentioned the support that Tariq Chishti provided from his post office, Netherlee Post & News, and I think it is telling and well deserved that he received an award for his work during lockdown. Many of our communities relied on the people who became focal points of their local area by going above and beyond what could ever be reasonably expected of them to ensure that people were okay in those difficult times. It is no surprise that post offices were at the centre of that. They are at the centre of our communities, and the functions that they provide are so very important. I am keen to hear from the Minister about the various actions that Members have asked for to try to secure the position of post offices, to ensure that they are sustainable, and to deal with issues overhanging from the Horizon scandal, which make it very difficult for people to see this as a sustainable business opportunity for them.

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

I thank the hon. Member. I called her because she was on the list of people who had requested to speak.

[Kirsten Oswald]

I am delighted.

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

Always here to help!