Postal Services Bill

Debate between Michael Connarty and Bob Russell

Wednesday 12th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Bob Russell]

I suggest that the hon. Gentleman discuss that last point with the hon. Member for Stone (Mr Cash), who can enlighten him far better than I can. I thank him for the intervention, but the short answer is that I do not know what impact my new clause would have on EU legislation. I am sure that if there would be an impact we will hear about it from one of the Front-Bench speakers at some point.

[Michael Connarty (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (Lab)]

If the hon. Gentleman looks at the record, he will see that the amount spent by the previous Government in paying out for closures of post offices—in other words, to people who left their post offices and took the King’s shilling—came to much more than the sum proposed by the current Government over a four-year period. How much impact does the hon. Gentleman think there will be on post offices from losing the arrangement to do business for Royal Mail, in terms of closures, compared with the paltry sum that is being offered? It may in fact be spent on redundancies and closing post offices, as it has been in the past.

[Bob Russell]

I need to move on, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bedford (Richard Fuller) suggested. However, in view of that intervention, I must respond by pointing out that the money the previous Government put in was to pay for closures, whereas the money this Government plan to put in will be to keep sub-post offices open. There is a significant difference between the two.

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[Bob Russell]

I am sure that the hon. Gentleman is right, which is why the new clause is important, not only for the retention of the sub-post office network but for the interests of employees whose morale, as I have said, is exceptionally low.

The new clause seeks to bring certainty, and ensure that the post office network will not face an immediate onslaught from Royal Mail. It places the IBA in legislation and ensures that it cannot be broken for 10 years. I accept that in order to help the process of privatisation along, Royal Mail managers have pledged undying love for their supplier. However, it could be argued that directors of a dynamic, privatised Royal Mail would be negligent in their duties if they did not try to cut the cost of doing business through Post Office Ltd.

The new clause can absolve them of that responsibility. It would enable all sides to point to the legislation and walk away from having to renegotiate the inter-business agreement. It would manage the expectations of institutional shareholders, who would not be able to exert pressure on Royal Mail to cut those costs. I am sure that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills will recognise that together we are protecting the post office network. The omission of the inter-business agreement from the Bill can now be rectified.

[Michael Connarty]

Unfortunately, I have to leave the debate early, because I have to attend the European Scrutiny Committee at 2 o’clock.

First, the new clause attempts to ameliorate the impact on Royal Mail and particularly the post office network of what is probably one of the nastiest things that the Government will ever do to the people of the UK. The terrible act of putting up tuition fees up to £9,000 will damage a number of people, and will probably bring about the demise of the Liberal Democrat party, but the Bill attacks the fundamental structures of society, because it will bring about the closure of a vast number of post offices. Strong arguments were made—and I made them—every time that the previous Government went through another retooling of the post office network at huge cost. The hon. Member for Colchester (Bob Russell) tried to say that Government money set aside for the post office network over the next four years will be somehow be used to keep post offices open. If we look at the amount of money spent by the previous Government paying postmasters and paying for redundancies in the Royal Mail and the post office network when post offices closed in many of the communities that I and all of us represent, it is clear that the money will go in that direction. One reason why it will go in that direction is that the inter-business agreement will not be sustained in a privatised environment.

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[Michael Connarty]

My hon. Friend echoes sentiments that are expressed in every post office and sub-post office when any of us take the trouble to ask.

[Bob Russell]

Will the hon. Gentleman be gracious enough to acknowledge that over the past 13 years his Government’s policies, inactivity and general performance created the situation that we are in today? If he wishes to move on with his argument for the future, he should have the good grace, please, to acknowledge past failings.

[Michael Connarty]

I have no problem doing that. I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman has been in the House when I have spoken about the Post Office in the past. I am the organiser and secretary of the communications workers liaison group in this place. I have opposed every attempt by any Government to bring in schemes to downsize the post office network—every single one of them.

My Government was criticised by me and by the Communication Workers Union. That Government put in a director, Crozier, who walked off with millions of pounds in bonuses for sacking people—for downsizing the number of people at the sharp end and failing entirely to do the one thing that he was tasked to do, which was to bring in the technology to modernise the process of distribution and introduce letter-bundling by street, as is done in any sensible country. He failed and was paid millions of pounds. That sounds like what happened with the banks so it seems as though we did a lot of that under the previous Government.

I am happy to say that the Labour Government got it wrong, because they did get it wrong. I say to the hon. Member for Colchester (Bob Russell) that his party will be judged on how it acts in government, not on how he is acting from the liberal wing of the Liberal Democrats. The orange book Liberals have joined the Tories and will become Tories if they want to stand at the next election. They are sitting opposite me at this moment. They are the people who are destroying the post office network, just as the delusional people in my party cost us millions of votes by doing what is about to be carried to its final conclusion—that is, attacking the structure of our communities.

When a Crown office goes and a sub-post office is put into a sweet shop at the end of the high street, we see the change. We see people queuing outside in the rain because the shop is too small to handle the business. When a sub-post office is put into the back of a small supermarket, as one has in Bathgate, or into a sweet shop, as one has in Linlithgow in my constituency, people in wheelchairs cannot get into the post office when staff create a barrier as they stock the shelves with quick-sale goods. All that happened under our Government, and the measures proposed in the Bill will be worse than any of that.