Question

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, if he will estimate the proportion of UK addresses end-to-end postal delivery companies would need to cover before there is a threat to the financial sustainability of the universal service.

Under the Postal Services Act 2011, Parliament gave Ofcom, as an independent regulator for postal services, the primary statutory duty to secure the provision of the universal service and to this end Ofcom must have regard for the financial sustainability of the universal service.

Last year, following a consultation, Ofcom, as the independent regulator for postal services, set out its guidance on its approach to intervening in response to a material threat to the provision of the universal service.

Ofcom has made clear that if its ongoing monitoring regime, which keeps the situation under continual review and allows for any new evidence, does not prompt the need for any earlier assessment, it will as a matter of course carry out a full assessment of the impact of competition on the universal service towards the end of 2015.

More information about Ofcom's regulatory regime can be found on its website (www.ofcom.org.uk).