Post Offices: Retail Trade

(asked on 6th March 2019) - View Source

Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, how many post office branches have been relocated into retail premises in (a) North West Durham, (b) North East England and (c) the UK since 2010.


Answered by
Kelly Tolhurst Portrait
Kelly Tolhurst
This question was answered on 13th March 2019

The Government values and recognises the important role that the Post Office plays in North West Durham and other communities across the North East and the UK. This is why we committed in our 2017 Manifesto to safeguard the Post Office network and protect existing rural services. This strategy, backed by Government investment of over £2 billion since 2010, has delivered a branch network that is at its most stable and accessible in decades, with over 11,500 branches.

The Post Office reports annually on the size and shape of the network; the most recent report can be found at http://corporate.postoffice.co.uk/modernising-post-office. The report shows the number of branches in the network so that the change can be seen year on

year.

The information requested is set out below. The vast majority of the Post Office network is operated on an agency/franchise basis with branches located in retail premises. The figures show the number of Directly Managed Branches operated by the Post Office and the number of Agency branches.

Number of open post offices in 2010

Directly Managed Branches

Agency branches

Total branches

North West Durham Constituency

1

29

30

North East Government Office Region

10

481

491

UK

373

11532

11905

Number of open post offices in 2018

Directly Managed Branches

Agency branches

Total branches

North West Durham Constituency

1

29

30

North East Government Office Region

6

484

490

UK

262

11285

11547

Source: Post Office Limited

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