MP calls for action on post offices

The government must "shift its position" on post offices and focus on "issues on the doorstep" if it wants to recover from recent poll losses, according to a Labour MP.

Ahead of a Westminster Hall debate on Post Offices in his Stroud constituency, David Drew said that closures would affect vulnerable people "disastrously".

But he told ePolitix.com that it was "wrong" to focus solely on the vulnerable "because lots of people need post offices, given the distance one has to travel in places like Stroud".

Drew said he had called the debate because "the issue of post offices is a live one in Stroud".

He pointed to one post office "which is at the top of a steep hill", making it very difficult for "anyone who's less than very stable on their legs".

"So it's not credible at all, the argument that there is an alternative that's readily usable," he said.

Drew said "community involvement" was needed to keep the post offices open.

"We've got to try and grow some other services and we've got to recognise that the public subsidy is an asset and not a liability," he said.

"These services are important - we keep them open and we try to get people to use them. But of course, if they're not there then they can't use them so the footfall continues to fall. It's a myth that you get a migration to other post offices.

"People just don't go to them in disillusion. They either get a bank account or they just find other ways in which they can do their basic postal services."

Change

Speaking during the debate, post office minister Pat McFadden said no attempt had been made to "bury bad news about this".

"This is a very difficult process for local communities - no-one likes to see their post office close," he said.

He told MPs it had been a "difficult decision to take" but said it was "incumbent upon us to look at some of the changes being faced by post offices which serve as the backdrop to decision".

Pointing out that post offices were losing half a million pounds every day and four million customers week, he said that the network was changing as result of "lifestyle, technology and competition".

"In the face of all that the government has committed very significant public subsidy to the post office network," he said.

"The government has made a major decision to subsidise to the tune of £150m per year."

McFadden said that "no previous government has subsidised the network" and that "without this subsidy, thousands more post offices would be under threat".

"We do have a duty to support the network but we also have a duty to the taxpayer as a government," he said. "Subsidy cannot be unlimited."