The latest campaign of Daniel Kawczynski Member of Parliament for Shrewsbury and Atcham

save our Post Offices campaign April 2008

SAVE OUR POST OFFICES - APRIL 2008

At the beginning of April 2008, the Government announced the details of 2,500 Post Offices across the country that it proposes to close. This includes five Post Offices in the Shrewsbury and Atcham Constituency:

Acton Burnell Post Office Acton Burnell Shrewsbury SY5 7PA

Cressage Sub Post Office 10 Shrewsbury Road Cressage Shrewsbury SY5 6AA

Ditherington Post Office 8 Mount Pleasant Road Shrewsbury SY1 3BQ

Greenfields Post Office 41 Wood Street Shrewsbury SY1 2PN

Montford Bridge Post Office Holyhead Road Shrewsbury SY4 1EE

Daniel believes that Post Offices are a vital part of our social fabric and local community which must be preserved.

DANIEL'S CAMPAIGN

As part of his campaign to save Post Office services for our communities, Daniel is writing to all residents in the affected areas to ask them to support the campaign by signing his petition, collecting signatures and writing or calling Royal Mail to register their opposition to the Post Office closures - a total of around 5,000 letters and petition forms.

You can see this letter by clicking here.

He has also launched a petition to oppose the closure of all five Post Offices, which is available here both in traditional paper format and online in electronic format.

To sign Daniel's online petition, please click here.

To download a paper petition, please click here.

To download a poster promoting the petition, please click here.

Daniel is determined to help our local communities make the case to save their local Post Office. He has already visited or spoken to all of the affected Post Offices and pledged his support.

WHAT CAN YOU DO?

(1) Sign the online petition

(2) Print off paper petitions and collect signatures

(3) Write with your views to:

Mark Partington, Network Developmental Manager, c/o National Consultation Team, Freepost Consultation Team.

Daniel hopes you will join him in this campaign to secure the long term future of vital local services. It is extremely important that you make your views known during this consultation period as it is possible to achieve changes to the proposals if enough people voice their concerns.

FURTHER INFORMATION

The Government and Postcomm, the independent regulator for postal services, have opened up Royal Mail to greater competition while denying it the freedom that it needs to compete effectively. This Government has presided over the largest ever annual closures of Post Offices: over 4,000 have closed since 1997. The Government’s decision on the future of the Post Office network amounts to an acceleration of that rate of closure, shutting a further 2,500 branches over the next two years. By the time of the next General Election, the Government will have closed over one third of the entire Post Office network.

Daniel believes that this decision is based on how many Post Offices the Government thinks that it can get away with closing, rather than on a real business case or on an understanding of what consumers want and need. The Government’s vision is to have fewer Post Offices, providing fewer services to fewer people, which will affect the most vulnerable people in communities across the country. The Government needs to recognise that where a local Post Office closes, often the last shop in the village closes as well: a van for a few hours a week is no replacement for a Post Office open full time.

It has been suggested that the European Union - and not the Labour Party - is responsible for the closure programme, as a result of Directives requiring liberalisation of the postal market. This is not the case. These directives relate to the Royal Mail and its postal collection and delivery services, rather than the wholly-owned subsidiary Post Office Limited (POL), which is not subject to competition. In spite of this, POL remains loss-making.

As already mentioned, the Government decided last year that 2,500 Post Offices must close to stem financial losses. However, the real problem is that the Government has failed to explore other ways to bring new business into Post Offices, for example by freeing them up to offer new services, including more financial services; to work with carriers other than the Royal Mail; to be a hub for central and local Government services. This would have enabled many more Post Offices to survive on business rather than subsidy, but instead the Government seems happy simply to manage the decline of the Post Office network.

It is wrong to suggest that the EU is the cause of the current closure programme. It is the British Government which has decided how many should close, what the funding package should be and what the access criteria should be to decide which ones will close. We should not let them off the hook!