IanP correctly identifies the salience of PO campaigns in rural areas, where I believe these campaigns first started. I agree he might have a point, my solution though would be to let Rural areas decide if that is how they want to spend some of the money currently managed by Post Office Counters.

Bridget on the other hand lives in Islington where no one is ever likely to be very far away from some small shop or government office. She seems to suggest any challenge to PO orthodoxy is an attack on vulnerable groups.

I think that’s an error. The division in thinking on this issue is not between those who want to serve the vulnerable and those who’d like the weak to go to the wall, it’s about how you do it and how well you do it.

Bridget’s answer involves tinkering with the structure of Post Office Ltd., rather than thinking more creatively about service delivery aligned to need. It’s as though when asked the question ‘how do we improve life expectancy?’ the question carries an unwritten sub-clause that says ‘by the way you’re only allowed to do this through the NHS, otherwise we can’t put it on a Focus Leaflet and attack the government, so it doesn’t matter’

The rest of her post unsurprisingly, and that from John, then concerns the commercial viability of the Post Office.

Having not really considered whether or not the PO should be viable they want to rig the law and markets to make it so. Possibly then wasting billions on unnecessary interventions that damage the viability of other organisations purely so the necessary social services that might only cost a few hundred million can be delivered in the same packaging they are delivered in today. Those billions in turn could have been used for targeted need-based services for the vulnerable.

Public sector conservatism, in the name of helping the vulnerable, can have precisely the opposite of the intended effect.

The problem is the central costs of Royal Mail and an attempt by government to stop cash payments.

But the real problem is that these are not just economic outlets, much more importantly they are hubs of social networks in those communities (yes, the “c” word) where people still recognise, ask after, and share themselves with their neighbours.

Then there is Post Office Ltd (POL)….Adam Crozier had problems making Premier League Football successful, so how he got the £1m per annum prize I’ll never know. Well, POL have refused to engage with Councils and LGA, and are going to bounce their nominations for closure with a short, 3-month “consultation”, it stinks.

So this is sticking up for individuals against big state, or big business, finding that what will be proposed isn’t equitable, and saying “enough”. Obviously can’t speak for others, but that seems to me to be a good enough reason for LibDems to be shouting; signing petitions; or whatever. I am sure that others may have a differing perspective, and I will hear.

But in real life times do change, needs do change, services need to change, and in real life budgets need to balance and priorities. Every desire cannot always be met.

I accept that and I’ve been named in Hansard for valiant post office campaigns. In fact the particular office referred to shut only because Mr Khan wanted to quit.

LDs like old Leech are still falsely claiming that Blair closed it with his own bare hands (slight exaggeration).

LibDems, even the wired ones on LDV, ought to have some sympathy with that constituency.

Benjamin is absolutely right about putting more business the Post Office’s way. Central government has shifted services away from the post office which is one of the reasons for the financial pressures to reduce the number of post office counters. Islington, like other Lib Dem councils, has tried to support post offices (and improve services to residents) by allowing the payment of council charges, rent, etc at the post office.

In Islington we have lost a dozen sub-post offices in as many years; now some of the Crown Post Offices which were designated to pick up their custom are also under threat of closure or at best franchising out. I have no ideological problem with franchising if the quality controls are in place – after all subpost offices are franchises – but the point about Crown Offices is that they provide a constant, full-time service even if the market means that the franchised offices operate on a reduced schedule.

The Post Office commitment (to urban areas at least )is to ensure that everyone is no more than 1 mile from a post office. That is the sort of national standard which is meaningless in inner city areas. While in many rural areas a post office every mile would be a dramatic expansion of the network, in inner London a mile away might as well be on the moon. It’s probably already in another borough.

Labour MPs – who have voted enthusiastically for the Post Office ‘network restructuring’ at every opportunity – seem to be happy for their most vulnerable constituents to ‘go the extra mile’ for the post office. I don’t think we should fall in with them.

I’m not sure that LF’s proposal is actually inconsistent with our campaigning style. We are happy to call for more local control over healthcare, education and taxation, and I don’t see why local control over post offices should be any less Focus-worthy.

More generally, tho’, I agree. Rather than campaigning to keep post offices open – at taxpayers’ expense – we should ask whether PO services could not be handled more cheaply and conveniently elsewhere. I realise that some pensioners prefer to get cash each week, so why not let any shop cash the pension voucher? Tesco etc already give cash back at the till, and I am sure that they and many others (in exchange for a small fee from govt) would be prepared do this. Small shops, newsagents, places like Chinese take-aways often take in huge amounts of notes and coins, and then too may well be prepared to do this. Why not have your local launderette, or even a pub, as a pension paying point?

Why is it still illegal for shops to sell the full range of stamps? Are there any PO services that could not be liberalised?

Tim

It’s unusual for LDV to publish articles under a pseudonym, and not something we intend to make a habit of. But it seems a reasonable price to pay for encouraging articles which intelligently challenge party orthodoxies.

In isolation I suppose it would not really matter, but its not. Its part of a larger plan to destroy the very fabric of our rural areas, the destruction of our farming communities, more and more regulation of land, removing the centers of village life, dehumanising pubs and village halls, and the post offices are just part of that.

http://thejournal.parker-joseph.co.uk/blog/_archives/2007/4/1/2851478.html

this will give you a better idea of what I mean, and it is worth protecting, because it is the European ideal to dismantle England, to turn England into small easily manipulated homogeneous regions of Europe.