Clare Daly (Dublin North, Socialist Party) | Oireachtas source

We have heard a lot of talk about how the fight has gone out of Irish people and how we have lost the will to protest. The crowds that have mobilised around this issue, from every part of the country, say that this is not the case. One of the Fine Gael Deputies said that the Irish Postmasters' Union should be congratulated on having made us realise this is something we might lose. The reality is that the people who have mobilised have let the Government Members know that they might lose their seats if they do not get the finger out and do something about this issue. It is as crude as that.

We are subjected in this House, day after day, to a phenomenal amount of doublespeak. I would actually say it is the hallmark of this Government, epitomised by the Minister, Deputy Shatter, himself. On paper, they say one thing but their actions deliver something entirely different. On paper, they say that the post offices will not close but the reality is that, by their actions and the step this Government is taking, the viability of rural post offices is under threat. That, I am sorry to say, is a fact.

Figures have been given on how, in the past period, 200 rural post offices have been lost. Deputies on the Government benches have tried to say that the threat identified by Grant Thornton of a further 600 closures and 3,000 job losses is no more, that they are on top of it and that it is just being exaggerated. I do not believe this is the case. I honestly believe the threat is real because of what has gone on.

I am a bit sickened by the game playing between the Government parties. We saw over the weekend the leaked memo whereby the Fine Gael Party was trying to mobilise its backbenchers to cover their own tracks by sending out letters and e-mails to blame the Minister, Deputy Rabbitte, in a cynical manoeuvre that would say it had nothing to do with Fine Gael. Obviously, that caused huge disquiet in the ranks of Labour Party Members who are up in arms, the like of which I have not seen over any other issue and despite the appalling policies that party has stood over recently.

While the Government may say it has no agenda to close the post offices, it has no strategy to keep them open, and its inaction will kill them unless it takes stock. It is a bit rich to be congratulating the Tánaiste, Deputy Eamon Gilmore, and the Minister, Deputy Joan Burton, on social welfare and passport contracts that predated them. This issue predates everybody and is not just a rural issue.

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