Denis Naughten (Roscommon-Galway, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I will begin by dealing with Deputy Pringle's question about my responsibilities as Minister. I am responsible for the postal sector, including the governance of An Post. An Post is a commercial semi-State company with a mandate to act commercially. It has statutory responsibility for the State's postal service and the post office network. I am responsible for the governance aspect.

Deputy Pringle is correct when he says that my predecessors sat on their hands. This portfolio has been held by Ministers from Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil, the Labour Party and the Green Party over the years. I have accepted the mantle and decided to try to do something with the post office network. That is the reason I am here. Unlike my predecessors, I have not taken the option of sitting on my hands. Instead, I am trying to put a viable future in place for the post office network. I am the focus of attention here today because we are trying to put a viable future in place. I believe that after we have gone through this process, people will look back and see that the right decision was made. It will become clear that it was right to put a proper plan in place to develop the post offices, rather than letting post offices drip away one week after another for the next decade until the network is completely gone.

My understanding is that one post office had 12 transactions a week. I understand the average in the post offices that were offered the redundancy package was 120 a week. Mr. McRedmond can clarify that. One cannot justify providing any level of support for a post office that has 12 transactions a week. We cannot try to do that.

Deputy Kevin O'Keeffe said the closure of one his local post offices will mean the loss of the local shop as well. That is something of which I have been conscious. He is correct that sometimes it is not just the post office that will close, but shops will close as well. However, as he clearly pointed out, something which some members fail to acknowledge, the local community has bypassed some of those post offices and gone to the bigger towns rather than use the local shop. I heard a postmaster in the past week make the point that some people passed the local post office, went to some of the German retailers in the bigger towns, and collected their pensions in those towns but now they are complaining that the local post office is closing. This is not a surprise to anyone. Since the day I was appointed, I have dealt with questions on the future of the post office network and issues arose long before that. Communities knew their post office was under threat yet they continued to pass by the front door and are now concerned about the post office closures. I gave an example in an earlier contribution of Imelda Burke, the postmistress in Ahascragh, who wrote to every family in her catchment area and outlined to them the services that were available. We need is new innovative services, which is what we will provide. That is what the management team in An Post is doing.