Ms Debbie Byrne:

We have 956 post offices, of which 46 or 47 are company-owned, with the remainder being what we call contractor or postmaster franchise operations. In looking last year at the network's sustainability and viability we carried out a forensic mapping of post offices and the country using the most recent census data. We used the criterion that every community of over 500 people should have a post office, while maintaining coverage on the islands and in such places. The offer of a voluntary exit programme was then made to postmasters within the country.