Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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We have received apologies from Deputy Brian Brennan and I wish to express our condolences to him on the passing of his mother. Today's meeting is an engagement with officials from the Department of Culture, Communications and Sport and representatives of An Post and the Irish Postmasters Union, IPU, on the future of the An Post network. From the Department I welcome Mr. Patrick Neary, assistant secretary, Mr. Ian Price, principal officer, and Mr. Anthony Treacy, assistant secretary. From An Post I welcome the chief executive, Mr. David McRedmond, the chairperson, Mr. Kieran Mulvey, and the managing director of An Post retail, Ms Debbie Byrne. I also welcome Mr. Sean Martin, president of the Irish Postmasters Union, and Ms Sandra Tormey, general secretary.

I propose to take the statements supplied to members as read. Is that agreed? Agreed. Before we proceed to questions from committee members I must clarify a number of matters. First, there was a request from one set of witnesses to appear before the committee separately and while that was understandable, unfortunately, due to the nature of the committee structure and the time that we have, it would be impractical to have a number of different sessions. We just could not fit them in. The number of committees in the Oireachtas now makes things very challenging. There is a broader range of committees and time is very tight, which will be very obvious as we proceed today.

I wish to clarify some of the limitations in relation to parliamentary privilege and the practice of the Houses as regards references witnesses make to other persons in their evidence. The evidence of witnesses physically present or who give evidence from within the parliamentary precincts is protected, pursuant to the Constitution and statute, by absolute privilege. This means that they have an absolute defence against any defamation action in respect of anything they say at the meeting. However, they are expected not to abuse this privilege and it is my duty as Chair to ensure that this privilege is not abused. Therefore, if their statements are potentially defamatory in relation to an identifiable person or entity, they will be directed to discontinue their remarks and it is imperative that they comply with any such direction. Members are reminded of the long standing parliamentary practice to the effect that they should not comment on, criticise or make charges against a person outside the Houses or an official, either by name or in such a way as to make him or her identifiable.

We will now proceed with our questions and answers session. Members will have approximately six minutes each for both questions and answers. We are also joined by several non-members who have requested speaking time.