Noel Dempsey (Meath, Fianna Fail)

I will not interfere in that process. The Deputy is correct in saying the term of office of the chief executive ends in the middle of the year but, as I have said, that is a mater for the board. On the question about the embargo on recruitment, that is a matter for An Post but my understanding is that agreement has been reached. The Labour Court recommendation has been accepted by both sides but has not been implemented. A number of issues have to be worked out. Company management made a decision some time back that in order to keep An Post viable it would not recruit staff to fill in for people that were missing due to the high absentee rate in the An Post workforce on a continuous basis. It decided not to do anything in the area of recruitment until all issues were resolved, and to my knowledge that is how the matter stands.

I fully agree with Deputy Broughan about next day delivery. The levels are not satisfactory whether one goes by the ComReg or An Post figures. The levels are way short of what they should be, but I hope that once the new agreement and so on is fully in place these levels will increase. They must improve. We need the percentage of next day delivery to be in the mid-90s rather than the current low 70s.

I accept some post offices are closing but I do not have the figures off the top of my head. I cleared a written reply to a question from the Deputy in recent days on this matter and the figures will be available to him through that. We have the largest number of post offices per head of population of any country in Europe. The latest information I have is that there are 96 company offices, in the region of 1,400 sub-post offices and 160 postal agencies operating nationwide. Some 1,000 of these offices are automated. We have a very good spread. No part of Ireland is any more than 5 km from the nearest post office, Postpoint or postal agency. The question is whether we can sustain that into the future.

I am satisfied with the current levels of the network and would probably also be satisfied with lower levels. I am also satisfied that the proposed financial services initiative being taken by An Post, which is being negotiated with a number of tenderers, would be perfectly viable with the current network. I am sure those who are avidly competing for that An Post joint venture have taken all that into account and are satisfied.

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