Mary Upton (Dublin South Central, Labour)

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this debate. I disagree in some respects with my colleague, Deputy Moynihan-Cronin, because I am mindful of the lack of post offices in urban areas. My rural background allows me to sympathise with what is happening in rural areas. I spoke earlier today to friends and colleagues about the impact the closure of post offices is having on the rural communities I remember from my childhood.

This issue is not confined to rural areas, however. I speak on behalf of my constituents and those of Deputy Quinn in raising the matter of the closure of three sub-post offices — Terenure, Kenilworth and Rathgar — in my area in 18 months. Local people can no longer walk to these offices to avail of the facilities and services they provide. These services were particularly important for elderly people, for instance, as well as for young mothers collecting welfare and child benefit allowances.

Post offices provide far more than merely a commercial or economic service. They offer a community service that we simply cannot allow to be decimated because of lethargy, inaction and a determination to ignore what is happening. I raise this issue regularly with An Post. It is simply not good enough for those concerned to throw their hands in the air and claim they cannot find suitable premises. I do not blame those who work in post offices, most of whom are unable to earn anything remotely like a decent living. The income they receive from providing postal services is entirely inadequate when one takes into consideration the costs of paying staff, renting premises and so on. It is impossible to make a living and some who attempt to do so are living below the poverty line.

We have the worst of all possible worlds. The knock-on effect of poor postal services is grumpy, disgruntled and disillusioned consumers of those services, and who can blame them? I last spoke on this issue in the House in 2002 and I could easily have recycled that speech today. My colleagues and I predicted much of what is happening now. We also pointed to all the actions that could and should be taken to make the post office much more than a facility for posting letters. What became of the proposal to provide Internet cafés? What progress has been made in terms of computerisation? Post offices could provide many modern community services and facilities but such services are largely unavailable locally.

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