Thomas Pringle (Donegal South West, Independent)

The Communications Regulation (Postal Services) Bill provides for the final liberalisation of the Irish postal market. This in effect means the privatisation of the market. Liberalisation is euro speak for privatisation. Members will remember the sell-off of Eircom that took place a number of years ago, where ordinary Irish people were conned into buying shares, believing in the neo-liberal dream that they too could share in capitalist wealth generation. This Bill provides for a similar break up and sell-off of a semi-State company.

I was amazed to hear the Minister state in his contribution earlier that An Post has greater problems than the liberalisation of the market due to the impact of electronic mail and such like. I find it amazing that a Labour Party Minister would speak in that manner. An Post has performed well and performs without State intervention currently. The greatest threat faced by An Post is this Bill and the so-called liberalisation or privatisation of the market.

An Post does not receive any subvention from the State and meets all its costs from its revenues. Therefore it is not a burden on taxpayers. However, the enactment of this Bill will be the death knell of a national asset. Every Member would agree that a postal service is in the interests of the people and a public postal service is a vital national asset that should remain part of the strategic interests of the State. Interestingly, the US, the bastion of free market capitalism, has protected its postal service, recognising that it is not in the interests of the people to break up the postal service. In other European countries, the postal service has already been privatised with massive job losses. In Germany between 2006 and 2009, some 33,000 jobs were lost in the former state run operator. In the Netherlands employment has dropped from 40,000 to 24,000. The changes that have taken place in the contracts of the remaining workers in the postal service there have already been highlighted.

It is estimated that privatisation here will lead to the loss of over 10,000 jobs in An Post. This will happen, because private operators will cherry pick the routes and services they want to provide. I am reminded of a discussion I had a number of years ago with a public servant from the Department of Finance on the question of public private partnerships in the water services and road building areas. When I put it to him that the private operators would cherry pick the contracts that led to the biggest profit for them, his response was that if one wanted to make a cherry salad, one had to pick cherries. That is what the private operators will do in the market once it is liberalised.

In rural Ireland, and particularly in Donegal, the postal service provides a vital social service as well as a postal delivery service. In many areas the postman is the only regular point of contact for people who live alone and in isolation. Having a regular postal delivery gives them contact with the outside world and a human contact they would not otherwise have. Over recent years, we have experienced the threat of post office closures, most recently in Fintown in west Donegal. This will become an even bigger problem in the years after privatisation. The focal point for many communities when people come to collect their pensions, child benefit and other payments will be withdrawn and people who very often do not have transport nor access to public transport will have to travel huge distances to collect vital payments, adding significant extra costs on them.

Recital 16 of the directive allows member states to regulate postal services and states that social considerations should be taken into account when preparing the opening of the postal market. This allows member states to protect the social values of the postal service and prevent social dumping, allowing full-time jobs with proper pay and conditions to be protected rather than the experience of other countries where jobs have been replaced by low paid part-time workers who depend on social welfare to supplement their income. Recital 16 needs to be enacted strongly in the Bill to provide some protection for the service and the rural communities that depend on it.

An Post has been designated as the universal postal provider in the Bill, but it is not clear how this option will be funded. It will possibly be by other companies that will operate in the universal service provider sector.

If this is to be implemented, then the Exchequer will have to provide funding for the public service obligation of the universal provider. There is no doubt about this, because the other companies will refuse and ComReg will probably not enforce their contribution to the costs. Otherwise there will be massive job losses and a rundown of the service that will ultimately lead to calls to sell An Post, and this will see the reduction in the standard of service that the postal service provides.

This Bill needs to be strengthened to protect the public interest, provide for a strategic postal service, protect the provision of services in rural Ireland and ensure that our postal service can contribute to our economic revival. If this is not done, it should be rejected by this House.

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