Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I have provided €80,000 to the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment to support the establishment of ten digital access post offices on a pilot basis. An Post have picked the ten post offices; we are looking at how we can support it in the digital era.

I do not like saying things like this, but I have to be honest sometimes. I have said to Deputy Ó Cuív as well that we must be honest about post offices. I could provide all the figures for the amount of post office closures under the current Government and the last two Governments. I want to be fair to the postmasters and postmistresses. I know them. We have lost some in our own county; they are being lost all over the country. We must be honest and say that people are not using the services we have. Some €615 million worth of goods was bought online in this country last year. People are bypassing their local shops, supermarkets, women's shops and clothes shops, and doing their shopping online.

I was in a village of 500 people recently-----

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