Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I acknowledge the work of Deputy Denis Naughten on the motion. It is important to respect the work done by other people. I remember the work done by the Deputy and thank him for his work as Minister. I acknowledge his genuine interest in supporting the post office network, including everything he did at critical times. He made important decisions that were difficult in the interest of nothing but keeping open as many post offices as possible.

I declare that I am a postmaster of a very small rural post office and am glad of that. I am very proud of the network. I will nonetheless highlight mistakes that have been made and post offices have taken a hit. For example, half of their business disappeared because payments were changed to being every two weeks instead of every week. We should remember that salaries are not paid to postmasters but that we get a commission on every transaction. Every time a transaction is made, whether it is selling a stamp, lodging money to a post office account or a person collecting a payment, the post office earns its crust.

There is one thing I have no interest whatsoever in and it is very seldom people would be heard saying this. I respect the work that was done on the report that was brought out recently but it is putting the hand out to the Government looking for money. As the owner of a post office, I am looking for nothing from anybody for anything. What I want is work. I want more people to come into my post office and my neighbours' and friends' post offices. We want footfall and business. Let us take the pandemic unemployment payment, PUP, for instance. If that had been channelled through our post offices, it would have been a lifeline to us during this critical time because people would have been doing their transactions and business through our network rather than through the main pillar banks. We should not forget community banking, which is the model in New Zealand. That was a success there and I do not see why it could not have been used here. I again thank Deputy Naughten and his group for-----

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