Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

All we announced last week was simply a return to the jobseeker's payment system that had always been in place before the pandemic whereby people collected their payments at post offices. This is about supporting our post office network. Post offices are an integral part of communities across the country. I have met the Irish Postmasters' Union and An Post. They were clear that the loss of footfall relating to these payments was having a severe impact on rural and urban post offices. Deputies on all sides of the House have called for the Government to put more services into our post offices. Here is an example of that happening in practice and is something that we should support. I met Mr. Tony Wall, the postmaster at Usher's Quay, last week. When we made this announcement, he told me how important this decision was for post offices. Post offices, postmasters and postmistresses do great work the length and breadth of this country.

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