Brian Stanley (Laois, Sinn Fein)
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I welcome the opportunity to raise this important matter with the Minister. I want him to halt the relocation of the post office in Mountmellick from O'Connell Square to Connolly Street. The relocation will have a huge impact on the town centre. It is not just in Mountmellick that this happening; it is also being done in Thurles, where the post office is being moved from Liberty Square to a shopping centre on the outer fringes of the town. Its current location adjacent to the square is perfect. and there is loads of parking available. I have never driven into that square and been unable to find a parking space. The square is suitable for pedestrians, particularly elderly people who would have to travel from the likes of Wolfe Tone Court, Emmett Terrace, Chapel Street, Twomey Terrace and other parts of the town.

An Post has stated that it is making this move to provide a modern service and that moving to a new location means it can provide more facilities. I am of the view that it could have modernised the existing service on offer in the current post office - because there is loads of space there - rather than taking the option of moving to another premises. There are also other options available on the square in Mountmellick. There are other retailers there that have substantial floor space available and that are willing to take this on.

The Government makes many claims and makes much play of putting the heart back in town centres and regenerating our small and medium-sized towns. I welcome this as a good policy and Sinn Féin supports it. However, what we have here is that one arm of Government is effectively doing and saying one thing while the other, namely, the Department of Communications, Climate Action and Environment through An Post, is doing the complete opposite. The irony is that An Post is using money provided by the Government for the modernisation programme to carry out these so-called modernisation moves and, as a result, the taxpayer is funding the destruction of town centres such as that in Mountmellick.

I want this to halt. I want the Minister to press the pause button on this so that it can be looked at in more detail and scrutinised. He should not allow what is proposed to proceed immediately in its current form.

Seán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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I welcome the opportunity to raise this important issue for the town of Mountmellick. On Friday last at 3.22 p.m. I received an email from An Post confirming that it had moved the post office and that it was sending me the notice that it had already issued to the local media. This is an awful way to treat members of the public and their elected representatives. The post office was in this location for 114 years. It is a large and substantial premises in the town centre. There are other large and substantial premises, supermarkets and big shops in the immediate vicinity and my real question is whether these were all examined before the decision was taken to move the post office to an out-of-town supermarket.

Day in and day out we hear that the Government has a policy in respect of towns and villages and maintaining town centres. It is not just one arm of the Government doing one thing and the other arm doing something else. The same arm of the Government is doing both and it is effectively speaking out of both sides of its mouth when it gives a commitment to protecting main streets and town centres and then states that it is providing substantial funding to An Post to invest in out-of-town shopping centres or supermarkets and locate post offices there.

An Post is 100% State-owned. This is the people's money being invested in moving a post office to a new premises. I want to know if a detailed examination was carried out and whether other premises were considered. Was the current premises examined for expansion? As I have stated, it is a substantial property. Were other locations in the town considered or was there a quick arrangement arrived at out of convenience?

An Post has been planning for this for some time. I walked the length of the entire main street and other streets of Mountmellick on Monday and the number of premises that are closed is extraordinary. Premises that used to be home to vibrant businesses are closed and we find that the one premises owned, run and provided for by the taxpayer is moving out of the town centre due to Government policy. The Minister can wash his hands and state that it is nothing to do with him but he sets the policy for An Post, which then implements it.

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Deputies for raising this matter. I know it is of concern locally and I understand that. Deputy Stanley and, in particular, Deputy Fleming, having been chairman of the Oireachtas committee on State-sponsored bodies for many years - I enjoyed my time working under him there - will know that these State bodies have been set up under law in such a way that Ministers are not responsible for the day-to-day decisions relating to them. We have to recognise that this is the situation which we in the Oireachtas have created. We have not created a situation where Ministers would be intervening in the day-to-day decisions the companies in question make.

The Deputies will also be aware of the serious financial backdrop against which An Post has had to develop a strategic plan. It faced serious financial meltdown in recent times. It faces a long-term secular decline in its postal business of 8% per annum. It has had to devise a new strategy to carve out a future for the postal service within the communities it serves. That is what it is doing, and successfully so.

In the case of Mountmellick and Thurles, I understand from An Post that it has found that the existing premises from which it is operating are not consistent with the vision it has to provide a better, modern service that recognises the digital transformation that is occurring, the opportunities that exist in the context of the postal service and the company's desire to expand into financial services and be close to where there is a footfall that would be relevant to its services. An Post has recognised that it needs to up its game to serve places such as Mountmellick and it is in that context that it has made this decision. Clearly, An Post should talk to its customers and explain what it is doing.

The suggestion by both Deputies, however, that I should intervene to prevent a company from doing what we as an Oireachtas have given it a statutory responsibility to do is simply not the right way to do business. An Post has an independent board. If a strong case is to be made, it needs to be made to An Post, which can evaluate it against the criteria.

From my understanding, An Post believes that Mountmellick will be the first of a new type of postal service outside of Dublin and that the quality of service it will deliver there will be cutting edge. It has evaluated the situation carefully in the context of the transformation programme it is undertaking. Given that An Post faces a continuing decline of 8% per annum in its postal services, the key to its survival is being able to transform its business and generate new customers from a society which is changing in what it needs. It must move with what its customers require. My responsibility is purely a high-level governance to ensure that An Post operates to the standards of governance set for them and that it is in a financially sound position. We must have faith in the board we have established under law to make these decisions in the best interests of An Post's customers, its workers and the communities it serves. By all means, I will convey to An Post the concerns that Deputies have outlined but the responsibilities lie with it and we have charged it with those responsibilities very consciously.

Brian Stanley (Laois, Sinn Fein)
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While I thank the Minister for his reply, I am disappointed with it. The State has made a major cash injection in An Post that is being used to cause damage to other Government policy, which was supposed to put the heart back into commercial town centres. There are a number of empty and occupied premises around Mountmellick, within 100 yd. of the existing post office, that would facilitate co-location. Have they been approached?

I have a copy of a letter from the local business association and Tidy Towns. They have asked how, in light of the many initiatives and reports funded by public money to breathe life into town centres, the Government can explain the decision as anything other than running contrary to those policies. They understand the matter. The Mountmellick local area plan states one of its strategic aims is to "[i]mprove the quality, vitality and vibrancy of the Town Centre." It goes on to state its policy is to "[e]ncourage and facilitate the reuse and regeneration of derelict and vacant sites" in the town. The decision, however, goes completely against the town plan and Government policy. I understand that the Minister does not want to get into the nitty-gritty but this is a policy direction issue for the Government. The Minister, on behalf of the taxpayer and the public, is the sole shareholder. The public signed a petition three years ago to recommend that the post office should not be removed from the town centre. Will the Minister give policy direction to An Post on this matter? We cannot let this be simply an executive matter for An Post to move the post office on a whim.

Seán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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The Minister made a few interesting points and mentioned the management of An Post. I am making a formal request to the Minister to convey to the management of An Post an invitation to meet Deputies from the area. That step needs to be taken immediately and we want to see it happen in the coming days.

The Minister has just given a death notice to every town centre post office in Ireland. He said post offices must move with the customers and consider where business is moving, and that these types of old premises do not fit the future vision of An Post. That can be interpreted as saying Mountmellick is the first town to move Government business from the town centre to the edge of town areas. Eventually, some Minister some day will announce €100,000 to renovate the town centre and footpaths and build new curbs in the area. That will be the response of the Government. It will renovate the footpath and think that it is great because a town renewal grant was obtained. We want to keep post offices, businesses and Government businesses in town centres. We look forward to the Minister facilitating that meeting with the management of An Post and Deputies.

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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Interestingly, I recently visited Mountmellick and found it to be a thriving community with great enterprising initiative being undertaken. It is using the fund of €1 billion the Minister for Rural and Community Development, Deputy Ring, has made available. It has competed for the fund, developed projects and is a shop window of good examples of how towns are taking their revival seriously. It has also revived old buildings to bring them into new uses. From my point of view, however, I must ensure that An Post, which has been given legislative independence, is allowed to ensure that the postal service it delivers is in tune with the needs of the community it serves. There is no future for us if An Post cannot develop the types of services on which it has based its strategy. We need to see it being a more vibrant servant to the community. It needs to move away from providing a service in decline, namely, the standard post mail, and develop the new opportunities that exist. It has been remarkably successful in that regard. It has achieved an agreement with its unions that has allowed it to transform its business and grow new business in different areas. It must be able to respond to the direction of its business.

It is untrue the decision spells a decline of rural towns. If we do not have thriving postal services, or thriving broadband access in our regional communities, or regional enterprise strategies, or the rural development fund, which allows people to develop initiatives from the bottom up, rural Ireland will decline. They are the modern tools of ensuring thriving towns, villages and rural communities. We must ensure we create a framework through which rural Ireland can thrive and grow, which is the basis for the decision. Such an outcome cannot be achieved by telling a progressive company seeking to carve out a new role that Ministers will interfere in their day-to-day operation, as the Deputies have suggested. That is not what Ministers do and it would be inappropriate for that sort of direction to be issued by a Minister to a body trying to rebuild its strategy with long-term services for the community it lives among.