John Kelly (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I support Senator Heffernan's point about the sustainability of rural post offices. I come from a family of three generations that have run a small post office in rural Ireland. I have also seen the letters that are being sent out by the Department of Social Protection encouraging people to move their pensions and social welfare payments from the post office to the banks for the purposes of so-called convenience when the reality is that it is only in order that it can get greater access to people's bank accounts.

We talk a lot in this House about the decline in rural Ireland and tend continually to blame the Government. Rural Ireland to some degree is in the hands of the people living there. Where there is a small post office, there is invariably a small shop. The postmaster-cum-shopkeeper depends on the people of rural Ireland using their shop for convenience purposes such as getting a loaf of bread, the pint of milk and a few groceries. I know it is very difficult to expect people not to go to Aldi, Tesco and Lidl but if they only contributed a small bit to the rural shop with the rural post office, they would be more viable. People should not be threatened by letters that come from the Department of Social Protection telling them to do what I have just described, and they should support the local post office. That will ensure its viability in the future.