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Mr. Lindsay Hoyle (Chorley): I am sure that my hon. Friend recognises that people have the right to have their benefits or pensions paid in cash. That is an absolute must. We must also guarantee a nationwide post office network and ensure that we do not lose it or allow it to wither on the vine in the way the previous Government did.
Mr. Wareing: I agree with my hon. Friend. I believe that the Government are sincere in their desire that there
should be a proper choice between going to a bank or to a post office and between receiving benefits and pensions in cash or having them paid into a bank account. However, they have not taken into account social variations between different parts of the country.
Mr. Letwin: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Wareing: I shall give way shortly.
For example, car ownership in my constituency is far below the national average, so many people rely on public transport. I know that pensioners in Liverpool receive, as they do in London, free public transport, but many people on income support will find it extremely costly to go to a bank, because there are only three bank branches in my constituency. There are moreover six wards in my constituency; in three of them there is not a single bank branch.
Mr. Gale: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Wareing: The hon. Member for West Dorset (Mr. Letwin) tried to get in first.
Mr. Letwin: The hon. Gentleman expresses much common ground between all parties. However, does he acknowledge that no one accuses the Government of lacking good will? The problem is administrative; the Government have simply not worked out how to achieve the result that they seek. Does the hon. Gentleman agree with us and hon. Members of all parties that there should be a delay in implementing the arrangements until the new administrative system has been worked out?
Mr. Wareing: I agree, to the extent that the hon. Gentleman agrees with me about examining the details of the scheme more closely. However, he would doubtless privatise the Post Office. Our agreement founders at that point.
Mr. Gale: The hon. Gentleman referred to the lack of bank branches. Can he deal with the point on which the Secretary of State refused to give way to me? Why are the Government so hell-bent on implementing a costly programme to transfer pension payments to banks, which are reducing the number of branches in the hon. Gentleman's constituency and mine, when the junior Minister wrote to hon. Members today to extol the virtues of the Horizon programme? It has been rolled out in every sub-post office, which could deal with precisely the sort of transaction that the hon. Gentleman's constituents and mine want handled locally.
Mr. Wareing: The hon. Gentleman may have a point. However, the Postal Services Bill has not been enacted yet, and the problems that the hon. Gentleman and perhaps other hon. Members face in their constituencies already exist. They do not result from changes in the way in which benefits are paid.
I am worried about the sick, the disabled and the elderly in my constituency. A post office has already closed there, although that was the result of vandalism, not the problems that will beset post offices under the current proposal.
Of course my constituents can go to a post office and draw cash under the proposals, provided that the post office exists. A move from a cash system of payment at the post office, which many of my constituents desire, means that those post offices will close down. Not only post offices, but nearby shopping areas suffer. The post offices will suffer not only through the change in the payment of benefit; their sales of newspapers and cigarettes will also suffer, and a whole range of shops in the area could be affected. Economic activity will decline and more jobs will be lost. The Government should tackle that problem.
The Post Office currently has a monopoly on services up to £1. The reduction to 50p is bound to have an effect and to endanger not only sub-post offices, but other businesses in the area.
Mr. Nigel Evans (Ribble Valley): Does the hon. Gentleman accept that, given that 500 post offices closed last year, and given the uncertainty of the impact of the changes on their profitability in future, many decent people who have put their life's savings and work into post offices are now witnessing the value of their businesses depreciate greatly? Those who want to sell them cannot get the money that they need for their businesses.
Mr. Wareing: I am not sure whether the figure of 500 that the hon. Gentleman cited is correct. He would probably be more convincing if he were able to offer options other than privatisation, because that would cause high Post Office prices.
We must remember that industrial relations in the Post Office have been transformed in recent years. [Laughter.] I do not know that the departure of the Minister for Competitiveness had anything to do with that. I am sure that he would have contributed to the improvements that have resulted from the measures to enhance competitiveness which arose from the negotiations between John Roberts, the Post Office chief executive, and Derek Hodgson, the secretary of the Communication Workers Union.
The union members readily accepted the new measures that were introduced by the union and management combined, but I do not believe that that acceptance will continue if we move away from the payment of benefits to recipients through post offices. Indeed, industrial relations are likely to suffer.
There are 15 post offices in my constituency. I fear that if the measures are implemented, those in areas such as Muirhead avenue, east and Baycliff road--as well as the Dog and Gun post office--will not survive for long because there are high rates of high unemployment and sickness and they depend on the payment of benefits such as disability benefit.
I hope that the Government will take heed of what I have said. The Tories' contribution to this debate is irrelevant, given their ideological commitment to privatisation, which is opposed by almost every Post Office employee. I have received representations from many people in my constituency, where this is a hot issue. I have also received representations from the Communication Workers Union, postmasters, the Liverpool chamber of commerce and, of course, the National Federation of Sub-Postmasters, which is leading the lobby today.
It is not enough to defeat the hypocrisy of Conservative Members, who have shed crocodile tears. I beseech the Secretary of State and the Under-Secretary to listen to the people in our heartlands, where there is real opposition to the proposals on benefit payment changes.
5.18 pm
Sir Peter Emery (East Devon): I wish to express considerable concern that the Secretary of State's speech did not reflect the real fear of tens of thousands of sub-postmasters and mistresses about their future and that of their business. I must tell the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Mr. Wareing) that the biggest ever red herring is the idea that the Conservatives want to privatise the post office structure. Does he not realise that sub-post offices are already privatised because they are private businesses? I have never been in favour of the privatisation of the Royal Mail. Indeed, at this moment, that is not part of the Conservative programme. We must ignore that red herring.
There is a lack of understanding on the part of Ministers of the role that sub-post offices play in the community, whether in Liverpool or in my villages, such as Dolwood and Southleigh, way out in the country. Part of the role of sub-post offices in the community is the payment of benefit.
I circulated a questionnaire to the 36 sub-post offices in my constituency. I want to tell the House about the feelings of those postmasters and postmistresses. They want a guarantee that they will be able to sustain their businesses in the future. That is not an unreasonable request from any business, whichever party one supports.
Some realistic suggestions have been made, which have not received sufficient emphasis in the debate. Local authorities have the right to give rate relief to sub-post offices. In many areas, that is not done completely. In my area, East Devon district council gives rate relief of 50 per cent. It would be much better for sub-post offices if they were given 100 per cent., as that would assist them generally.
Sub-post offices need to be able to generate greater income, and there are ways in which that could be done. The Government should arrange for sub-post offices to issue vehicle tax licences. There is a demand for that service, especially in the countryside, where people are some way away from a major post office where they can obtain a tax disc. Passport forms should also be available from sub-post offices. Why not? These small matters are not being considered in the debate, but they are realistic and would help the remuneration of sub-postmasters.
There was talk of subsidy. How much? How is it to be dealt with? Has it been agreed with the Treasury? I hope that the Minister who replies to the debate will clarify the matter.
Few people know about the banking services that are already offered through post offices by Lloyds TSB, the Co-op and Alliance & Leicester. That is not advertised nationally on television, and only customers of post offices and sub-post offices would know about it. More publicity should be given to the availability of banking services.
The suggestion that cash machines should be installed in post offices overlooks the fact that the people most likely to use them are the elderly. I wonder how many
elderly people who do not have a bank account or a piece of plastic understand the operation of a cash machine and would know the PIN number needed to operate it. Such matters must be considered when we speak about elderly people, particularly those whom I see in my constituency, whether in the better areas of Budleigh Salterton or out in Dolwood, Southleigh and such places.What about the possibility of taking out of a bank machine cash other than in notes? Many pensions are not rounded to a sum that would be payable in notes alone. I do not know of bank machines that will deliver £56.50. What will happen when an account is overdrawn? Does it become overdrawn? How is anyone to know? None of that has been considered fully.
I do not think that the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Mr. Wareing) would be at all happy if his constituents could not obtain their cash on a weekly basis. They need the money in order to run their homes, and they will not be willing to receive it on a four-weekly basis. That has not really been considered either.
The Government seem to gloss over the idea that all this will come about when ACT is operating in 2003 and 2005. I can tell Ministers that I shall not be in the House of Commons then, but I can also tell them that many small post offices will be out of business by that time. There is no point in preparing a system for a group of businesses that will not be able to sustain their operations.
Fear of what is to happen has driven down the value of sub-post offices. It is now six times more difficult for sub-postmasters and sub-postmistresses to sell their businesses than it was four or five years ago. Until now many people, on retirement, have bought sub-post offices, run them for some years using their savings as income, and supported themselves for the rest of their lives with the income from the sale when they have handed them on. Over the past few years, a host of post offices in my constituency have had to close because no one could be found to take them on.
I appeal to the Government to start being more practical, and to come to grips--as any business man should--with the problem of how to extend the incomes of sub-postmasters and sub-postmistresses. It is possible, with a little lateral thinking. If the Government could do that, I believe that thousands of people who are outside Parliament today would be very much happier.
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