The Humble Petition of Cllr Larry Henson and others of like disposition,

Sheweth

That Post Office Ltd. proposes to close the Hawthorn Road Post Office in Kettering, which is a long-standing, popular and profitable local Post Office branch used by thousands of local people, many of whom are elderly, young mothers with children and those with disabilities, who would find it inconvenient and difficult to reach any other branch of the Post Office.

Wherefore your Petitioners pray that your Honourable House urges Her Majesty's Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform to call upon Post Office Ltd. to reconsider its closure proposals and ensure that the Hawthorn Road Post Office in Kettering remains open and part of the national Post Office network.

And your Petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray, &c.—[Presented by Mr. Philip Hollobone, Official Report, 7 January 2008; Vol. 128, c. 470.] [P000101]

Observations from the Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform:

The Government fully recognises the important social and economic role of post offices, particularly in rural and deprived urban communities. That is why it is determined to maintain a national post office network allowing people to have reasonable access across the whole country and why it has put in place a new policy and financial framework to achieve this. The Government has invested a total of £2 billion since 1999. For example, this has paid for a computer link-up for every post office as well as support for non-commercial branches since 2003.

In its response to the consultation on the Post Office network, the Government announced confirmation in May 2007 of its decision to extend funding of up to £1.7 billion to 2011, including provision of a £150 million Social Network Payment to support the post office network up to this time. The Government strategy includes provision for 2,500 compensated closures and 500 new Outreach services.

The 500 new and innovative Outreach locations will mitigate closures, primarily in smaller and more remote communities. These will operate in partnership with other local services such as in pubs, village halls, churches or in mobile post offices. POL announced on 9 April that it will extend Outreach trials into urban areas which, if successful, could mean additional Outreach branches over and above the 500 originally planned. Nevertheless, there will need to be up to 2,500 compensated post office closures within the defined access criteria.

Post Office Limited (POL) is responsible for implementing the network change programme at a local level. It is developing a rolling programme of some 50 local consultations on detailed area plans. These are based on groups of Parliamentary constituencies. The first area plans went out to local consultation on 2 October last year and these plans will continue to be rolled out at regular intervals until August, with the whole programme scheduled to take around 15 months to complete. The consultation period for Leicestershire, Northamptonshire and Rutland finished on 10 January and POL announced its final decisions on 1 February. The decisions are available on their website at www.postoffice.co.uk/networkchange. Having considered all representations and the criteria for the network change programme, POL has confirmed that the Hawthorn Road Post Office branch is to close.

POL develops its proposals with the participation of sub-postmasters, local authorities and the consumer watchdog, Postwatch. When drawing up its implementation plans, it takes into account the numeric access criteria set out by Government as well as local factors affecting ease of access (such as rivers, mountains etc). POL is also required to consider the availability of public transport and alternative access to key post office services, local demographics and the impact on the local economy. Local consultations provide the opportunity to raise any specific concerns over particular proposals.

The Government does not have a role in proposals or decisions for individual post offices. No decisions on individual Post Offices are taken until after local consultations. Those decisions are made by POL in light of the responses to the consultation, while subject to a four-stage appeals process involving Postwatch. The Review Process for closure decisions after public consultation process applies where Postwatch shows that, for an individual branch:

POL has not given due consideration to material evidence received during the public consultation in coming to its decision or;

evidence emerges from the consultation that the proposal for the branch does not meet the Government’s policy requirements.

The aim of the further review process is for POL and Postwatch to reach an agreed way forward by bilateral review with 3 stages available at increasing levels of seniority. An addition to the review process last November provides for very difficult cases which remain unresolved after stage 3. Allan Leighton, Chairman of Royal Mail Group, will review the issues and reach a final decision.