4-08-04

Barrett disbelief over Tory Post Office hypocrisy

John Barrett, Liberal Democrat MP for Edinburgh West, today expressed disbelief at the news that Lord James Douglas-Hamilton MSP and local Conservatives are campaigning against the post office closures announced last week.
 
Post Office management announced their intention last Thursday to close 20 post offices acrossEdinburghincluding 8 on the west side of the city.  In less than a week, John Barrett has already contacted over 10,000 of his constituents who will be affected by the closures, asking them to sign his petition against the plans.
 
Commenting on the news of the Tory 'campaign', John Barrett MP said:
 
"One of the reasons Lord James lost Edinburgh West to the Liberal Democrats in 1997, and for his subsequent rejection by my constituents in two elections since, is the fact he was a Minister in a Conservative Government that closed over 4,000 post offices.  That is even more than Labour are planning to close now!
 
"Two years ago, when the prospect of local post office closures first flared up, Margaret Smith MSP and I warned up to six post offices could close.  At the time, the local Tories accused us of 'scaremongering', merrily putting out a leaflet describing our campaign as a 'cynical trick.'  If anything, we underestimated the scale of the problem as Post Office management have actually announced their intention to close 8 post offices used by many of my constituents.
 
"How on earth Lord James and his local Tories have the bare faced cheek to campaign on the issue of post offices now is beyond me.  With their record in office, who knows how many more post offices would be closing if they were still in power?
 
"I have no doubt my constituents will feel angry as I do at this opportunistic attempt by the Tories to jump on the post office bandwagon."
 
ENDS
 

Notes to Editors
 
The Tories have little credibility to campaign against post office closures for the following 4 reasons.
 
(a) During the Tories' period in office (1979-97) the number of Crown post offices fell from 1,580 to 606 (down 974) and the number of sub-post offices fell from 21,213 to 17,731 (down 3,482).  In other words, nearly four and a half thousand post offices shut down and were not replaced under the Tories.  The highest number of post office closures in the past 20 years was in 1984-5 under the Conservatives.
 
(b) The Tory record in office shows they care more about profit than public services.  "By 1995, the Treasury had taken £1 billion from the Post Office.  Over the next two and a half years, an additional £1 billion was taken from the income received by the Post Office.  That money could have been used to invest in the network but the Treasury came first with the Conservatives." (Stephen Byers, DTI Secretary,12/4/00debate in the Commons)
 
(c) Michael Heseltine, as Minister with responsibility for the Post Office, repeatedly made it clear that his desire to see a fully privatised Post Office was frustrated only by the extremely small majority of the Major government. Had this happened it would have led to even more cutbacks in the postal network.
 
(d) The Conservative motion also supported "the computerisation project started by the last Conservative Government to tackle fraud and improve technology available in post offices". This project was a fiasco.  Within a few months of the Conservatives leaving office (i.e. late 1997) it was discovered that the project (for a benefit payment card) was overrunning by £600 million and was three years behind schedule (DTI information). The project continued to have problems under Labour and was abandoned in early 1999, but the problems undeniably began under the Conservatives.