Closure programme

12:24pm Thursday 24th July 2008

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I hate to ruin Stan Parr’s fun but his letter “proving” the EU was at the root of our post office closure problems (Journal, July 17th) did exactly the opposite.

Yes it’s true that there is an EU directive on competition in mail services – but this country encouraged it, we liberalised our mail services well before any EU “deadline” because we thought it would be good for the UK and anyhow, the principal change (the development of competition in business or “junk” mail delivery) has had absolutely no impact on trade in sub post offices.

Yes it’s true that the EU approval for the subsidy, or state aid, for our post office network lays down limits – but these are only a restatement of the limits the British government itself asked for. There have to be state aid rules to prevent, for example, the French or Italian governments from unfairly subsidising businesses that compete with our own – “to stop then cheating” to use words Mr Parr might understand. The EU gave ready approval to the state aid application for post offices because there was no competition issue.

It’s time for Stan Parr to stop believing all he reads in UKIP newsletters (I’ve seen the one he must have based his letter on) and to come to terms with the simple fact that there are some things this country is perfectly capable of getting wrong entirely for itself. The post office closure programme is one of those things.

Peter Luff MP, Member of Parliament for Mid Worcestershire, House of Commons, London SW1A 0AA.