Postal Services Bill

My Lords, the importance of the issues dealt with by the Bill could not be demonstrated better than by the number of your Lordships who have put their names down to speak in this very important debate. We also very much look forward to the maiden speech of my favourite political novelist, the noble Lord, Lord Dobbs, and that of the noble Lord, Lord Empey, to whom I had better not yet put an epithet. We have of course been here before, as the noble Baroness said, and I am delighted to see the noble Lord, Lord Mandelson, in his place. Whether he is going to show the scars on his back that he obtained when he was here before, I know not. However, we have been here before and we gave very detailed scrutiny to the Bill that he brought forward when it came to this House but was then, as the Minister indicated, withdrawn before it reached the other place. As the Minister indicated, the reasons behind the legislation have not really changed since the noble Lord, Lord Mandelson, felt it necessary to bring that Bill forward on the recommendation of Sir Richard Hooper. The competition for Royal Mail from e-mail and the internet continues, resulting in shrinking volumes in its business. I do not know whether noble Lords who received lobbying from organisations that wish to maintain Royal Mail more or less in its current format noticed how much of that lobbying came by e-mail rather than through Royal Mail. That could be no better indicator of the problems that Royal Mail has in competing with the internet. Losses are continuing and, unless they are stopped, they will ultimately be the responsibility of the taxpayer. Then there is the massive issue of the pension deficit, which overhangs Royal Mail’s balance sheet. The noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, was brave enough to accede that this Bill contains a lot of similarities to the Bill that we considered last year or the year before. First, the pension deficit is dealt with and taken on by the taxpayer, as was the case in the Bill of the noble Lord, Lord Mandelson. Secondly, there is improved regulation, and I am glad that the noble Lord endorses the transfer of regulation to Ofcom. As is clear from both Bills—this one and that of the Labour Party—we all believe that that will give better protection to the universal service obligation, which is absolutely at the heart of Royal Mail’s business. Thirdly, as in the Bill of the noble Lord, Lord Mandelson, although it goes somewhat further than that Bill, this Bill provides for Royal Mail to have access to private capital. There are of course a number of additions to the Bill which I suspect the Labour Party will agree with, although they were not in the Bill of the noble Lord, Lord Mandelson. There are new safeguards in this Bill to protect the universal service obligation, as was mentioned by the noble Baroness. First, before any recommendation to alter the universal service obligation can be made, Ofcom is required to take into account the interests of the users. Secondly, there is an absolute ban on any alteration to the uniformity of the service, as the noble Baroness explained, so that different prices cannot be charged in different places and a different service cannot be provided in different places. Most importantly, particularly in the context of the last Bill that we debated—I am sure that this will commend itself to your Lordships—no change to the universal service obligation can be made without an affirmative vote of both Houses of Parliament. Therefore, there is parliamentary control of any change. Perhaps I may apologise briefly to my coalition colleagues for the point that I am about to make. I cannot let the moment pass without recording the fact that there are a number of issues in this Bill which are dear to the heart of Liberal Democrats. Of course, a Liberal Democrat Cabinet Minister is responsible for this Bill and a Liberal Democrat Minister took the Bill through another place. The latter is Edward Davey, who has extensive experience of post offices and mail services throughout the world. Of course, there are issues in this Bill that we endeavoured, but failed, to persuade the previous Government to include in theirs. The first is a much bigger commitment to employee shares. As the noble Baroness indicated, if the Bill goes through in its current form, the employee share ownership in Royal Mail will be the largest of any UK organisation. Secondly, the Bill provides for mutualisation of post offices. Liberal Democrats have always been keen on the mutualisation concept. We believe that, when Post Office Ltd becomes a mutual, that will be massively in the interest of all the sub-post offices, which, as the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, indicated, are at the heart of many British towns and villages. We have all been assailed by endless lobbying on the Bill, which demonstrates the importance of the issue to the public. There seem to be two overall objections to the Bill, which no doubt other Members of your Lordships’ House will voice. The first is that Royal Mail does not need to be reformed. The noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, has said that there has been a significant improvement in labour relations and that the technological developments that are necessary to compete in the modern world can be introduced without any resort to private capital. I do not accept that and I do not think that the coalition accepts that. If we want a comparison we can look at the fact that during the previous Labour Administration, 65,000 jobs were lost in the Royal Mail, at huge personal cost to those individuals. However, if we compare that with what happened since Deutsche Post floated in 2001, Deutsche Post has made an investment of £11.6 billion over the past 10 years in forming and modernising its network. Those two statistics demonstrate very graphically why the Royal Mail needs access to private capital. The second objection, which the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, put extremely effectively, concerns why the relationship between the Royal Mail and the Post Office Limited cannot be enshrined better in this Bill. The Government have used two arguments for this, which I expected. First, any attempt to put that on the face of the Bill could be open to legal challenge as regards the privatisation mechanisms and the competition mechanisms. Secondly, and more importantly, it is attempting to say in 2011 what relationship will be necessary between the Post Office and Royal Mail in future years. How can we predict? That must be a matter for commercial negotiation between the Royal Mail and Post Office Limited. It seems almost inconceivable that anyone running the Royal Mail would not want to take advantage of the network of sub-post offices out there to help to distribute the mail. What other network would they use? That seems to me to be entirely a matter for commercial negotiation as the two organisations move into the next five, seven or 10 years. The critical issue for Post Office Limited, as the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, indicated, is how it develops new business. From the Liberal Democrat point of view, I do not think that we will take any lessons from the Labour Party or our colleagues in the coalition Government about closures of sub-post offices. Many of us have campaigned for years to try to keep sub-post offices open while both the Tory Government, under Margaret Thatcher and John Major, and then the Labour Government, under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, presided over huge closures of post offices. In the commitments that have been made by the new coalition, first on the investment fund, which the noble Baroness referred to, and, secondly, on commitments to explore new ways of developing business for the Post Office, coupled with, as I indicated, the advantages once the post office network can become a mutual, I think that the future of the Post Office is much more secure than it has been for many years.