Postal Services Bill

My Lords, I very much understand and appreciate the sentiments behind these amendments. Royal Mail has a tremendous history and heritage. I know that the noble Lords, Lord Clarke and Lord Christopher, have both campaigned to secure Royal Mail’s future for many years, and they have a strong desire to protect the company’s proud heritage. As noble Lords have heard, I recently visited Royal Mail’s archive and saw for myself some of the public records, including a sheet of Penny Black stamps—something that I thought I would never see—and museum artefacts on display in the archive. I also saw on my visit the designs for stamps commissioned by the then Postmaster-General, Tony Benn, working with the artist David Gentleman, which did not include the image of Her Majesty. Thankfully, as I think the Committee will agree, these stamps were never issued and the tradition that the noble Lords are seeking to preserve through Amendments 25A and 25B continues to this day. Clause 60 provides the Secretary of State with a power of direction that can be used to require the universal service provider to maintain that tradition and to make sure that the stamps receive royal approval before they are issued. Amendment 25A would require the Secretary of State to issue such a direction, while Amendment 25B would require that any such direction was subject to the affirmative resolution procedure. This clause was discussed in the other place and, as was mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Young, the Government subsequently introduced an amendment to strengthen the safeguards for protecting the future of this unique tradition. We are not here today to remove that amendment in any way. The current voluntary framework governing the approval of stamp designs has been in place for more than 40 years and it has worked well. Royal Mail has been, and is currently, doing just what a direction would require it to do. I would therefore like to draw on a piece of timeless wisdom that says, ““If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it””. That is not to say that we should not have the tools in place to fix it, if fixing were ever required. That is precisely what this clause provides for. However, this power is a failsafe that should be drawn on only when required. It can easily be drawn on by the Secretary of State if there is ever a justifiable need to do so. On Amendment 25B, we take the view that if there is ever a need to use the power of direction, the direction itself will not be of a nature to warrant the use of the affirmative resolution procedure. This power of direction can be used only for a limited and focused purpose, in effect to re-impose time-honoured practice and processes. Furthermore the direction will be imposed only on the universal service provider, and Clause 60 allows for any such direction to be varied or revoked by subsequent directions. We believe that this clause as it stands is fit for purpose and proportionate to the important task of protecting the future of the sovereign’s image on UK postage stamps, if such protection is ever needed. I hope that I have been able to reassure the noble Lords on this. On Amendment 29A, and as noble Lords will recognise, archive status and museum collection status are different, although both are currently maintained by the British Postal Museum and Archive—the BPMA. The archives of Royal Mail and its predecessors are part of the public record, and they will remain part of the public record after we dispose of shares in Royal Mail. The Bill makes this clear and ensures that no changes can be made to the way in which the records are kept without consultation with the Keeper of Public Records, which is the National Archive. As public records, the archive must be preserved, maintained and made available to the public in accordance with the Public Records Act 1958. Amendment 29A would, however, place additional requirements on Royal Mail that would not apply to other organisations which have responsibility for keeping public records. I do not think that it would be right to place an additional burden on a privately owned Royal Mail that Parliament does not place on publicly owned bodies. The museum collection is not part of the public record; I understand that its ownership was passed to the BPMA in 2004. Although the Government, like noble Lords, wish to see the collection maintained, we do not believe that this should be a statutory requirement on Royal Mail. It is currently not a statutory requirement for Royal Mail to maintain the collection. Royal Mail funds the BPMA because it recognises the importance of its heritage; it does so not because it is publicly owned but because heritage is part of the Royal Mail brand. I would fully expect this approach to continue in the future. Royal Mail, whether privately or publicly owned, should be proud of its history and use it to positive advantage in an open and transparent way. I read in my brief that British Telecom is a good example of a privatised company respecting and maintaining its heritage, although the noble Lord, Lord Young, has just given us an instance of when it was not. It has a purpose-built repository for the archive which is located in Holborn; and although the dedicated British Telecom Museum closed in 1997, it has invested some £6 million in establishing its Connected Earth initiative which provides access to its museum collection online and at its 10 partner museums located around the United Kingdom, including the National Museum of Scotland, the Museum of London and the Amberley Museum and Heritage Centre. The noble Lord, Lord Clarke, mentioned the Post Office underground railway—Mail Rail. He was even kind enough to mention it to me the other day in passing so that I would not get caught out, as I would have done if he had mentioned it only today. I understand that the Post Office (London) Railway Act was passed by a Select Committee of this House in 1913. Construction began in 1914 but was halted during the First World War, when the tunnels were used to store and protect art treasures belonging to the National Portrait Gallery and the Tate. The railway finally opened in 1927. At its height it was carrying an estimated 4 million letters a day. Royal Mail decided to stop using Mail Rail for operational reasons in 2003, primarily because many of the mail centres that Mail Rail serviced had been closed or changed their function. Of the nine original stations, Royal Mail still owns only four of the properties. Royal Mail is not unique in deciding to disuse such underground railways. The German and United States postal service providers have similar systems, but they also no longer carry mail. In fact, the United States railway in Chicago is now used to carry rubbish, as part of the city's waste disposal system. Royal Mail has not made any decisions about the future of the railway; it does, however, continue to maintain the tunnels, to ensure that they remain safe and sound. Although there have been previous discussions about putting the tunnels to commercial use, no commercially viable solution has been developed so far. Any suggestions that your Lordships may have on good commercial uses for the railway can be sent on a postcard to Royal Mail at 100 Victoria Embankment. I am sure that the company would be only too delighted to offer a prize to any offer put forward and successfully processed. In all seriousness, in response to the noble Lords, Lord Boswell, Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville, Lord Christopher and Lord Young, I assure them that I recognise their concerns about Royal Mail, its heritage and how it should best be preserved in future. I would like to take away the issues that they have raised for further consideration and will return to the matter at Report. I ask that, with those reassurances, the noble Lord will be kind enough to withdraw his amendment at this time.