Postal Services Bill

The hon. Member for Linlithgow and East Falkirk (Michael Connarty) finished where the hon. Member for Llanelli (Nia Griffith) started—in total opposition to the Bill. I have to tell the Opposition that they are ignoring the economic and financial reality of Royal Mail. As a result of the reduction in letter volumes because of technology such as e-mail, the internet, text messaging and social networking, it is losing a huge amount of money. The reduction in letter volumes—its core business—is predicted to fall again and again, but it is not only Royal Mail that is affected. Every postal administration around the world is seeing letter volumes and revenues go down. That means that those administrations are leaching money and something has to be done. The previous Government failed to do anything, although I should pay tribute to Lord Mandelson, who had the decency, on Second Reading in the other place, to recognise that we were on the right track with this Bill. The fact that Labour Front Benchers are unable to recognise that today is testament to Labour's unwillingness to face up to the reality of the challenges.