Angus MP's bid to save Royal Mail

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Angus MP Mike Weir, SNP Postal Affairs spokesman, joined members of the Save Our Royal Mail Campaign at 10 Downing Street recently.

Whilst there, Mr Weir joined the Royal Mail campaigners in presenting a petition to the Prime Minister at 10 Downing Street calling for the government to abandon plans to privatise Royal Mail.

The petition had quickly collected 160,000 signatures against government plans. Mr Weir has consistently campaigned against the plans, both by the previous Labour government and the present Coalition governments, to privatise Royal Mail.

Commenting Mr Weir said: “There is huge public concern that the privatisation of Royal Mail would have a disastrous consequence for mail services with a knock on effect on our local post offices. The fact that the petition very quickly gathered so many signatures shows the depth of that concern. I have received representations from constituents from all over Angus expressing concerns at the plans and how it will affect local businesses in particular. The Scottish Government have recently entered into a contract with BT to introduce fibre optic broadband to large areas of Scotland, covering some 95 per cent of the population by 2017.

“This could provide a massive boost to local businesses in rural areas. That will only happen, if they also have access to a reliable and reasonably priced postal service that will deliver and pick up form all parts of the country.

“There is a real danger that privatised mail services will abandon anything but a very basic service in rural areas as they concentrate on the much more lucrative city areas. Ofcom have already removed price caps on all mail services apart from second class mail, which is now, effectively , the only true universal service.

“The Government must rethink this policy now. If they rush ahead and privatise the service by next Spring, as they plan, it may be very difficult to unravel in the future.”