Questions in the House - Post Offices

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Post Offices
Business, Innovation and Skills

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Graeme Morrice (Livingston, Labour)

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills what support his Department has given to Post Office branches to diversify their services since May 2010.


Jennifer Willott (Cardiff Central, Liberal Democrat)

As shareholder, the Government does not play a role in operational matters, such as providing advice or support to individual subpostmasters. However, the Government has committed nearly £2 billion since 2010 to maintain, modernise, and protect the Post Office network. This includes funding the Network Transformation programme that is seeing investment into thousands of branches, helping subpostmasters to modernise, introduce new operational practices (such as offering longer opening hours and making better use of their premises), and to become more sustainable. For branches where Network Transformation is not a viable option, the Government is providing a £20 million improvement fund to enable those subpostmasters to develop and secure their businesses.

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Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham, Conservative)

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills how the £1.3 billion Government investment into the Post Office network will be spent over what time period.

Jennifer Willott (Cardiff Central, Liberal Democrat)

In November 2010, the Government set out its commitments to the Post Office in its policy statement "Securing the Post Office network in the digital age", which include maintaining a network of at least 11,500 branches; complying with strict access criteria; and providing for the modernisation of thousands of post offices. This is being supported by £1.34 billion funding, provided over the following years:
£ million
2011-12 180
2012-13 410
2013-14 415
2014-15 330

Additionally, in November 2013, Jo Swinson MP announced to Parliament that the Government was committing a further £640 million covering the period April 2015 to March 2018 to ensure the Post Office network continues to be maintained, modernised and protected.

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Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham, Conservative)

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills what assessment he has made of the effects of the Government's investment into the Post Office network.

Jennifer Willott (Cardiff Central, Liberal Democrat)

The Government set out clear and ambitious objectives in its 2010 policy statement, “Securing the Post Office network in the digital age”, which are being met and made possible by the funding provided by this Government. This includes maintaining a network that is at its most stable for two decades; a modernisation programme that has seen nearly 2,000 branches improved, with thousands more subpostmasters signed up to modernise over the coming years; a strong Post Office that has negotiated a long term commercial agreement with the Royal Mail, and has won every Government contract that it has bid for over the last two and a half years; and is successfully operating as an independent business for the first time in its history.