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08/07/07 - Ministers have urged Post Office Limited to be transparent in their forthcoming consultation on post office closures.

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Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Sustainable Growth John Swinney has written to Post Office Limited, saying communities need to be fully prepared to ensure future decisions about post offices are taken with the best information available.

Mr Swinney has also written to the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (CoSLA), asking them to seize the opportunity and become involved through community planning partnerships.

The full text of these letters is below.

Letter to Alan Cook, Managing Director of Post Office Limited

I was very pleased to meet you, Ian McKay and Julie Morrison on 22 June and to learn about your aspirations for the future of UK postal services.

At the meeting I said that Scottish Government was committed to improving service delivery for the people of Scotland, placing people at the heart of everything we will do. We aim to create a clearer and simplified public sector, freeing up more resources for vital front line services and ensuring value for money for the Scottish taxpayer. Our aim is for public services that are as effective and efficient as possible, and are delivered as close to people as possible. The need for local authorities to secure Best Value in the delivery of public services means they should engage with your consultation exercise. To that end, I have written today to the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities encouraging their pro-active co-operation in local consultation and consideration of future service delivery. A copy of my letter is enclosed for your information.

I was also pleased at the meeting to hear your commitment to better develop your business linkages with local authorities in Scotland.

Government has a role in encouraging and facilitating discussions between service providers, within the overarching framework of improving services. In Scotland, Community Planning Partnerships (CPPs) have a key role to play in considering local needs and circumstances and options for service delivery and I was pleased to learn from my officials that you are inviting representatives from Community Planning Partnerships to your information seminars.

Your invitation impacts my desire to make the process you are embarking on to be as transparent as possible. To reinforce this move, I think it would be helpful if you were to publish as much detail as you can about your proposals for consultation both at broad area and the more important detailed local level. Allowing communities to prepare for area consultations in advance will, hopefully, improve the quality of background information which you will require to enable you to make your decisions about local postal service delivery. In this spirit, I am publishing my letters on the Executive website.

As you know, postal services, post offices etc are reserved matters which means that Scottish Government's powers in this area are limited. Our common interests in Best Value and good service means Scottish Government can, however, help shape the work you are doing. We agreed at our meeting that my officials will continue to work with yours. We wish to ensure that your consultation outcomes take into account all that devolved and local Government can offer to develop a sustainable postal network in Scotland fit to take us forward into the 21st century.

I am copying this letter to the Secretary of State for Scotland, the Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform and Ian McKay, Director of Scottish Affairs, Royal Mail Group, Brunswick Road, Edinburgh.

Letter to Pat Watters, President of CoSLA

I am writing to update CoSLA and Scottish local government on the latest situation.

I have noted the CoSLA response to the DTI Consultation on the PO Network of 5 February 2007. Following on from my statement to the Scottish Parliament on 23 May, I had a meeting with Post Office Limited (POL) and the Royal Mail Group (RMG), including the Director of Scottish Affairs, Ian McKay.

I have subsequently written to RMG, stressing the need for full and transparent statements, as early as possible, regarding the process and evaluation criteria. RMG stated that this round of surveys would be undertaken "on the ground", rather than being solely map-based.

I think that this represents an opportunity for councils, as community planning partnership leads, to take the initiative and become fully involved as early as possible. There is an advantage in making the clearest possible linkages between the survey work by RMG and the local knowledge and experience gained through the ongoing community engagement work of all CP Partners.

In addition, RMG mentioned that Post Office Ltd were in the process of developing more dynamic products specifically for local authorities. As I said to the Scottish Parliament I want to encourage local authorities and other service providers to become involved in examining the excellent examples of innovative practice we have already seen across Scotland in order to sustain or extend the range of post office coverage throughout Scotland. Whether this would involve councils considering revising existing service delivery plans in light of any emerging developments in service options from RMG would, naturally, remain an issue for local decision.

I have encouraged RMG to approach CoSLA with full details of the timings and processes involved for the consultation and also to provide CoSLA with further information on these services. I hope this is helpful. My officials will continue to liaise with both RMG and the newly-named Department for Business, Enterprise & Regulatory Reform, although Schedule 5, section C11 of the 1998 Scotland Act (inter alia) is explicit in setting out our current powers in this regard.
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