HC Deb 15 July 1960 vol 626 cc1882-8

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn. —[Mr. Gibson-Watt.]

4.1 p.m.

Mr. Ronald Russell (Wembley, South)

I wish to raise a subject which may be more simple and parochial than that which we have been discussing, namely the need for a Crown post office at Wembley Park in my constituency. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Assistant Postmaster-General for being present to answer the debate.

I am raising this matter, because I have had representations from the Wembley Chamber of Commerce and from business firms in the district. There are two sub-offices in the area, one at Wembley Park Drive and the other one in Grand Parade, Forty Lane, which is actually in the constituency of my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Wembley, North (Wing Commander Bullus). In the past these offices have done very good work and served the needs of the residential population and shopkeepers very well indeed, as do most sub-post offices in various parts of the country. But in recent years there has been a great change in the Wembley Park district.

Ever since the British Empire Exhibition of 1924 a trading estate has been growing up on the old Exhibition site. In the last three or four years more firms have erected office blocks in Empire Way, including Dunlops, Roger Malcolm, Kyle Stewart, and Kelvin Hughes, and Associated Rediffusion has a large studio there which presumably contains office accommodation also. There is a Crown building and Government Department in Wembley Way, which was opened a year or so ago, and there are offices as well as shops along Bridge Road. The Town Hall is also in the area, although of course that has been there since 1939. A large office block is to be erected on the corner of Bridge Road and Olympic Way, and it is proposed to build shops over the railway apposite Wembley Park Station.

All this is making a great difference to the office population of the area. I understand that some firms with offices in Wembley Park have to transact most of their postal business at the head post office in Wembley High Road, which is a mile away or at another Crown office in Preston Road which is about the same distance, because both the sub-post offices are congested with customers buying groceries and other things. These two sub-offices finish their working day early. They close, or at least the one in Wembley Park closes, at 5.30 p.m. whereas the main post office in Wembley High Road does not close until 6.30 p.m. Originally both sub-post offices were closed on Wednesday afternoon, which was a great inconvenience to the firms, but three weeks ago, thanks to the fulfilment of a promise made by my hon. Friend, the one in Wembley Park Drive began to stay open on Wednesday afternoon and close on Saturday afternoon instead. I am grateful to her for that.

I wish to make it clear that I am not in any way opposed to sub-post offices where they can handle the work and serve the public as so many thousands do throughout the country. I think that most hon. Members have received this week an attractive brochure from the National Federation of Sub-Post Masters setting out what they can do. It is much cheaper for the Post Office to use their services and it is beneficial to the shopkeepers concerned. Clearly, we want to maintain this system where it has done such splendid work, but it seems equally clear that there are districts where Crown post offices are necessary, and my business constituents are convinced that Wembley Park is one of them.

I wish to ask my hon. Friend what is the policy of the Post Office on the establishment of Crown post offices. There is one in Wembley High Road, which is mainly a shopping area with a certain amount of business property, one in Alperton, in Ealing Road, which is also a business area and to a certain extent a shopping and residential area, and one in Preston Road, in the constituency of Wembley, North, where the district is mainly shopping and residential. There is another in Kenton Road, still further away. Is it the policy of the Post Office to have Crown post offices in business areas, or could my hon. Friend say what the general policy is on the establishment of Crown post offices?

A suggestion has been made by my constituents that Wembley should have its own postmaster and cease to be a dependancy, so to speak, of Harrow, the idea being partly that that would add a little to its prestige as it is now a large borough and should, therefore, have its own set-up. I wonder what the position is in neighbouring boroughs such as Ealing, Hendon and Willesden. I wonder if each of those has its own post office.

The Post Office is no respecter of municipal boundaries. The north-west corner of my constituency is in the postal district of Harrow, but in other parts of it the address for letters is North Wembley although Wembley, South is the Parliamentary constituency. In still other parts the address is Greenford, which is in the Borough of Ealing. Some of the constituency of my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Wembley, North is in N.W.9, the London postal area. What is the policy about this? I think I am right in saying that most of these postal areas, certainly the London ones, have been unchanged for forty years. No doubt they work well, but is account taken of the building of new office blocks and the tremendous development which has taken place in that area of Middlesex since the end of the First World War?

These are all cases which ought to be looked into. I do not want to detain the House any longer than is necessary, but I ask my hon. Friend to reconsider the question of a Crown post office for this area. I do not necessarily expect a decision today, but this is an important matter to many of my constituents. The absence of such an office is causing a great deal of inconvenience and I hope the hon. Lady can do something to make the service more satisfactory.

4.8 p.m.

The Assistant Postmaster-General (Miss Mervyn Pike)

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Wembley, South (Mr. Russell) for the way in which he has put his case for a Crown post office at Wembley Park. I am sure that he knows very well some of the arguments, which I need hardly reiterate, but perhaps it would be useful to try to put the whole question into the national context by stating, first, the way in which we have to look at it.

Although my hon. Friend's main consideration is that of local needs, we have also to take into consideration national policy, about which he also asked. Our main consideration in all these matters is, first and foremost, to make certain that the general public has the service which it requires and the best service that we can give in all the circumstances. At the same time, we have to bear in mind economy. Although we are a national undertaking, we are a commercial undertaking which is trying to make all its service viable, and to that extent we look to commercial considerations.

Our general policy is to see what service can be given, whether it can be given by sub-post offices and whether, in the best interests of the community as a whole, sub-post offices should be established.

On the other hand, in the larger communities there are the Crown offices, but we do not have a hard and fast rule which lays it down that in one type of area there should be a Crown office and in another type of area a sub-post office. As my hon. Friend said, it is more economic al for us if we can provide these services by using sub-post offices. Very often in residential districts it is to the customers' convenience, too, because, although much of our activities consists of selling stamps and postal orders, the issue of pensions and allowances figures widely in our activities, too, and it can often be to the general convenience, we believe, to have our post offices in an area where people also do their shopping.

The Wembley Park area has a population of about 15,000. It is very sharply divided by the Metropolitan Railway line. I do not know the area as well as does my hon. Friend, but I understand there is to the North the Barn Hill area, which is largely a residential area, which has not been much developed in recent years and which at present has one shopping centre, and in the midst of which there is a sub-post office serving that community.

To the South of the railway line there is the Wembley Park area, which is more a business and commercial area. As my hon. Friend said, there has been recent development of commercial and business firms, which, I understand, is still going on, in that area. The area is served by a sub-post office, which is in the shopping part of it.

My hon. Friend mentioned that there had been changes, and the changes have taken place in that area. They have been in the industrial and business life, which requires not so much counter service in a post office as a good collection and delivery service. That is the main requirement of a business and commercial undertaking. In that context, I can assure my hon. Friend that the people in the Wembley Park area enjoy a particularly high standard of service. We have taken their needs into consideration, and they have a collection and delivery service which is of a particularly high standard by comparison with any other part of the London area.

Mr. Russell

Sometimes there is the question of registration. Will my hon. Friend deal with that?

Miss Pike

I quite agree. I think my hon. Friend will, however, agree that they have a particularly good delivery and collection of post.

If we establish a Crown post office in this area, having regard to the economic aspect of our undertaking, we should have to close the two sub-post offices which, I think he will agree, now give a very good service. if we did that we should have to make a decision whether to put the new Crown office in the north of the area or in the south. Wherever we put it, we should be denying facilities to some of the people who are at present particularly well served, and to that extent we should be giving a worse service to the community as a whole by establishing one Crown office in one part of an area than by the two offices which we have at present.

My hon. Friend says that these business people are at some disadvantage because the present offices close at 5.30 p.m. and they cannot do their registered business in an office near to their firms. The Crown office, however, is only three-quarters of a mile away. That may sound a long way, but on the whole these people will probably take their important and valuable registered mail by some form of transport. To that extent, therefore, I do not consider that they are at a great inconvenience—certainly not as great as that to which the general public would be put if they had to do with one Crown office instead of two sub-offices.

I would also point out that we could not justify a Crown office in this area. My hon. Friend mentioned three other parts of the borough where there is a Crown office, but each of those offices does more work than the two sub-offices concerned put together. Therefore, from the point of view of the amount of work we could not justify establishing a Crown office in this area.

The sub-post offices in question are very conscious of the service that they must give to the public. At present, they are both planning to increase the facilities within their offices. In the northern area—that is, the Barn Hill area—the sub-post office will be quite considerably re-furbished in the next month or two. The counter will be moved so that it is nearer the front of the shop. It will, therefore, add greatly to the convenience of customers. The counter in the Wembley Park sub-post office will be enlarged and the facilities thereby greatly improved. The type of service which is provided in both offices is of an extremely high order. The counter clerks doing the job are extremely efficient. From that point of view the people of Wembley Park can claim that they have a very good postal service in all respects.

I know how very much the Chamber of Commerce in Wembley would like a Crown post office from the prestige point of view, but we have to look at other considerations.

Mr. Russell

The desire for a Crown post office is not connected with prestige. There may be a certain amount of prestige in the request for a separate postmaster, but not in the request for a Crown office.

Miss Pike

I am sorry. My hon. Friend said that they would like to have a postmaster of their own. He asked me what the neighbouring post offices had in that respect. He mentioned Ealing, Willesden and Hendon. None of these has a postmaster. They are under a district postmaster, who is some miles away. In Wembley, there is the Harrow and Wembley postmaster. The joint postmaster is working from the Wembley area at present whilst his office is being reconstructed. There is no difference in service. There is no difference in his interest as between different parts of the community. At present, he is located in the Wembley area and works from offices in that part of his district.

Mr. Russell

Would there be more speedy delivery if there were a separate postmaster?

Miss Pike

No.

Mr. Russell

One idea held by my constituents is that it would speed up delivery.

Miss Pike

No. It would not make any difference to delivery. It would make no difference to the service in any respect.

My hon. Friend asked me if we took into consideration the changes in the postal districts in the vicinity. I assure him that we keep under constant review all the different changes. Our main aim is to give the most efficient delivery and collection service. I am sure that he will recognise that very often it is far better to follow the postal boundaries rather than the municipal or borough boundaries.

I assure my hon. Friend that we have looked into this case very fully indeed. We recognise the genuine desire of the residents to ensure that they have the best possible post office facilities in their neighbourhood. We believe that under the present arrangements they are getting just that. We believe that their interests would not be served by closing both these sub-post offices and bringing in a Crown office. On grounds of national economy and of the national picture as a whole, we have no justification for changing the present arrangements and acceding to my hon. Friend's request. I assure him that we are watching very carefully all the services in the vicinity.

I do not know whether it would be any help to the hon. Gentleman to have stamp machines placed outside the present sub-post offices to enable people who wanted to do so to buy stamps after the offices are closed. We are looking at everything we can possibly do, but we cannot possibly accept his request to establish a Crown Post Office at this particular time.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at nineteen minutes past Four o'clock.