§ 1. Mr. Russellasked the Postmaster-General when the European Conference of Posts and Telecommunications Administrations last considered the speed and efficiency of the transport of mails between European countries.
§ The Assistant Postmaster-General (Miss Mervyn Pike)A sub-committee of the conference is currently studying the postal and allied customs procedures applied to parcel mails at post offices with a view to simplification and speedier treatment.
For the carriage of mails between post offices, individual postal administrations use those transport services, appropriate to particular categories of mail, which offer the earliest arrival times, and they make a point of keeping the services used under constant review. The speed and efficiency of those services are pri- 380 marily the responsibility of the transport undertakings concerned, but if my hon. Friend cares to let me have details of any instance in which he thinks mail transmission times might be improved I shall be glad to look into it.
§ Mr. RussellWhilst thanking my hon. Friend for that reply, may I ask hex whether she is aware that I have already given her some examples which she is very kindly looking into? Would she not agree that the mails between this country and Italy and between this country and France are apt to be very erratic and sometimes very slow, and in view of the speed of air traffic these days, does not the whole question want looking into?
§ Miss PikeI think that the instances which my hon. Friend has cited are instances in which the other postal administrations have, perhaps, been more to blame than us. It is difficult for us to improve their services, but I can assure my hon. Friend that we are doing our best to make our own services as efficient as possible.