Government must come clean on Post Office closures - Liberal Democrats

12.00.00am BST (GMT +0100) Tue 24th Apr 2007

Leader of the Liberal Democrats Menzies Campbell today accused the Government of attempting to hide the impact of its post office closure programme on local communities ahead of the May elections.

Speaking on a visit to a Post Office in Cuddington, Buckinghamshire, he demanded that the Government immediately come clean on its proposals so that the voters could judge them at the ballot box on 3rd May.

Post Office closure facts:

· The Government plans to close 2,500 post offices but has conveniently delayed its response to the consultation on the proposals from March until after the local elections

· Over 300 post offices close every year

· There have been 4,000 post office closures since Labour came to power and there were 3,500 closures under the last Conservative Government

· The highest number of closures were in the North West, the South East and London (full table below)

Menzies Campbell said:

"Communities up and down the country are deeply worried about losing their local post office and this government is deliberately concealing the details of the post office closures until after the local elections.

"The Government must come clean and produce details of its post office closures immediately.

"Labour and the Conservatives have failed to support this vital network. Only the Liberal Democrats have fully funded proposals for investing an extra £2 billion into the Post Office network."

Attacking the Government for taking services away from the Post Office, Liberal Democrat Shadow Trade and Industry Secretary, Susan Kramer MP said:

"The Government behaves as if the Post Office's decline is inevitable and nothing to do with them. But time and again - on pensions, road tax, television licences and passports - they have taken business away.

"Losing these services cost the network £168 million last year compared to an operating loss of £111 million. In other words, the value of lost Government business is more than the losses of the entire network'.

"This crisis is the fault of ministers, not technology or customers."