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Royal Mail

I will not, as many hon. Members want to speak in the debate, and Back Benchers are under a time limit. The regulatory proposals make sense. It plainly makes sense to transfer the regulatory responsibilities for Royal Mail from Postcomm to Ofcom. The change goes with other things, as Hooper says, but it makes sense in any event, as the relationship between Postcomm and Royal Mail has been fairly unsatisfactory. In addition, it no longer makes sense to deal with Royal Mail apart from the other responsibilities that Ofcom has. The pension question is, as the right hon. Member for Neath (Mr. Hain) says, very important. The Government have allowed the pension deficit to become extremely severe by the standards of any commercial organisation in the country. The report does not clearly recommend anything; it leaves options. However, it does say that the Government should address the growing pensions deficit.