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Royal Mail

During discussions on the Hooper package we were told time and again that there was no need for some of the reforms suggested in it because everyone was up for change. Yet since the Government said that we would not proceed with the Bill at this stage, we have seen not change but a return to the destructive pattern of industrial disputes over change and modernisation in the postal service. There was an opportunity for those who disagreed with the Hooper package to show that change could be delivered, but that opportunity has not been taken up; in fact, the very opposite has happened. On regulation, we will encourage a closer working together of Postcomm and Ofcom, because the postal service must be seen in the light of the wider communications market. To go back to the point made by the hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (John Thurso), there are alternatives, and we are all using them every day.