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Postal Services Bill

I welcome the Bill, which largely represents the policy that the Liberal Democrats went into the general election with. There are differences. Under our policy, the Government would have retained a stake, but we understand the problem of making this a very attractive sale, so that part of it has gone. Under our policy, share ownership for employees would have been larger, but the measure still represents the largest share ownership ever on record, so we can live with that. Another difference is the potential to mutualise the Post Office. That is right up our street as Liberal Democrats; it is Liberal Democrat-plus, so we welcome that. We have strongly maintained that the Post Office should never be sold and we hope that, under the new proposals, it will become stronger, thrive and even grow. The £1.34 billion announced today is extremely welcome.