Universal Postal Service Order: Rhondda

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the universal postal service order in Rhondda constituency.

It is a delight to see you in the Chair for the first time, Mr Henderson. Congratulations on your elevation—some have greatness thrust upon them. I should say that I am here as a Back Bencher, although I am quite often up against the Minister from the Front Bench. It is a different kind of arrangement today.

The universal service obligation, which is an essential part of delivering many public services up and down the land, says that there should be letter delivery six days a week, next-day delivery for first-class letters—which we all know are now quite expensive—and delivery within three days for second-class letters. I fully understand that recent years have been tough for Royal Mail. Letters are down from 14.3 billion in 2011-12 to 7.3 billion in 2022-23, and parcels are up from 2.6 billion in 2018-19 to 3.6 billion in 2022-23. It would be very easy for Royal Mail to conclude that its future lies in parcels, not in letters, but I want to say on behalf of my constituents in the Rhondda—I suspect that MPs from every constituency in the land would say the same—that the service they are getting at the moment does not meet the universal service obligation. That is a problem for individuals, our public services and our economy.

Let me talk through some of the issues that my constituents have faced. In the past three years, my office has dealt with a vast number of cases that have come in by email, letter and phone. We have created more than 100 individual pieces of casework relating to Royal Mail issues. All those cases share some very specific issues: sporadic arrival of mail, sometimes no mail at all received for weeks, and large bundles arriving at once. These are not people complaining that they are not getting any letters from anybody because nobody loves them; they are people saying they know a letter is due and it does not arrive, even when it has a first-class stamp on it. The most common complaint is late delivery, resulting in missed hospital appointments and fines.

These are not isolated locations in the Rhondda; the issue affects the whole of the constituency. It is a persistent problem that residents have been reporting since 2019. I have tried regularly to get to the nub of these issues with local managers. I am endlessly promised that they will be sorted, and they never are.

Of course, all my constituents are full of praise for their local postal workers, who deliver in rain and sunshine—I worry about sunshine because I have had melanoma and I know the dangers of skin cancer, so I want to make sure there is proper protection for postal workers. Many of the issues that postal workers face are the same ones that my constituents complain about.

Postal workers have told us about the following issues. There are not enough base staff to cover all rounds. Staff holidays and staff sickness come at peak times, making it impossible to maintain the USO. Management prioritises parcels over post—I know the Business and Trade Committee has looked at that closely. There is clear evidence that that is still happening, and it is problematic. Rounds are far too big and undeliverable. Vans are not large enough for parcels and the post, so postal workers have to go back to the sorting office and make multiple trips, and no overtime is offered for that.

I have met the Royal Mail management team at the sorting offices multiple times, and they always say that it is a matter of staff sicknesses and that it is all going to be sorted next time, but it never is. I have also been told anonymously that staff are paid overtime to clear the mail before I get there so that when I arrive at the sorting office, it is all perfect and there is no mail waiting to go out, but once I have gone somebody gets back in the van and it goes back into the sorting office. If that is true, it is obviously a deliberate attempt to mislead the Member of Parliament, and I am sure the Minister would want to condemn it.

I will just go through some of the specific cases we have had—

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Yes, I can—I think it is fine.

As long as it is to do with the Rhondda.

Absolutely. I commend the hon. Gentleman for bringing forward this issue; he is right. Does he agree that there must be a greater obligation under the universal postal service order for availability in rural areas? I understand that that is an issue for him too. There is no substitute for a full-service post office, and those obligations should be clearly defined in law. I think the hon. Gentleman is pushing for that. If it were in law, that would be to his advantage and to everybody else’s too.

To be honest, I just want to get it sorted in my constituency. I want Royal Mail to do the job that it is required to do by law already, and I just do not think that that is happening. I suspect that 650 MPs could give exactly the same story.

Let me give one instance. Nicola Thomas wrote to me about the delivery of letters from the local health board:

“I received an invite to book an appointment, a reminder of that invitation, and a letter saying ‘we’ve removed you from the list because we haven’t heard from you’ all in the same delivery.”

That is clearly a nonsense.

Another resident told me that all her mail takes over three weeks to arrive. She received a letter on 15 April that was dated 19 March. She is disabled. She has had numerous hospital appointment notifications that have not arrived on time. When she called the hospital to apologise for not attending, they say everyone is having the same problem, and I can confirm that. She has tried to call the clinic and sorting office. Nobody ever answers. She has tried calling the main headquarters. Nobody ever answers. Her postie told her that his boss at Clydach said that parcels take priority over letters. That is manifestly wrong. Her partner, who lives in Porth, where I also live, paid £70 to have their mail redirected, but the new tenant is still bringing letters to him. They have also tried to complain, but they can never speak to a human.

A resident in William Street in Ystrad said:

“We only get mail every 3/4 weeks, this has been an ongoing issue since last November. They’ve now stopped delivering parcels too. Royal mail have said there isn’t enough time for the post person to deliver to William street at all, with no plans to resolve the issue. I have to go to the sorting office in Ferndale if I want to receive any mail which is sometimes difficult with the restrictive opening hours.”

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

I think I am meant to take only one intervention in these short debates, if the hon. Member does not mind. I am not quite sure of my timing. Mr Henderson, you may want to remind me how much longer I should go on for—the Minister will always say, “Stop now”, but—[Laughter.] I heard that laughter over there.

Post matters. Letters matter. It is not just about appointments and fines but about banks. Quite often, they send out material that needs to get to the person in a timely fashion, including credit cards, bank cards and so on. That is all the more important now, because we do not have a single bank left in the Rhondda constituency, and several of the banks are now closing in Pontypridd. Any kind of physical contact with a bank might mean going down into Cardiff, which would be a considerable journey for many people in my constituency. Yet again, it is all the more important that we have a proper system.

Birthday cards also matter. It would be really nice if everybody in the Rhondda who was sent a birthday card with a first-class stamp got it on their birthday, rather than two or three weeks after. I cannot tell you how many constituents have told me how upset they have felt when no birthday cards have arrived at all, when they know that their family would always want to ensure that they arrived on time.

There are important things that Royal Mail needs to do. First, if it is true that it has been trying to obscure the problems it has locally, it should apologise, make it clear that it has done that, and not do it again. Secondly, it needs to employ enough staff to do the job properly, and it needs to value those staff, so that they feel enthused about coming into work, rather than feeling constantly battered into submission by a system that simply does not allow them the room to do their job properly. Thirdly, it needs to ensure that letters are prioritised and not treat them like second-rate citizens compared with parcels. Whatever Royal Mail’s future aspirations for the USO may be, I am not here to talk about that today. I simply want it to adhere to the USO today. That means first-class letters being delivered the next day.

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mr Henderson. Would you mind indicating what time we are due to conclude? I am a little bit lost.

We will finish at 4.54 pm.

I am very grateful, Mr Henderson.

I thank the hon. Member for Rhondda (Sir Chris Bryant) —I could not believe he is not a right hon. Member— for securing today’s important debate. I will touch on the specific situation in the Rhondda, as well as the wider situation. If I may, I will talk about the wider situation first.

Clearly, we recognise the points that the hon. Gentleman made. Mail is very important to our constituents for all kinds of different reasons, ranging from hospital appointments to cards and letters, which are very important to our constituents and will remain so. In the last financial year, all postal operators delivered around 3.6 billion parcels across the UK, and Royal Mail delivered 7.3 billion addressed letters—I will come to the point about prioritisation shortly. The hon. Gentleman did not directly refer to any changes in the universal service obligation; he wants to leave that for another day.

Order. The sitting is suspended for 15 minutes for a Division in the House. I will allow 10 minutes for each subsequent Division.