Lib Dems attack Labour double standards on post office closures

3.47.42pm BST (GMT +0100) Tue 13th Jul 2004

Liberal Democrats on Islington Council have attacked Labour politicians' double standards over the recent wave of post office closures announced recently.

Following the decision to close branches in Copenhagen Street, Amwell Street and St.Peter's Street, Islington South Labour MP, Chris Smith, said he would fight the plans and was opposed to the closures. However, Islington Liberal Democrats have uncovered that on at least two occasions, Chris Smith has voted in Parliament in favour of their plans to close 30,000 post offices across Britain.

Islington's former Labour council group leader, councillor Mary Creagh, is also on the record as saying that post offices were not an important issue and that the Council should not waste its time looking at how it could give post offices more business. Labour's deputy leader said that the Government was right to prioritise rural post offices over urban ones.

Liberal Democrat Executive Member for Sustainability, Councillor Bridget Fox, said:

"For Labour to now pretend they are opposed to post office closures in Islington is hypocrisy in the extreme.

"The cat is now out of the bag. Chris Smith failed to vote against post office closures when he had the chance. Labour councillors have consistently failed to support Liberal Democrat moves to support local post offices in their slavish support for anything this government does.

"Liberal Democrats will not let local people forget just how two-faced Labour is being if they now try to wriggle off the hook and spin themselves as opposing post office closures. Only the Liberal Democrats have consistently opposed post office closures in Islington and only the Liberal Democrats."

The Facts

Islington South Labour MP Chris Smith voted against an opposition motion in Parliament debated on 13th January to review the post office closure programme and voted with the government in favour of the Post Office closure programme. Labour's former Islington Council group leader Mary Creagh said in a council meeting during a Liberal Democrat motion on local post office closures: "I think the Government have got better things to do". Their Deputy Leader, Richard Greening, added that "the Government are right to prioritise rural post offices over urban ones". The Post Office's consultation on the proposed post office closures in Islington South & Finsbury ends on 12th August.