The Workers’ Party has condemned the decision of An Post to close the Cork Mail Centre at Little Island with the loss of 200 jobs

Workers’ Party Cork City councillor Ted Tynan said the closure of the Little Island facility is directly the responsibility of the government and made no sense from commercial, strategic or efficiency reasons.

Cllr. Tynan said the closure of the centre was a vote of no confidence in the region and a direct contradiction of the government’s strategic plan to increase the population of Cork to around 350,000. It would mean that local mail posted in Cork city and county would now have to travel to Portlaoise to be sorted before returning to Cork for delivery

He said it was further symptom of the government’s “hands off” attitude and allowing state and semi-state companies to operate on purely commercial grounds with a complete abandonment of An Post’s social role, saying “This can only further contribute to the closure of many more rural and suburban post offices  around the Munster region. It is also clear that privatisation of An Post is the ultimate aim here”.

 “The closure the Cork mail centre is a direct result of the ideologically driven de-regulation of mail delivery in Ireland at the behest of the government and the European Union.  So-called competition is assisting private operators with an anti-union and low-pay agenda to undermine and eventually take over the public postal service”.