MEDIA RELEASE - SENATE EVIDENCE DESTROYS FLETCHER’S FALSE CLAIM THAT POSTIES ONLY DELIVER LETTERS - 20 AUGUST 2020
20 August 2020
MICHELLE ROWLAND MP SHADOW MINISTER FOR COMMUNICATIONS MEMBER FOR GREENWAY
SENATE EVIDENCE DESTROYS FLETCHER’S FALSE CLAIM THAT POSTIES ONLY DELIVER LETTERS
. Paul Fletcher has falsely claimed front line postal workers “previously dedicated to delivering letters” are being liberated to deliver parcels, in a letter to Senator Fierravanti-Wells which misled the Liberal Senator on multiple fronts.
There is no such thing as a postal worker “previously dedicated” to delivering letters. Every postie delivers parcels on a daily basis, and has done so for years.
Don’t take our word for it, just examine the evidence given by Australia Post in 2018:
MR BARNES:Today we see nearly 45 per cent of all parcels delivered by posties. So when you think of the context of the letters declining at 10 per cent per year, that's been a big boost for our posties in keeping them busier out there. We expect to see that close to 50 per cent within a year and a half. Source: Senate Estimates, 23 October 2018. p55. Mr Barnes is the Executive General Manager of deliveries.
In other words: as letter volumes decline, posties are delivering a growing share of parcels every day of the week — up to 150 million parcels in 2019.
To repeatedly assert posties only deliver letters is both misleading and disrespectful to the thousands of posties who have been working harder than ever during COVID-19.
The Minister has repeatedly used this language to imply workers do not have enough to do — which is contradicted by every fact on the ground.
We have a Minister for Communications who does not know what postal workers do, or worse still, misleads about what he does know.
