Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Marie Fitzpatrick: Rural Women CEO on the NZ Post potentially reducing their delivery services

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Marie Fitzpatrick: Rural Women CEO on the NZ Post potentially reducing their delivery services · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: As rare as students in class, potentially mail boxes and
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: post offices. The Ministry for Business, Innovation and Employment is
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: proposing New Zealand post mail deliveries be cut to twice
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: a week. This is in towns and cities, rural areas
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: from five times weekly down to three, and reducing the
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: minimum number of postal shops from eight hundred and eighty
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: to five hundred. It says people are sending eight hundred
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: and thirteen million fewer male items than they were twenty
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: years ago. Maury Fitzpatrick is with Rural Women New Zealand.
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: She's the chief executive. She's with us Live this morning.
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: Good morning, Good morning Roan Marie. Nice to have you
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: on the show. You're obviously not on board with this.
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: That's a fair assessment. We're pretty still at the depth
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: of these cuts and it's really disappointing that New Zealand
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: posts abandoning its quality of service and putting commercial violulity
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: ahead at the needs of rural New Zealanders.
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: What is so crucial for rural kiwis that you need
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: five times a week instead of three.
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: Well, if it starters, there's an assumption that we do
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: everything online and for you and I who live in
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: a city, that's probably true. But in rural communities not
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: everybody has access to reliable, steady internet, or that internet
• 1:12
  Speaker 2: can be extortionately expensive if you have to result the
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: satellite or other things like that. So for some more
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: vulnerable rural communities, that really really has a significant impact
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: dropping from five days to two. New Zealand Posts recently
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: dropped from six days to five in rural communities and
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: that has already had a profound impact on those communities.
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: What impact has it had? What does it meant to people?
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: Well star, does people get more than just their post?
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: I think this consultation document focuses on male specifically and
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: excludes career parcels and things like that that New Zealand
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: Post delivers through its Career Post network. If you live rurally,
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: that happens in the same van, so it's not like
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: the Post is delivering my mail here in Wellington and
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: then I get my career packages every day regardless. Career
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: packages contain your insulin or important medication or important medication
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: for your animals if you're on a farm, for example,
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: having that cut to three days a week can be
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: really significant.
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: But wouldn't you just order more earlier.
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: Probably if he was looking about five days to sit
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: six days to five, but you know five days down
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: to three, and you know there's a detail, and that's
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: not necessarily proposing to be alternative days. It could be
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: consecutive days and then nothing for a week.
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Look, I have sympathy for you because and for
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: rural people because my family, some of my family lives
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: really and they chew my ear off about this. But
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: I just think if it's going to be that as
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: expensive as they say it is to maintain these services,
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: and it's kind of a no brainer, I don't know,
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: well it is.
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: And this is a state owned enterprise the State Owned
• 2:54
  Speaker 2: Enterprises Act, So this proposal is consulting on the deed
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: of understanding. But the state owned Enterprises has a number
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: of principles. One is that they need to be commercially viable, correct,
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: But there are other parts of those principles which are
• 3:07
  Speaker 2: ensure that these day don't enterprises exhibit a sense of
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: social responsibility and have a regard to the interests of
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: the community in which it's creating. And we just want
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: the government to consider the needs of rural communities as
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: well as the commercial viability of this organization and we
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: think there's a way to balance that better than this
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: proposal does.
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: Marie, thank you very much for your call. I can
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: see we're getting lots of feedback on this funne already.
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: Marie Fitzpatrick, the Royal Women, Sorry Rural Women, New Zealand
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: Chief executive. For more from early edition with Ryan Bridge.
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: Listen live to News Talks it be from five am weekdays,
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.