Madam, Now that the closure of Herefordshire Post Offices has been confirmed it is important that the public know the real reasons why many thousands of them will have to travel longer distances to find a Post Office.

The European Parliament in Brussels passed a series of laws (they call them 'Directives') which opened our postal services to so called competition by taking away Royal Mail's monopoly. In effect this did not provide true competition because, while the Royal Mail has a legal obligation to provide a service throughout the British Isles to all addresses, at the same price, other companies do not.

Companies like TNT (Dutch) and Deutsche Post (German) only operate in the profitable areas making bulk collections in cities etc. TNT etc do not deliver this mail, Royal Mail is forced to deliver it for a loss-making small fee.

Royal Mail has, for nearly 150 years, operated at a profit without any burden on the taxpayer because its monopoly enabled it to off-set the many loss making rural areas, against the profits it made in the cities. The loss making areas are the remote country areas throughout mainland Britain and the offshore islands such as the Orkneys and Shetlands etc. Loss of sales of stamps for collection plus losses on deliveries has resulted in huge financial losses for Royal Mail. In order to keep going it has had to cut back on its services and put up prices.

The public will be outraged to learn that the MEPs of all three of our main political parties voted in the Brussels Parliament for this disastrous change. Further more because EU laws have precedence over British laws the Labour, LibDem and Conservative MPs rubber stamped the EU laws into British law in the House of Commons, without any protest. To make matters worse many large companies including Herefordshire County Council, the NatWest Bank, Lloyds TSB and Saga have given contracts to TNT for posting millions of their letters. We are all paying for this short sighted pursuit of a quick buck by the reduction of services and stamp price increases forced upon Royal Mail. The Government, at the taxpayers expense, gave a subsidy to Royal Mail. Now the European Union has passed another 'Directive' forbidding any subsidy after 2009. So that in future years Royal Mail will have to make further cut backs and price increases.

For nearly 150 years Britain has enjoyed the benefits of a postal service which was the envy of the world but this is being ruined by interference in our internal affairs by the European Union. I trust that when the elections are held for the European Parliament next year the public will remember that it was the three main political parties which voted for this disastrous state of affairs thus causing the previous 3,000 Post Office closures and the current round of another 2,500.

C N Burkett, Hereford