Canada Post’s plan to stamp out home mail delivery met strong local opposition Wednesday, but no one from the beleaguered Crown corporation was around to heed the message.
About 25 residents attended a forum at the city hall council chambers to show their support for continued door-to-door delivery in
Flin Flon.
“Flin Flon has lost enough,” Churchill MP Niki Ashton, who favours home mail delivery, told the forum.
Ashton joined Gord Fischer, national director of the Canadian Union of Postal Workers, at the head table for the union-sponsored event.
Between them sat an empty chair and a handwritten nameplate for Fred Pollard, a divisional general manager with Canada Post. Fischer said Pollard was invited to present Canada Post’s side of the story but was a no-show.
Fischer said home delivery is not a relic of the past but is “considered an essential form of communication” maintained by every other
G8 country.
Though Canada Post has already begun enacting its five-year plan to end almost all home delivery across the country, Fischer said the corporation has bowed to public pressure in the past.
Flin Flon Mayor George Fontaine hopes that can happen in this case. He told the forum the city stands behind any effort to preserve door-to-door service.
“We have one of the highest seniors’ components in the North in this community,” he said, referencing a segment of the population that is particularly worried about losing home
delivery.
Fontaine added that the city wants to retain the good-paying local jobs afforded by Canada Post at a time when jobs are scarce.
Flin Flon MLA Clarence Pettersen is calling for a continuation of home delivery as well, a message delivered to the forum by Alex McGilvery, president of the Flin Flon NDP Constituency Association.
Also weighing in was Harry Hobbs, a Flin Flon senior with a slight physical disability.
In a letter read to the forum by Fischer, Hobbs said he receives a high volume of mail and worries about snow buildup at the outdoor neighbourhood mailboxes that will replace home mailboxes.
“I really hope that Canada Post will reconsider the decision as it places undue hardship on seniors and people with disabilities, especially in parts of Canada with long, harsh winters,” wrote Hobbs.
In addition to ending home delivery in Flin Flon sometime by late 2018, Canada Post plans to open a privately run retail postal outlet in the community. No opening date has been announced.
While Canada Post says the outlet would be complementary to existing services, and offer residents the opportunity to pick up parcels at night and on weekends, Ashton is concerned.
“I think certainly we have to see on a case-by-case basis in terms of what they’re proposing, but I think in the current environment we live in, they’re looking at ways to cut the actual service,” she said. “So I really take the references to ‘complementary’ with a grain of salt.”
Fischer said Canada Post has used a retail outlet in Regina to eat into jobs and hours at the public post office situated across the street.
Fisher accused Canada Post of inventing a financial crisis to justify service cuts, saying the corporation has made over $1 billion in profits for the federal government over the last 20 years.
Canada Post has defended its decision to end home delivery, saying it is necessary for the continued viability of the corporation.
Canada Post will continue to offer home delivery in cases where someone has a mobility problem and a doctor’s note to verify it. Mail can also be redirected to an able-bodied family member.
