Australia Post

The Hon. P. CAICA (Colton) (16:26): Today, I rise to speak about an ongoing issue my office has been having with Australia Post. In December last year, my staff lodged an electorate-wide mail-out of my quarterly newsletter along with a 2015 pocket calendar with the unaddressed mail service of Australia Post. My office began receiving a vast number of complaints from constituents claiming not to have received the newsletter and inquiring about the calendar—something they have come to expect in December throughout my 12 years as a member of parliament.

My staff followed due processes and lodged an inquiry with the unaddressed mail service at Australia Post to ascertain if there had been a problem with delivery. It was discovered that there had been an issue, that up to 12,844 articles may have been undelivered and that the undelivered articles were thrown away. As a result, Australia Post offered a replacement delivery for 12,844 articles and informed my office that the staff member responsible for this error was being monitored. I was informed that the unaddressed mail service had no way of tracking or recording individual deliveries and that it was impossible to ascertain how many, if any, of the 12,844 articles had been delivered, hence the offer to redeliver the maximum amount at a later stage.

Whilst I accepted the offer of a replacement delivery, I wrote to Mr Ahmed Fahour, Chief Executive Officer of Australia Post, expressing my concern that articles had been thrown away and requesting reimbursement for the production cost of the newsletter and calendar. As many in this house will know, newsletters and, more importantly, yearly calendars are a fantastic opportunity to connect with the entirety of your electorate. Whilst the financial loss to my office is significant—over $4,000 in fact—my disappointed constituents and the missed opportunity to communicate with them is a far greater loss to me.

I received a response to my letter to Mr Fahour, and I might note that this letter was sent via registered post from a Nicholas Wright. Mr Wright gave no indication in the letter as to who he was or why he was responding on Mr Fahour's behalf, and failed to acknowledge or comment on anything I had raised in my letter to the CEO. Instead, Mr Wright wrote of Australia Post's generosity and affordable prices, and insisted that just one street in my electorate had not been delivered to and that the letter from Australia Post's unaddressed mail service outlining the 12,844 articles unaccounted for was simply issued prematurely.

I wrote a second time to Mr Fahour, firstly asking who Mr Wright was, and respectfully requested further response from the chief executive, as the recipient of my letter. In my second letter, I once more asked direct questions: for example, why were undelivered articles thrown away? I questioned the volume of complaints I have had from my constituency and how that fits with the contradictory claim that only one street had been missed. I asked that, if it was impossible to recall individual delivery, how is it now possible to claim that only one street was missed? Given that my own house did not receive a newsletter or calendar, and that my house is not on the street claimed to have been missed, I questioned the validity of this claim.

Not only did Mr Wright once more respond to my second letter, my questions yet again were ignored. I am no closer to ascertaining who Mr Wright is. Mr Wright made no comment on Australia Post staff throwing away my product, gave me no indication of how it was decided that only one street was missed and once more reminded me of Australia Post's generosity, goodwill and affordability.

Australia Post, in my belief, have demonstrated extremely poor customer service, have failed to answer direct questions and are refusing to acknowledge the significance of a staff member throwing away correspondence from a member of parliament's office. Whilst I expect reimbursement for the loss this error by Australia Post has resulted in, my main concern is to have my queries responded to. My most recent correspondence to Mr Fahour has me asking for a third time for his comment on a range of points that thus far have blatantly been ignored by Australia Post. I would be more than happy to share with the house the thread of correspondence to those who are interested.

I do not begrudge him getting between $4 million and $5 million a year or whatever his salary is—he clearly deserves it—but I am not happy with the level of service that I have got. I have now written to the CEO three times and once to the Hon. Malcolm Turnbull, Minister for Communications, subsequently seeking assistance in investigating this series of events and have requested a formal response as soon as possible.

I am seeking the minister's support in advocating for the reimbursement of production costs particularly, as I am sure everyone in this house is aware that electorate office newsletters and calendars are at taxpayers' expense and, in this instance, the majority of my constituency has not received their product. I further understand in doing some investigations that yet another member of this house has had some difficulty with the performance of the unaddressed mail and there may be others, so I would urge those members, too, to take up those complaints. We do not need to be told how cost effective it is—that is why we are actually using it—but we expect to get the service that we are paying for and that is to have those articles delivered.