David Ruffley expressed concern this week at new figures published by Royal Mail on its performance in delivering letters. The latest performance results show that in the three months from April to June 2004:

• Only 89.7 per cent of first class letters in the Ipswich postcode area to addresses outside the area are delivered the next day- failing to meet the Post Office's target. This means that over 11 per cent of letters are not delivered on time.

• In addition, 92.8 per cent of first class letters sent to local addresses inside the postcode area fail to be delivered on time as well.

• Just 17 of the 118 postcode areas in the country are on target for delivering first class mail to outside their postcode area, explaining why much first class mail sent to Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket is late.

• Nationally, the Royal Mail failed all fifteen of its performance targets.

Mr Ruffley said:

'I am disappointed by these figures, which confirm local resident's and firms' suspicions that a lot of first class mail is not arriving the next day. Yet the Post Office is 100 per cent owned by the Government and Whitehall sets the performance targets, hence, the Government cannot escape its ultimate responsibility for the state of the Royal Mail network.

'In addition to many local post offices being under threat of closure, it is clear that the current state of the Royal Mail network is yet another public service let down from Labour.'