Taku Yamasaki, policy chief of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, said Wednesday that it would be difficult to keep intact the three services of the Posts and Telecommunications Ministry.

His remark came after a public hearing during which policy chiefs of the LDP and its two smaller allies, the Social Democratic Party and New Party Sakigake, listened to calls opposing a controversial proposal to privatize the post office's "kanpo" life insurance and savings services.

The session was held in Tokyo and was sponsored by the ruling bloc. It came before a government blue-ribbon panel on administrative reform compiles its final report next week.

The Administrative Reform Council, headed by Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto, suggested in its interim report in September that the two services be privatized while mail delivery service be maintained.

During the hearing, a number of speakers said that the public wants to keep the services under post office jurisdiction because people have increasingly lost trust in commercial banks and securities firms. In making their claim, speakers cited the downfall of the bubble economy and recent revelations of a series of scandals involving the nation's leading financial institutions and "sokaiya" corporate extortionists.

Noriko Konya, chief researcher at the Japan Securities Research Institute, said the privatization plan would adversely affect the public. "Posts offices have provided the public with better services than private financial institutions," she said. "Therefore a majority of the public have chosen posts offices."

A number of public surveys conducted by national dailies have shown that a majority of pollees hope the three services will remain under the post office.