Privatisation is the only solution for Royal Mail

[TrueBlueTerrier]

http://www.spectator.co.uk/columnists/a ... oyal-mail/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

We have had a very high failure rate in deliveries of the catalogues for Emily Patrick’s exhibition,’ says an email from the painter’s husband. ‘Over 50 per cent have been lost in the post or inexplicably delayed.’ Come to think of it, my own most recent Amazon order, allegedly dispatched a fortnight ago, hasn’t reached Yorkshire yet — and neither has last week’s Spectator, although a large envelope posted to me from Old Queen Street on Wednesday did arrive on Thursday, but without its contents. Have aliens seized the sorting offices, or have Royal Mail managers been distracted by a ‘secret 62 per cent increase’ in their bonuses, revealed this week?

That percentage turns out to apply to middle managers at £2,717 apiece, hardly a sum to froth about. Royal Mail chief executive Moya Greene (poached from Canada Post) banked a £371,000 bonus last year, taking her package to a provocative £1.1 million; but that’s barely half the bundle collected by her predecessor, known to this column as ‘Teflon-coated Adam Crozier’, who moved on in 2010 to run ITV leaving a chorus of disgruntled mail users behind him. And the three executive posts below Greene averaged packages of £760,000 last year, compared to as much as £1.4 million in the Crozier era. So what I called ‘the delusion that turns astronomical numbers into “the rate for the job”’ last time I wrote about Royal Mail pay has been partially shaken off — perhaps setting an example for another state-controlled problem business, Royal Bank of Scotland, where five of chief executive Stephen Hester’s top team are in line for £6 million of share awards under a long-term incentive scheme, in addition to Hester’s own £780,000 pot.

The key question in both cases, of course, is whether they are running significantly stronger businesses than their predecessors. It’s easy enough to tick that box for Hester, since the previous RBS regime left the bank in ruins. In the case of Royal Mail, however, the wider public is less interested in balance-sheet strength than in quality and price of service. And what they see is a limping dinosaur in retreat, missing delivery targets, pushing up stamp prices, closing village post offices, yielding to militants in its workforce, and failing at every turn to maximise the competitive advantages of its brand power and infrastructure. On that assessment, Moya Greene and her colleagues are still paid far too much.

Prospectuses in the post

These issues will come into sharper focus now that the resurgent stock market has put privatisation of Royal Mail and RBS back on the agenda. Business Secretary Vince Cable is reportedly promoting the idea of an RBS share gift worth up to £400 to every taxpayer as compensation for pain suffered these past five years — a new form of quantitative easing, you might say, with the merit of relieving ministers of the embarrassment of owning RBS, ahead of the 2015 election and sooner than would be the case if they waited for conditions to ripen for a conventional share offer or sale to a single buyer. What’s more, if a portion of RBS were given to citizens, the residual state-held portion should rise in value by virtue of increased activity in the shares. So it’s not such a daft idea, but it would look like a blatant pre-election bribe — and one that would inevitably favour the Tories as the party of popular capitalism, rather than the Lib Dems. So if George Osborne starts to show enthusiasm, watch for a swift U-turn from Vince Cable.

Meanwhile, business minister Michael Fallon has inherited a filing cabinet stuffed with feasibility studies and covered with dents where previous incumbents have kicked it in frustration. It’s the one labelled ‘Royal Mail privatisation’, and it bears the boot-prints of, among others, Lords Heseltine and Mandelson. This is an industry with shining examples of postal services in Germany and Holland that have transformed themselves into successful global businesses, having adopted privatisation models pioneered in Britain for the sell-off of other kinds of consumer-facing public services. It’s astonishing that the Communications Workers Union and its Labour chums have been allowed to thwart every proposal to date (even with the promise of generous share giveaways to postal staff) for a partial sell-off, trade sale or commercial partnership with a European operator. Royal Mail will only ever shape up as a real business when one of those options is finally allowed to happen; let’s hope Mr Fallon finds the key to the cabinet.



This article first appeared in the print edition of The Spectator magazine, dated 23 February 2013

[TrueBlueTerrier]

"As a company we are not in a position to deliver the post on time, particularly on Saturday and Monday,' TNT said in a letter to workers in The Hague region in Feb 2011". 90% of Post Offices shut since privatisation. Mail being sorted in garages - Oh yes Holland really is a shinning example.

[trythat]

"As a company we are not in a position to deliver the post on time, particularly on Saturday and Monday,' TNT said in a letter to workers in The Hague region in Feb 2011". 90% of Post Offices shut since privatisation. Mail being sorted in garages - Oh yes Holland really is a shinning example.

Couldn't have said it better!! I'm sick and tired of TNT being held up as the way forward, everything I've recently read about TNT is about what a crap company they are to work for, and even worse at what they are supposed to do - deliver things.

Where do these writers go to get their facts?

[craigyboy4677]

I don't think privatisation is the answer but i also dont believe being a service is the answer either. Running trucks to and from distibution centres half empty isnt the answer. Also i would say the majority of people working for royal mail are in their mid to late 50's counting down the days till their cushy pension or redundancy whatever comes first is going to cost a hefty amount of money, but i blame the unions for backing the company into a corner. Ive never seen a company run so much by the workforce to the point of going into meltdown. I f the workers werent on such a good wage then the price of a stamp wouldnt be so expensive and more mail would get delivered by royal mail instead of other mail/courier companies getting the business

[fishtank]

Also i would say the majority of people working for royal mail are in their mid to late 50's counting down the days till their cushy pension or redundancy

You would be wrong.
The largest grouping is 40-49,still a long way from the "cushy" pension and the vast majority are outside your mid to late 50's age range.

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[craigyboy4677]

Well im based in the south west and going by that table theres more people working for royal mail there than the whole of scotland and northern ireland put together and the theres quite a lot of over aged people on the books, not that im saying over 50 is a limit but theres not a lot in the 20-30 age range

[fishtank]

but i blame the unions for backing the company into a corner.

Do you actually work for us craigyboy cause that statement had me pissing myself....
Anybody inside the company knows that's bullshit.

[craigyboy4677]

i do on occasion through an agency and i have read the CWU noticeboards so i kind of have some sort of insight as to whats going on. The workers are trying to protect their jobs but management are trying to modernise the company so theres a bit of headbutting between the two, add to this falling volumes of mail and theres basically a standoff so when the management propose something that the workers dont like, the workers down tools and leave it to the union to try and sort out. Am i close???

[fishtank]

Am i close???

Not even warm mate,not even warm.

theres quite a lot of over aged people on the books, not that im saying over 50 is a limit

Over aged...50?
I laughed a lot at that one.
Put down the Daily Mail before you do yourself a mischief.

[TrueBlueTerrier]

i do on occasion through an agency and i have read the CWU noticeboards so i kind of have some sort of insight as to whats going on. The workers are trying to protect their jobs but management are trying to modernise the company so theres a bit of headbutting between the two, add to this falling volumes of mail and theres basically a standoff so when the management propose something that the workers dont like, the workers down tools and leave it to the union to try and sort out. Am i close???

Don't worry even though I think your views are naive you have at least one person in Royal Mail of CWU grade who probably believes the same. http://www.royalmailchat.co.uk/communit ... 18&t=50720" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The reason I say naive is because I empathise somewhat as I used to be of the same opinion before I worked for Royal Mail.

However the sad fact is that the RM corporate awareness team is a lot larger and more proactive than the CWU one and they get their message out a lot better and faster than the Union does. Plus most of the Newspapers in this country have not forgiven the Print Unions and lump all workers actions into the BAD column.

What I do find weird is that people who say Posties get paid too much hardly mention the millions Crozier got paid, or the fact that managers got multi thousand bonuses when our bonuses were valued at exactly £0 just last year.

There are many reasons why Industrial Relations in Royal Mail are so bad, and whilst the CWU may take some blame, a lot is never laid at managements door, despite 2 reports by Honourable Lords saying that RM management culture needs to change.

[craigyboy4677]

But thats the problem with royal mail,too many chiefs and not enough indians, the amount of shirt wearers i see with the manager hi viz vests on makes me laugh, maybe moya greene should look at that first and see how much money she can save there

[chooch]

But thats the problem with royal mail,too many chiefs and not enough indians, the amount of shirt wearers i see with the manager hi viz vests on makes me laugh, maybe moya greene should look at that first and see how much money she can save there

I'm sure the bean-counters have already run that one past her.. just a question of time.

[Sharkeyes]

The job will go FULL CIRCLE in the end. If not by Royal Mail, then by the many future Ex RM employees who will play these interfering political imbeciles at theiir own game when it all goes tits up. all we need is a 'leader' to start the ball rolling.
what am I on about you might ask?
In one day I delivered just under two grands worth postage on my wlak alone of which, more than half was what we once knew as INTRA mail, (Local to Local) or NDN (Neighbouring District Network) stuff. theres more than enough work out there in the local catchment area for us to sustain ourelves as self employed, yet working as a co-operative incompetition with the 'new privatised employer'. In essence, we can run a 'mirror business' in direct competition to the 'new employer' as well as existing competitiors because we have somethings that they don't,
Knowlege, Experience, skills, innovation, customer service focussed and dedication to the provision of service.
On the whole because of this, we also have the respect of business and domestic customers alike, they know that they can trust us, but the managers, senior ones in particular, well I doubt that they can ever have that same respect as we do, given their record of incompetant changes, mistakes and inflation busting bonuses for failure and mass wastage of money on pie in the sky ideas, from the school of ' We've already tried that one years ago and it didn't work then, then so why not try it agian now.'

[borders]

i do on occasion through an agency and i have read the CWU noticeboards so i kind of have some sort of insight as to whats going on. The workers are trying to protect their jobs but management are trying to modernise the company so theres a bit of headbutting between the two, add to this falling volumes of mail and theres basically a standoff so when the management propose something that the workers dont like, the workers down tools and leave it to the union to try and sort out. Am i close???

i work in the south west and and would like to know when the workers last downed their tools, care to enlighten us ? i am also over 50 ,and can complete my duty just as competent as any other age group. my cushy pension as you call it , has been earned. it is deferred wages and as it has recently been changed , will not be as cushy as it might have been.
however , what i do know having spoken to agency workers , is that they are appallingly treated by their agency and abused by RM expecting them to turn up at a whim. hence the need for a Union to fight for workers rights. i believe that some permanent jobs were offered to agency workers but not everyone was accomodated which pissed a lot of them off.
we all need permanent, full time work to participate somewhat in this society , so i have sympathy for agency workers .