EU postal Lib - Allowing state funding for USO

[deadbox]

Somewhere in this LONG doc. there are some words of encouragement for us all, inc. provision for GOV. funding to maintain the USO.

No wonder AL wanted his plans to privatise in place asap before all this hit the press.....He doesn't want the state interfearing in HIS company ( Yeah I know, I thought that the GOV. owned RM and that Allan was just an employee too -- But in HIS LITTLE WORLD he thinks he is king )

As I said, this is LONG

PS.- Even wee Adam gets a mention.......
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Postal services liberalisation[fr][de]
Published: Thursday 1 February 2007 | Updated: Tuesday 28 August 2007

The EU is entering the final stages of a 15-year process to make European postal services more efficient by opening them up to competition. But member states will first have to overcome differences of opinion regarding the speed of liberalisation and how to achieve a universal service for consumers.
Related:

* News
* LinksDossiers

* Postal liberalisation set for delay (31 May 2007)
* Parliament votes to delay postal liberalisation (12 July 2007)
* Postal reform comes under Parliament scrutiny (10 July 2007)
* MEPs agree two-year mail-reform delay (19 June 2007)

* Financing Universal Service for mail delivery (18 June 2007)

Latest & next steps:

* 11 July 2007: EP adopted a compromise agreement in a first reading vote in plenary.
* 1 October 2007: Next Transports, Telecommunications and Energy Council.

* OEIL:external
* PreLex:external

Policy Summary Links->
Background:

The postal sector is of major economic importance, affecting the competitiveness of other sectors, generating an annual turnover of approximately 1% of EU GDP, and providing employment to around 1.7 million people.

Efforts towards reforming the postal market began in the early 1990s, as part of the push to create a European single market. The aim was to:

* get national monopolies to open up to competition in order to make postal services cheaper, faster, more efficient and more innovative – similarly to what was done in the telecom and energy sectors;
* harmonise performance across member states;
* improve the quality of cross-border services, and;
* respond to the rise in electronic alternatives to mail, which many feared would lead to a decline in physical mail volumes, although in reality, domestic letter post volumes have remained stable since 2002.

The first Postal Services Directive, adopted in 1997 (97/67/ECexternal ), and a second one, adopted in 2002 (2002/39/ECexternal ), succeeded in opening up a number of postal services, including the delivery of parcels and express services, but stopped short of imposing competition for the delivery of letters weighing less than 50 grammes.

Incumbent operators were entitled to hold onto this so-called “reserved areaâ€

[nelson]

[quote]Adam Crozier, CEO of the UK’s Royal Mail, said that despite his original reluctance to liberalise postal markets, he now strongly believed that competition is both good for the company and the consumer. “In three years, Royal Mail went from being a loss-making operator to a profit-making one,â€

[somerset]

I think the EU big operators in the postal market our wetting themselves now.They have seen what has happened here in the uk when :cfo bought it in before everyone else? It's not competition at all.It's just cherry picking at it's best.