The Guardian editorialises:
If ministers get their
way, our postal services will be sold off within a year. Details of the privatisation are taking
shape: Goldman Sachs and UBS will be in charge of a consortium of
investment banks providing advice in return for hefty fees (even if business
minister Michael Fallon considers £30m "speculation", his letter
to this paper yesterday did not rule out the sum); provision has been made for postal workers to enjoy a £300m stake;
and the Royal Mail's chief
executive, Moya Greene, is touring North America in the hope of rousing foreign
buyers.
Yet with the resolution
of these second-order questions, the biggest one becomes harder to answer: why
is the coalition flogging Britain's postal network? The traditional reason for
flogging the service was that it was a financial basket case.
Not any more: annual profits are up over 60%. Last year's whopping rise in stamp prices, and the dumping of the mail's pension liabilities on the government books, means that the entity now looks enviably stable. So what would a sale add?
Not any more: annual profits are up over 60%. Last year's whopping rise in stamp prices, and the dumping of the mail's pension liabilities on the government books, means that the entity now looks enviably stable. So what would a sale add?
Hawking a recovering
organisation before the next election will not raise bumper sums for the
Treasury. But it probably means that stamp prices will keep rising and the
service will get worse (imagine what rural deliveries will be like come 2020).
The management is right to talk about the need for investment – but this could be done now, simply by the mail borrowing. There's no need for it to change hands. Privatisation of the mail increasingly looks like a policy without a purpose.
But remember, this was not the policy either of Labour or of the Conservatives at the last General Election. It was the policy of the Lib Dems. The party that The Guardian endorsed. Blame them. And blame it.
The management is right to talk about the need for investment – but this could be done now, simply by the mail borrowing. There's no need for it to change hands. Privatisation of the mail increasingly looks like a policy without a purpose.
But remember, this was not the policy either of Labour or of the Conservatives at the last General Election. It was the policy of the Lib Dems. The party that The Guardian endorsed. Blame them. And blame it.
But not political party has committed to renationalising it-and no political party opposes its privatisation in principle.
ReplyDeleteLabour is opposed to it in principle.
ReplyDeleteDon't pay any attention to the Blairite living dead. Even Progress no longer agrees with them about anything.
Wait for the matter to come before Parliament. We all know what will happen.
The question of renationalisation does not arise until there has been a privatisation. This one can be stopped.