Ofcom is right to raise fears that unfair competition is damaging Royal Mail’s ability to deliver to every UK home for a set price. Competitors are creaming off profitable urban mail, while leaving expensive rural mail for Royal Mail to deliver. What a pity no one listened to me and my colleagues in the Post Office press office when we were warning of this nearly 30 years ago.
Again, no one listened 20 years ago, when competitors were allowed to start delivering letters. The then government threw Royal Mail to a pack of wolves without a thought for the universal service obligation, and the then regulator said the only issue for him was to make sure big business got lower prices. I heard him say so at a conference.
In 10 years, starting from the early 80s, the government plundered £1bn from the Post Office’s earnings before the business saw a penny go into its own coffers – and then they taxed that. Members of the trade and industry select committee didn’t even know, or perhaps care, that the Post Office was being taxed twice over. So let’s not have any hand-wringing by politicians saying this world-envied service that binds the country together is at risk. Crocodile tears count for nothing. They pawned the future of Royal Mail for short-term political posturing and free-market dogma.
Alan Whitt
Former chief press officer, Post Office
