Profit alone isn't enough for Royal Mail

[TrueBlueTerrier]

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/b ... 289884.ece" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

David Wighton: Business Editor's commentary
It has been a while since the youthful BT has made less money that its venerable former parent, the Post Office. And Adam Crozier, Royal Mail Group's chief executive, had some rather more significant milestones to celebrate when he announced that all four of its businesses, including letters and the Post Office, were in the black for the first time in two decades.

The doubled operating profits of £321 million brought a predictable response from those who oppose the company's planned partial privatisation. If it ain't broke, don't fix it, they cried.

Except, of course, it still is broke, or close to. Cash is flooding out as it pours money into modernising the mail business and puts £800 million a year into the pension fund. Mail volumes fell by 5.5 per cent last year and are predicted to be down 10 per cent this year because of electronic competition and the economic downturn.

Royal Mail needs more equity, relief from its huge pension burden and fairer regulation. That is what the Government is offering with the highly controversial package of reforms.

Ministers also argue that the company needs access to fresh management expertise, through a new minority owner from the private sector. But, even if that were true, why not just buy it in?

The truth is that what the company really needs is to be set free from the constraints of public ownership to pursue the sort of radical change, not least in terms of relations with its workforce, that the likes of BT went through after privatisation.

It will surely happen. It is just a question of when.

[BELIAL]

Or in other words , no amount of profit will ever satisfy some , and the company needs to be freed from the unbearable constraint of paying its workforce the pension it contracted to .Even if they made £1,121 million profit this sponge would have written the same article but claimed that our massive pay packets were crippling RM

[k979aaa]

Or in other words , no amount of profit will ever satisfy some , and the company needs to be freed from the unbearable constraint of paying its workforce the pension it contracted to .Even if they made £1,121 million profit this sponge would have written the same article but claimed that our massive pay packets were crippling RM

Servitude of the masses by the few. :cfo :lfo :mfo

[smokerjim]

The phrase I really lothe in that article is

....The truth is that what the company really needs is to be set free from the constraints of public ownership....

To me it sounds like a clarion call to dismantle the USO :mfo :mfo :mfo

[BELIAL]

The phrase I really lothe in that article is

....The truth is that what the company really needs is to be set free from the constraints of public ownership....

To me it sounds like a clarion call to dismantle the USO :mfo :mfo :mfo

USO is going 2010-11 postcomm has approved Zonal pricing, thats the crack, all manner of milking will follow on. What a sweet carrot for the fat cats. Once that principal is established ,watch the floodgates open wide

[randompostman]

I thought postcomm was on the ay out?

[Big Daz]

I thought postcomm was on the ay out?

the change of regulator is in the postal services bill along with sell off and pensions.

If the bill goes down then the other aspects go down with it untill the government resseurect them as stand alone policies.

If and when ofcom take over they will be conducting a review of the postal serices sector with a start date of changes from that review being 2012.