Bungling posties deliver GCHQ post to Echo

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Bungling posties delivered confidential letters intended for GCHQ staff to the Echo offices in Cheltenham.

Twice this week, the paper's headquarters in Clarence Street received On Her Majesty's Service corres- pondence to individual workers in Personnel Security.

On Tuesday, receptionists were handed one of the brown envelopes, and on Wednesday they got two.

Twice, staff from the Benhall listening post have been sent out to personally collect the post for fear it would be misdelivered again, identifying staff members and their secret work, or go missing altogether.

A GCHQ spokesman said: "It is of concern that letters intended for GCHQ are being delivered to the wrong address.

"We will follow this up with the Royal Mail and review this incident. We will take any action necessary."

Royal Mail has apologised for its mistake.

A spokeswoman said: "We apologise that this has happened again. We are recovering the mail so we can establish how these items have bypassed the checks we have in place.

"With the service used in this case, items are sorted in a slightly different way to ordinary mail, which may account for the problem, but we need to check this out."

But Paul Trehearne, Gloucestershire's branch secretary for the Communication Workers' Union, blamed a cut in trained staff in Cheltenham and a reliance on casual and untrained workers who are drafted in to make up the shortfall.

He said: "Mistakes happen because of this. Whether or not this is intended for GCHQ, someone has paid for the item to be delivered and for the Royal Mail service. Anyone who does so should expect the mail to reach its destin- ation."

In May, postal workers at Cheltenham's Swindon Road depot said morale was at an all-time low because of staff cuts, route changes and "infuriating" efficiency drives like not being able to sit down while sorting mail.

Since then the Echo has heard from several Cheltonians complaining about missing mail, including one woman who missed the deadline to accept a university place because her offer letter had been delivered to the wrong flat.

One resident called a meeting with Ian Tyrrell, the Swindon Road sorting office boss at the time, who has now left.