Small mail centre.

Post by **fmrPOSTIE** » 31 Oct 2008, 21:14

All this talk of hiving off DO's and competing Mail Centres is crap, quite frankly.

Royal Mail is publicly owned by the Govt. and in order for this "privatisation" to take place (i.e. the fragmentation of it) there would need to be primary legislation. A vote in the commons & the lords.

Post by **TrueBlueTerrier** » 01 Nov 2008, 12:04

Welcome fmrPOSTIE - I think your right, if Labour stay in power at the next GE I think we should be fairly safe as it would be political suicide if they broke up or part privatised RM. However, if the Conuservarites get in then our time as a Government owned business will be quite short, or at least under a lot of pressure.

Post by **fmrPOSTIE** » 01 Nov 2008, 13:45

TrueBlueTerrier wrote:Welcome fmrPOSTIE - I think your right, if Labour stay in power at the next GE I think we should be fairly safe as it would be political suicide if they broke up or part privatised RM. However, if the Conuservarites get in then our time as a Government owned business will be quite short, or at least under a lot of pressure.

Cast your mind back to the 90's when the then Tory Government tried to privatise Royal Mail & Parcelforce, they couldn't get it through even in power. I hate to say it but Royal Mail needs to amalgamate some of the mail centres to become more efficient. The union shouldn't be opposed to this as nobody will be forced out. Super Mail centres are the way forward.

I know this will be unpopular but I believe Parcelforce should be sold off as it plays no part in the USO. Governments should not be owning parcel companies, in my opinion. The money raised should go towards maintaining PO's in the public sector, along with Royal Mail.

axeman · Post by **axeman** » 01 Nov 2008, 19:05

What hapoens in the event of power failure or other circumstances where the machinery is prevented from running for lets say a period of 1 hour or perhaps a few hours at the super mail centre ? if it's a broader or a more widespread operation then less likelyhood of masive amount of mail not reaching it's destination on time. But if the super duper mail centre goes tits up then boy your problems are a lot larger are they not ....but of course the machines never breakdown do they

Post by **kingtubby** » 01 Nov 2008, 19:40

axeman wrote: ....but of course the machines never breakdown do they

No, that's absolute an impossibilty

I think that there should be one huge super mail centre with a giant all-singing, all-dancing, and all-sorting mega machine that only requires one operator to press the on and off button - and of course I'm the obvious candidate for that job

...and if it breaks down, well I'm sure that with the publics reduced expectations it shouldn't be a big problem...

Tman · Post by **Tman** » 02 Nov 2008, 09:46

="

axeman"]What hapoens in the event of power failure or other circumstances where the machinery is prevented from running for lets say a period of 1 hour or perhaps a few hours at the super mail centre ?

Easy answer Agent Yorkie, is that the standby generator starts up....

if it's a broader or a more widespread operation then less likelyhood of masive amount of mail not reaching it's destination on time. But if the super duper mail centre goes tits up then boy your problems are a lot larger are they not ....but of course the machines never breakdown do they :shock

They do, regularly, and that's why there's always spare capacity built-in.

Simple, isn't it?

Post by **fmrPOSTIE** » 02 Nov 2008, 10:42

Absolutely right, you can still have super mail centres and machine redundancy in place to cope with any failures. Every other private company or large national company goes through rationalisation plans to make them more efficient & to keep costs down, so should Royal Mail.

To give you an example, Portsmouth Mail Centre is a huge city centre site, consisting of 5 floors. Yet floors 4 & 5 are virtually un-used and have been for 6 years!. Is this good use of buildings???

Tman · Post by **Tman** » 02 Nov 2008, 12:54

Problem with Portsmouth is that it's one of the last (if not the last) multi-floor MC, so has to rely on possibly unreliable lifts to transport the mail internally.
Shame really, as when it opened it was seen as a model for other MCs to base their designs on.

BELIAL · Post by **BELIAL** » 02 Nov 2008, 16:48

Tman wrote:Problem with Portsmouth is that it's one of the last (if not the last) multi-floor MC, so has to rely on possibly unreliable lifts to transport the mail internally.
Shame really, as when it opened it was seen as a model for other MCs to base their designs on.

They do, regularly, and that's why there's always spare capacity built-in.

Simple, isn't it?

Tman · Post by **Tman** » 02 Nov 2008, 17:17

Good to see you've forsaken the pycho-babblers for once, and quoted someone sensible, Bell....

BELIAL · Post by **BELIAL** » 02 Nov 2008, 18:58

Always a pleasure to highlight your clock ups, sorry cock ups

axeman · Post by **axeman** » 02 Nov 2008, 19:53

The generators at my local mail centre are just about on the limit running the lighting... especialy in these dark months ahead.... theres no chance of them being able to handle the extra voltage to run the machines lets not forget most machines run three phase 415v

Thats why they beg night sorters to stay back when this hapens hope the night staff now enter the spirit of things and next time tell them to **** off

Tman · Post by **Tman** » 03 Nov 2008, 07:45

BELIAL wrote:Always a pleasure to highlight your clock ups, sorry cock ups

Still carrying old wounds I see, but I don't get the "clock" reference.
Perhaps I should have asked where the spare capacity could be found in a lift?

Tman · Post by **Tman** » 03 Nov 2008, 07:50

"axeman"]The generators at my local mail centre are just about on the limit running the lighting... especialy in these dark months ahead.... theres no chance of them being able to handle the extra voltage to run the machines lets not forget most machines run three phase 415v

Agent Yorkie, you're commenting on things you very obviously know nothing about, and although that may be a common occurrence, it's best you keep quiet..

Big Daz · Post by **Big Daz** » 03 Nov 2008, 17:24

niallm wrote: How long does our leadership think it is right to pay the "red" tories. Billy Hayes still thinks its right even though he is rightly scared of the prospect of a tory government. Why is he not then involved in a major fight against his own party and the torys. Billy, It is time to step up to the mark and stop worrying about your 100k plus salary, same is true for Dave Ward(major disappointment, think the b***s fell of you). Who do you represent, the Labour Party, yourself or the members who elected you and pay your wages? If you live in an area that has them, Vote Respect

Billy Hayes is vice chair of the Labour Party National Policy Forum the chair is Pat Mcfadden minster of state for postal servcies.

Dave Ward stood down as the CWU rep on the Labour NEC due to the treatment of RM by the Government,

As for respect there are alternatives such as the Green party.

Green MEP'S (only 2 in the uk) unlike Labour, Conservative and Fib Dem MEP'S have not supported the opening up of the European postal domestic markets. Green MEP'S also proposed in the EU parliment to allow postal services to be reserved for the domestic incumbent if a individual government wished to do that, again Labour, Conservatives and the Fib Dems voted against this!

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