Current Affairs 2023

[Onelife]

I've recently had a cataract removed (other eye due on Friday). It made a huge difference to my vision. Mind you the cataract didn't really affect my driving. I could see anything bigger than a bike.

It helps if you have poor hearing as well…didn’t see or hear a thing, guv.

[barney]

I see the Privacy Poster Boy is ruffling feathers again.
Respect My Privacy
His world privacy tour is back on track.
Content needed for his reality show.
The Only Way Is Sussex.

[Mervyn and Trish]

Can't think who you mean

In other news I see Royal Mail is threatening to go into administration if it can't get the pay deal it wants with its staff.

So my idea.... let's renationalise it. Since it is effectively worthless no compensation to shareholders needed. Re-emerge it with the Post Office, as it was previously, and run it all as a public service. Novel eh?

[david63]

let's renationalise it

Technically we cannot "renationalise" it as it was never nationalised. Royal Mail, as it is now, along with what is now BT were all part of the Post Office which at that time was actually a government department.

[Mervyn and Trish]

Well that's what I meant.

[Onelife]

In the right hands privatisation has its place but in the wrong hands profit driven systems inevitably work for the private investor and not for the public service…there are many instances where CEO get paid extortionate amounts of money for overseeing poor public services…we then have the down right greedy private investors who take the profit at the expense of the service.

And you wonder why I have lost all faith in a political system that allows this to happen.

[Mervyn and Trish]

Well that's what I meant.

My Dad worked for them for more than 40 years, I remember it well but was simplifying for the less informed.

[barney]

The reason for existence of the Royal Mail was to deliver letters and parcels.
Since privatisation, the reason for existence is to make a profit.
It was quite obvious what would happen.

[towny44]

The reason for existence of the Royal Mail was to deliver letters and parcels.
Since privatisation, the reason for existence is to make a profit.
It was quite obvious what would happen.

I dont believe it ever made a profit for the post office but as a govt dept its losses were paid for out of taxes,so perhaps it's not surprising its now heading for administration.

[oldbluefox]

there are many instances where CEO get paid extortionate amounts of money for overseeing poor public services…

We have a good many examples of that OL......too many, and it is the general public who suffer

[barney]

The reason for existence of the Royal Mail was to deliver letters and parcels.
Since privatisation, the reason for existence is to make a profit.
It was quite obvious what would happen.

I dont believe it ever made a profit for the post office but as a govt dept its losses were paid for out of taxes,so perhaps it's not surprising its now heading for administration.

Not correct John.
The Royal Mail regularly turned a profit when in public ownership.
Even up to a couple of years ago, it turned a substantial profit which was primarily paid out to shareholders, thus leaving it cash poor.
Seriously bad management since it was privatised.
The CEO has done ok though.
I relished him getting ripped a new one at his recent parliamentary committee hearing.
The level of incompetence was truly astounding.

[Stephen]

Can't think who you mean

In other news I see Royal Mail is threatening to go into administration if it can't get the pay deal it wants with its staff.

So my idea.... let's renationalise it. Since it is effectively worthless no compensation to shareholders needed. Re-emerge it with the Post Office, as it was previously, and run it all as a public service. Novel eh?

Good.
The current service, or should I say lack of is rubbish, so let someone else take over that can do the job as it’s supposed to be done. At the moment they seem to be concentrating more on parcel deliveries and pleasing themselves on what day they feel like delivering mail.

[david63]

One of the biggest problems over the years with Royal mail, and previously the Post Office, has been with the unions who have the Royal Mail over a barrel. The Royal Mail charter states that they have to deliver mail to every address every day (there are a few exceptions) which results in tying the hands of management and making efficiencies somewhat difficult.

I remember many years ago that there was a dispute with the posties who wanted a five day working week, which they eventually got but as soon as they got the five day week it was then all about how much overtime they could get for working six days a week!

[barney]

Just think back a few years before privatisation.
We got two deliveries a day.
The first was mandated to be before 9.00am and then a second delivery.
Boxes were cleared two or three times a day.
Every address in the U.K. got a service at the same price.
Lands End to the Shetlands.
You generally had the same postie every day and knew him or her. They knew what to do if you was out.
It was all about the service which was 1st class delivered the next day at a 96% success rate.
Second class was 2/3 days.
Posties would be disciplined if they fell short of the expected service level.
Then the government decided to raise a few bob by selling it off.
The rest is history and it now looks like they will have to take over again, unless we accept the absolute demise of Royal Mail.

[Mervyn and Trish]

And in those days you didn't have to sell a kidney to buy a first class stamp!

[Stephen]

I think you’ll find it’s now a kidney and a leg, that’s if your daft enough to buy a first class stamp.

[screwy]

No good complaining about shareholders. A lot of shareholders are/ were posties.

[paultheagle]

We can go several days without a delivery, at Christmas it was nearly 3 weeks. I've missed a couple of hospital appointments because I didn't get the letter. When they do deliver an amazing amount of letters, brochures and rubbish comes through the letter box. So the post is just sitting in the sorting office with no one to deliver it.

They need sorting out.

[Mervyn and Trish]

I think you’ll find it’s now a kidney and a leg, that’s if your daft enough to buy a first class stamp.

Makes you hopping mad!

[Frank Manning]

Just think back a few years before privatisation.
We got two deliveries a day.
The first was mandated to be before 9.00am and then a second delivery.
Boxes were cleared two or three times a day.
Every address in the U.K. got a service at the same price.
Lands End to the Shetlands.
You generally had the same postie every day and knew him or her. They knew what to do if you was out.
It was all about the service which was 1st class delivered the next day at a 96% success rate.
Second class was 2/3 days.
Posties would be disciplined if they fell short of the expected service level.
Then the government decided to raise a few bob by selling it off.
The rest is history and it now looks like they will have to take over again, unless we accept the absolute demise of Royal Mail.

Sounds like a recipe for nationalisation to me. There are plenty more examples of the folly of selling off the family silver for free market dogma purposes which have been a blank cheque for executives to line their pockets while providing poor service.

[Ray B]

The time may be ripe to look at nationalisation for some industries. Look at the railways, contractor finds it can not maintain a service and the Government takes it back, turns it around, and then puts it back out to the private sector. In the old days of British Railways, they inherited a lot of dead wood that lived in the past from the top down to platform workers who had thier job to push a trolly another worker to load it and another to put on the train. No flexibility.
Now all that has gone and with proper incentives maybe a new public sector with the correct management would work

[towny44]

The time may be ripe to look at nationalisation for some industries. Look at the railways, contractor finds it can not maintain a service and the Government takes it back, turns it around, and then puts it back out to the private sector. In the old days of British Railways, they inherited a lot of dead wood that lived in the past from the top down to platform workers who had thier job to push a trolly another worker to load it and another to put on the train. No flexibility.
Now all that has gone and with proper incentives maybe a new public sector with the correct management would work

If modernisation of labour practises on the railways was as you quote Ray, then what have the unions and employers been arguing about for the last 12 months?

[Mervyn and Trish]

Dear Asylum Seeker Supporters

I am sure you are full of best intentions, but before you complain about the facilities in which those who are seeking asylum are housed please look around you.

The facilities may not be luxurious but if those occupying them are genuine refugees they are fleeing far worse and are now being safely housed and fed at the expense of the UK taxpayer.

Many of those paying those taxes are living in poor accommodation, far worse than a hotel room, and many are cold and hungry.

So when you campaign for better facilities for refugees spare a thought for those footing the bill.

Thank you.

[screwy]

Those facilities were good enough to house our military.

[Mervyn and Trish]

Those facilities were good enough to house our military.

Quite so and, in the case of the hotels being used, for paying guests!