By Denis Campbell

First they closed 2,000 small local Royal Mail Post Offices, now Postman Pat’s company is looking for a business partner to sell a minority stake. I wonder if he is still quietly smiling or has his blood pressure burst a vein?

The UK Government expects a £7 billion pound deficit in the Royal Mail pension plan this year, so they announced the sale of a stake in Royal Mail further disintegrating and breaking up the company. Dutch postal giant TNT expressed an interest in acquiring a minority stake and Business Secretary Lord Mandelson said he would also welcome other expressions of interest from other “credible partners”, should they come forward. So what am I bid on this aging relic?

Already reeling from upstarts TNT, Business Post, CityLink, DHL, UPS and newcomers FedEx, Big Red has been haemorrhaging cash using antiquated sorting and delivery systems, offering life-long employment and possessing a general loathing of efficiency or cuts. So they threatened strike action that would hold up payments to pensioners and others dependent on mail and have not as yet embraced computers, telephones or the Internet. 

The UK remains one of the EU’s only nations to still post and process millions of paper cheques using those bright red boxes and post offices. With the famous red telephone boxes soon to disappear for lack of use (most everyone has a cell phone) or vandalism, the icons are vanishing rapidly. Well sacred cows often make the best burgers and in this case there is not a cow more sacred then the Royal Mail.

Most every other nation has switched to electronic or Internet bank transfers for bill payment, but the pick-up/conversion rate is very slow amongst older Britons. If Obama complained about Middle America ‘clinging to religion,’ people here in the UK cling to their local Post Office counter. 

Predictably postal workers were displeased and in true 1980s Margaret Thatcher UK fashion, threatened to strike at the end of this week. Now not to worry, the strike was supposedly announced because f the above named 2,000 office closures, will likely be 24-hours in length (because members can lose a day but will not go on record longer because it will hurt their pocketbooks) so we have a largely toothless gesture where folks will toot their horns and grin and bear while not much will happen. 

This summer we had a series of 24-hour strikes in local council governments and other institutions, that “brought attention to their plight” and now we have no idea who struck for what or why and not much has changed. 

So, six days before Christmas on the last day to post letters in time for deliver in the UK, the union will increase the burden on their own workers to deliver mail in a timely fashion and thus further divert nervous providers to other sources such as… TNT, CityLink, DHL, UPS, FedEx…

The report also recommended modernisation for the postal service, with potential job losses there as a result. The government has “committed itself to maintaining the “universal service” - daily deliveries to every UK home, and collections from all post boxes.” Not easy to do without help and that help could kill it.

So it’s going to go on for awhile and Postman Pat and his little black cat will hopefully drive through the countryside for some time to come.