'Should the Royal Mail be part-privatised?' poll discussion

cw18

rickbonar wrote: »

If Royal mail is privatised then will it follow in the footsteps of other privatisations?

Railways
BT
Gas
Electric
The Bus service

not to mention other services such as Banks already in the private sector.

In all of the services mentioned by me off the top of my head, ALL without fail have resulted in a stampede and raft of rip-offs, poor slow service, dirty tricks and miss selling and you're paying through the nose for the privelege.

Even the milkman service ... now there was a Thatcher success story !

Personally I'd like to see all these nationalised.

Can anyone actually tell us of a privatised service which is better??

I'm soooooo pleased to see someone else put into words (and so much better than I could) exactly what I think of the idea......

Yes, I always moan when the prices go up -- especially the latest, which seemed much more extreme for some categories than I'd have expected - but I'd rather see another rise of a few pennies to keep it a public owned company !!

Let's be honest, if it gets privatised - partially or fully - we're going to see price rises anyway!!!

Patrick20

It shouldnt be privitized but it should be run as if it was private. I think posties should be given segways to scoot about on to speed up delivery. If any vehicle was perfect for a postie then the segway is it.

Ben84

I think privatisation is often illogical and contradictory.

The reasoning generally seems to be that by introducing private investors they will make the service more efficient, competitive and cheaper. These are the three selling points that come up normally. I don't believe these are the full picture, and have not always been the outcome from past privatisations, but even if they were true I still feel it's wrong.

If this can be done, as claimed, why aren't the government doing it? They told us they could run a country when people voted for them, so solving these business problems shouldn't be too complex.

If they have the potential to make a public service better, cheaper and bring in useful revenue from it, then they should have a duty to do that for the full benefit of the public. Why should we lose a valuable asset that belongs to the public and never see any financial return from it when the government are suggesting it could be turned around fairly easily?

teddyco

There is an option missing from this poll - H. Gordon Brown should call a General Election!

neverthesamedaytwice

There are some services which need to be available because they are essential for some sections of society.

As soon as such a service is privatised; profit becomes more important than provision of that service.

This is a danger for any privatised service or utility -> and this is why I don't like privatisation. Like many, I'm sick of the greedy fat-cats and bankers .. and I don't want them putting profits before people.

Deco

peter_the_piper wrote: »

Can't for the life of me work out how the Government can say they are thinking of part privatisation because of the pensions problem, amongsrt other reasons, and then say they will take the pension into public ownership. If they can do this for the private sector why can't they do it anyway and leave the Royal Mail alone.

My god its physically sickening.
They blindly rob the royal mail employees of their pensions and then use it as an excuse to privatize (resulting in job losses and paycuts).
Then the reason they sold off in the first place isnt gunna be handled by the business that has took the public's resource but instead the taxpayer shall take the burden off paying those pensions out.

All three of the main parties are for this, don't vote for any of them!
Especially labour, the apparently left wing party which is privatizing everything as rapidly as thatcher did!

Money_Grabber13579

The worst thing that the labour government did to the Royal Mail was to break it up and hand all the profitable business mail over to TNT. So now their shareholders make a fat profit, which all the personal mail MUST be delivered by Royal Mail at either a loss, or a huge increase in prices. And it has been the increase in prices which has happened (Something like 10p in 3 years - about 50%.)

The thing is, that any mail that TNT won't deliver is just passed back to Royal Mail so then have to deal with it for something like 14p a letter, and so TNT just pocket the difference for absolutely no work!

The whole postal system should have remained a public service, because now the majority of the British public are paying more in order to give TNT shareholders a big fat profit.

birchy

Deco wrote: »

All three of the main parties are for this, don't vote for any of them!
Especially labour, the apparently left wing party which is privatizing everything as rapidly as thatcher did!

Iam suprised and angry that Labour are planning to ruin Royal Mail by privatizing it.Saying that I would NEVER Vote for the Tories even though there seems little difference between them.

Keep Royal Mail Public. It still makes money!
Privatization will lead to more job cuts,less service,later deliveries and higher prices.

ipod_killed_the_musicshop

teddyco wrote: »

This is just one more reason to GET LABOUR OUT!

No because the Tories would do the same, but if Labour lose the next election they'll have themselves to blame.

As for my answer no it shouldn't be privatised, nothing I can add which hasn't been said already.

ipod_killed_the_musicshop

teddyco wrote: »

There is an option missing from this poll - H. Gordon Brown should call a General Election!

I've now joined the "accidentally thanked" club. Yeah brill idea, then we can pay for even more MP's moats.