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Penguin, I broadly agree, except that the Girobank was a genuinely innovative and successful operation. It’s rather ironic that after all these years we are now back to banking at the Post Office due to all the bank branch closures. I agree that the roots of the problem go back further than 2012 (?), when the PO and RM were separated so RM could be sold. I’m willing to blame Peter Mandelson, Margaret Thatcher or even Keith Joseph. But none of them will be standing for the local council, hoping to make capital out of the possible closure of Lordship Lane PO, as if they are in no way responsible. The Lib Dems can’t be let off the hook that easily. -
By Cyclemonkey · Posted
The main problem Post Offices have, IMO, is they are generally a sub optimal experience and don't really deliver services in the way people want or need these days. I always dread having to use one as you know it will be time consuming and annoying. -
If you want to look for blame, look at McKinsey's. It was their model of separating cost and profit centres which started the restructuring of the Post Office - once BT was fully separated off - into Lines of Business - Parcels; Mail Delivery and Retail outlets (set aside the whole Giro Bank nonsense). Once you separate out these lines of business and make them 'stand-alone' you immediately make them vulnerable to sell off and additionally, by separating the 'businesses' make each stand or fall on their own, without cross subsidy. The Post Office took on banking and some government outsourced activity - selling licences and passports etc. as additional revenue streams to cross subsidize the postal services, and to offer an incentive to outsourced sub post offices. As a single 'comms' delivery business the Post Office (which included the telcom business) made financial sense. Start separating elements off and it doesn't. Getting rid of 'non profitable' activity makes sense in a purely commercial environment, but not in one which is also about overall national benefit - where having an affordable and effective communications (in its largest sense) business is to the national benefit. Of course, the fact the the Government treated the highly profitable telecoms business as a cash cow (BT had a negative PSBR - public sector borrowing requirement - which meant far from the public purse funding investment in infrastructure BT had to lend the government money every year from it's operating surplus) meant that services were terrible and the improvement following privatisation was simply the effect of BT now being able to invest in infrastructure - which is why (partly) its service quality soared in the years following privatisation. I was working for BT through this period and saw what was happening there. -
By first mate · Posted
But didn't that separation begin with New Labour and Peter Mandelson?
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