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The Forum > Article Comments > A postal strike in Britain is the war at home > Comments

A postal strike in Britain is the war at home : Comments

By John Pilger, published 29/10/2009

Postal workers deserve the support of all honest, decent people: they may be next on the list if they remain silent.

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I normally cannot tolerate the rubbish that John Pilger is capable of dishing up to us. However , on this occasion , he is spot on with his views .

It eventually had to happen.. I had better mark the date.
Posted by Aspley, Thursday, 29 October 2009 11:14:00 AM
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What a pile of dung.

Having watched an business commentry on the Royal mail on the BBC, it is clear that all is not well financially for this institution as technology and competitors strip it of revenue.

The article is probably cut and pasted from the union mouthpiece and is far from unbaised commentry.

Aspley, I'm afraid your wait continues.
Posted by Shadow Minister, Thursday, 29 October 2009 1:14:42 PM
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If Scargill was fighting to save an industry, in the UK, The Germans & Japs, in WW11, were fighting for freedom, & democracy for all.

What utter BS.
Posted by Hasbeen, Thursday, 29 October 2009 1:46:43 PM
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I'm afraid that whatever truth there might have been in this commentary on the loss of a venerable British institution is entirely lost beneath a steaming pile of overblown, emotive rhetoric.

Reality and Pilger seem to have parted company. And I say that with sadness, as someone who has purchased and read several of his books.
Posted by Pericles, Thursday, 29 October 2009 3:24:16 PM
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I'm with Pericles on this one.
Mr Pilger may well have some valid points, indeed he may even be entirely correct, but the overblown verbiage of his polemic left me cold.
Maybe next time more with the facts, less with the hyperbole.
Posted by J S Mill, Thursday, 29 October 2009 5:27:48 PM
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Pilger is defending the indefensible… the rights of minorities with a vested interest sanctioned by a government monopoly exercising dictatorial strike power over the general population.

Any government which follows the wisdom of the Thatcher government, in removing the sucking parasites from the teat of public revenues and subsidies, is doing the right thing.

The likes of Scargill (I remember having to study by kerosene lamp thanks to the rolling blackouts the actions of his swill caused) was despotic.. .an attempt to maintain the preferential employment rights of miners at the expense of everyone else.

The sooner governments everywhere realize that they will always be faced with a conflict of interests, when the operators / owners are also the regulators, the sooner we will see the complete withdraw of government from commerce and an end to these clusters of despotic strike power.

It pleases me to see so many post criticizing the view of the Pilgers of the worl
Posted by Col Rouge, Friday, 30 October 2009 9:01:16 AM
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In the past I found Pilger to be a hard read and at times a touch arrogant but perhaps it is because I am getting older and wiser he is pushing buttons with me, or it might be because I can ignore his more verbose moments.

I know quite a few victims of the drive to corporatization within Australia Post and recognising how far this mad rush to privatisation has gone in the UK we really don't want it here.

The grumpy old men series on the ABC revealed how dysfunctional a once glorious institution had become.

Here in Australia it is only by legislation we are only just keeping some greedy mitts off the core of our postal service.

I think it adds to the notion of an egalitarian nation when a letter can be posted from Broome (WA) to Boat Harbour (Tas) for 55 cents, even if as a result it costs us a touch more to mail one across town in the big smoke.

Well done Mr Pilger.
Posted by csteele, Friday, 30 October 2009 2:37:39 PM
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Thanks John for another great article on an issue which is as seminal to British democracy as the miners' strike in 84. Perhaps in an Australian context it is as seminal as the forthcoming (I hope) building industry strikes to prevent Ark Tribe being jailed for refusing to talk about what was talked about at a union meting. (I write on this on my blog.)

Once again, thanks John.
Posted by Passy, Saturday, 31 October 2009 5:18:18 AM
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We have to hold on to public assets, period! My mother, an old Brit, holidayed in the UK recently and a wayward letter, illegibly inscribed, found her, due to the supererogatory diligence of the local poat office master. I'm no friend of tradition, but I'm as paranoid about a world run by corporations as the tories are about socialism. Australia's post office has already made the transition, to all intents and purposes; it's just waiting to get floated. Australia's ABC also waits nervously in the wings.
We are entering an era of corporate governance--is this not patently obvious!
Don't listen to some of the p1ssants above, John.
"The man without a stamp is rich in spittle".
Posted by Squeers, Sunday, 1 November 2009 4:06:07 PM
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I guess there's one saving grace, csteele.

>>I know quite a few victims of the drive to corporatization within Australia Post and recognising how far this mad rush to privatisation has gone in the UK we really don't want it here.<<

Australia Post is owned by the people of Australia and run as a government business. It has not been privatized. It makes corporate profits, while providing a public service.

So your "victims of the drive to corporatization within Australia Post" were clearly not required, and were released in order that the organization as a whole survived.

So, which option would you have preferred?

The reduction-in-force that enabled the service to continue, or privatization?

The same enlightened approach to the UK Post Office could have the same result, and avoid the need for sentiment-dripping articles such as this, that miss the point that with proper management the service could become profitable.

But not, in reality, without "a few victims of the drive to corporatization". Stripped of its rhetoric, this is the truth that underpins Pilger's sob-story. Until and unless the business is run as efficiently as its competitors in the private sector, it will always be on the ropes.

After all, we've managed it.

>>I think it adds to the notion of an egalitarian nation when a letter can be posted from Broome (WA) to Boat Harbour (Tas) for 55 cents, even if as a result it costs us a touch more to mail one across town in the big smoke.<<

Community service, at a profit to the community.

All it takes is good management.
Posted by Pericles, Monday, 2 November 2009 7:18:50 AM
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Pilger should start a new career as a stand-up comic. This article is so out of touch with reality that it's genuinely funny. I can't wait for his article in support of Lyndon Larouche and some of his whacky ideas.
Posted by Bernie Masters, Monday, 2 November 2009 10:22:27 AM
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Dear Pericles,

While I get that it probably shouldn't make a loss Australia Post needs to make corporate profits because why?

It is a public service and some of that public service is unquantifiable and often not recognised until it is gone.

UK postal workers are paid well under US and Australian rates, have co-operated with three dramatic modernisation phases including layoffs and casualisation. I don't blame them for baulking now.

My 'victims' have had stress leave caused by management bullying and unrealistic demands.

Can I offer the following link as something worth reading on the issue. Gives a different perspective.

http://www.lrb.co.uk/v31/n18/roy-mayall/diary

If the cream of our city deliveries could be captured by the privateers then the prices would have to increase for the rest of the country. No universal obligation means more profits but we are all the poorer for it.
Posted by csteele, Wednesday, 4 November 2009 11:53:37 AM
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That's a good point, csteele.

>>While I get that it probably shouldn't make a loss Australia Post needs to make corporate profits because why?<<

The short answer is that it doesn't "need" to make them. But it is generally a good thing to conduct business along "corporate" lines, in order to avoid slipping into managerial laziness.

Which, it would appear, is what happened in the UK.

This, from the current issue of The Economist:

http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=14744974

"In the 1990s the Royal Mail was a model modern post office. French and German postal executives used to visit and learn, and it profited from selling its know-how around the world. Today, starved of the investment in automation it so badly needed, the Royal Mail is 40% less efficient than its local competitors."

Good management, coupled with a "Board of Directors" mentality would have not allowed that to happen. The lazy view is to blame the fact that it is a public utility, and that the private sector by definition would run it better. But the reality is that governments fail to appoint competent management, and enable rigorous oversight.

This is the line taken by The Economist:

"Government ownership will restrict their liberty, and lead to deepening losses and, in the end, taxpayer bail-outs. Pressure from private shareholders, in contrast..."

To me, that is putting the cart before the horse, and hiding the problem behind the solution. Regrettably, though, history proves them more accurate, and makes me the eternal idealist.
Posted by Pericles, Wednesday, 4 November 2009 12:17:50 PM
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Dear Perciles,

Was that gift intentional?

How on earth did the Royal Mail ever become "model modern post office" that was the envy of "French and German postal executives" who "used to visit and learn" in the first place? Through proper bloody management by government!

So here is this lot saying they have to privatise to make it work because the workers have stuffed the thing up. Pig's arse.

Why are so many of our governments failing to run our public institutions properly and why are we letting them get away with it?

Which twit in our own government thought it was too expensive for our services to fly our dead home so let's use a private contractor instead? Oops, the body got swapped?! Not our fault, blame the contractor!

Better yet let's privatise our Wheat Board. Oops, they've been doing what? Giving nearly half a billion dollars of kickbacks to a regime we are about to go to war with? Hell, not our fault you see we privatised them a few years back. Ministerial responsibility? None here.

Lets sell off the Commonwealth Serum Laboratories then bitch about the prices they want to charge for our vaccines or about those they decide not to produce even though they protected our rural folk.

Even better idea, sell off Telstra. Oops, it ain't our fault we have fallen so far behind in IT infrastructure, it's the Mexican's.

These selloffs are not about money, they are about governments devolving responsibility, and we just buy the spin.

The next party who wants to step up to the plate and says it wants to run these institutions properly rather than sell them to the highest bidder gets my vote!
Posted by csteele, Wednesday, 4 November 2009 6:57:26 PM
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All good questions, csteele.

>>Why are so many of our governments failing to run our public institutions properly and why are we letting them get away with it?<<

The answer to the first is that government departments tend over time to become safe havens for our most incompetent managers. They are not challenged, their performance is not measured, and their "key success factors" have more to do with irrelevant feelgood bureaucracy than real results.

It is therefore almost by accident that a competent management is occasionally able to provide a public service efficiently.

And also almost certain that this state of affairs will not last.

Think of it this way. You are running a fine hospital. It is clean, efficient, and its staff are helpful and productive.

The hospital down the road is badly run, with patients left in corridors for the paparazzi to splash over the front pages.

You ask the Department to invest in some new diagnostic equipment, and for some money for minor refurbishments.

The other hospital asks for three times as much money for vague programmes to reduce waiting times, to hire more nurses (to attract them away from your hospital) and briefs a friendly reporter that the minister has "refused to help".

Which hospital will get the funds? And how will throwing more money at incompetent management help the sick?

More relevant to your hospital, what sort of message is that sending to you and your staff? That incompetence is rewarded, while efficiency is actually a handicap.

Which is, it would appear from the Economist article, what happened to the UK Post: they were well run, so became starved of new investment.

Regrettably, the entire system is designed to foster incompetence, simply through the desire of politicians and management in the public service to keep their jobs, and the bloated pension entitlements that go with them.

Why do we continue to let them get away with it?

Because they represent a significant voting bloc. And you're hardly going to vote yourself off the gravy train, are you?
Posted by Pericles, Friday, 6 November 2009 8:58:26 AM
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Squeers “We are entering an era of corporate governance--is this not patently obvious!”

Not really, performance improves when the ‘operator’ of any business is not the ‘regulator’ (just as separate umpires oversee a cricket match, supposedly independent of either playing side) and may be applying agendas which are not in the best interests of the business.

“"The man without a stamp is rich in spittle".”

And for that man, what is the point of a stamp which costs twice as much when supplied by government than when it is supplied by private enterprise?

So could anyone tell me - why should a postal service be given special protection, through access to an endless amount of tax payer funding, instead of being expected to provide commercial value and economic benefit to its users for what is a commercial service (level playing fields come to mind)?

Csteele “These selloffs are not about money, they are about governments devolving responsibility, and we just buy the spin.”

Monopolies, inefficiencies, insider-deals, despotism and cronyism are the hallmark of Centralized government and centralized control.

Personally I am all for devolving everything… less power to the federal government, not more… it is. After all what really makes sense.

As for selling off government businesses.. it is about removing the risk component from the taxpayer and making commercial entities commercial responsible - and that is a good thing, when the tax payer has no direct say over the commercial discipline or integrity of any government operated entity.

I would agree with Pericles and so will not bother to repeat him
Posted by Col Rouge, Saturday, 7 November 2009 12:45:02 PM
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Col,
haven't we just seen via the GFC a stunning example of corporate responsibility? And did you watch Four Corners the other night and see the extortionate tolls being charged by privateers?
I don't see why public companies can't be overhauled and run more efficiently. And I don't follow the logic that privatisation equals greater efficiency anyway, when high corporate salaries and bonuses and dividends to shareholders have to be factored into overall costs.
The leaner efficiencies of privatisation are accomplished primarily by screwing the worker: slash the workforce to the bone and keep wages and conditions trimmed to a minimum. Simultaneously, executives are paid obscene amounts on the pretext that that's the only way to attract "talent". What a joke! Executives are the gross gourmands of the business world and the archetypes of corporate "principles".
Excuse me, I think I'm going to puke!
Posted by Squeers, Saturday, 7 November 2009 4:14:10 PM
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