Having run a few businesses in my time I thought I knew my way around a set of accounts. Not so it seems.

Here are the accounts for Australia Post;
http://auspost.com.au/annualreport2013/financial-report.html

“This year Australia Post’s profit after tax was $311.9 million; this is 20.8 per cent higher than our 2010 underlying profit after tax (excluding restructuring costs).”

“Underpinning the improved result was $5.9 billion in revenue.”

“We delivered a strong rate of return for our shareholder, the Federal Government, paying a cash dividend of $243.7 million (up 25.7 per cent this year). Our return on equity was 18.5 per cent.”

This is apparently why 900 Australia Post workers had to be sacked.

“Mr Fahour says the job cuts are needed as Australia Post heads towards billion-dollar annual losses due to a 30 per cent decline in letter volumes over the past five years, which is only expected to accelerate. "Losses in letters are now, for the first time, overwhelming the profits we make in parcels," he said.”
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-06-10/australia-post-confirms-900-jobs-to-go-in-restructure/5511414

Who else thinks we are getting sold a pup? I wouldn't care if Australia Post broke even each year. Their job is to provide a postal service to Australians with the principle that we can send a letter anywhere in this big wide land from one Australian to another for the same rate, a universal service. I know the city subsidises the country to some degree but I think most city folk do not begrudge that fact. I also know that a decline in letter volumes and a rise in parcel volumes has meant one area is subsidising the other but so what.

In splitting the parcel and letter divisions I guarantee the first will be privatised and the second will remain in public hands at a far more diminished service.

It's a public utility whose fate is being dictated by economic rationalists who have got their little MBA matrix out and think they know what needs to be done to protect and enhance profits for the shareholder, but they seem to be forgetting just who that is.

steels your right//they are setting up a great theft
aussie post has/the bes stamp collection/in the world
woth over 15 billion/just that meaty little asset/that prints them paper pictures.

then you have a daily distribution network/that will shortly be automateD/THAT NETWORK/PLUS BASED = 6=8 BILION..THEN THE GOODWILLL

anyhow/its looting and plunder][like when we sold our gold resefves/in the bottum of the market

like when we sold the commonwealth bank/for 9 bilion
that today makes 9 billion proffit eaxch year

like when obid tok over water/like qld did/like we gold plating the powerlnesbefore sellingvthem/how we sold telstra/after building the system/the public servant slush fund stole it

anyhow i say take back all privatised infastructure
or if you going to sell it/issue shares out to the users/and allow us to sell our share for our price

see when commies went bust/everyone got shares
when capitalist merchantiism/goes bust they bailo=in our cash/into their bonus/as we sell off income production/we increase taxes/when taxes was only installed to pay off war bedt/after BANBKING SCUM STOLE THE NATIONAL BANKS

DRAW THE LINE
SEIZE BACK LOOTED ASSETS
then take back the proceeeds of crime.like the 9 bilion comm bank gets every year/times the 30 years ago it was sld for a song to a mate from the choir.

"Australia Post employs more than 32,000 employees and around 10,000 licensees, franchisees and mail contractors"

So cutting back 900 positions this year is less than 3% of the employees, which with a turn over of personnel of roughly 10% is a drop in the ocean and mostly can be accommodated by re assignment. Considering that letter delivery is dropping by about 6% p.a. this would seem to be a rational move.

If nearly all correspondence today is via electronic means, the reliance on daily deliveries is difficult to justify. There are alternatives that have successfully used elsewhere. Reduce mail deliveries to 3 times a week, or even twice a week, or, provide free of charge individual mail boxes in clusters near to the houses.

The alternative is to ramp up the cost of postage which is already one of the highest in the world.

Adding insult to injury is the obscene payment to the head of Australia Post.

“Mr Fahour - a former CEO of NAB and Citigroup - was paid $4.8 million last year as chief executive officer and managing director of Australia Post, which is 100 per cent Government-owned. In contrast, the head of the US Postal Service was paid $550,000 in 2013, despite running a company with 19 times more staff and 11 times the revenue.
The head of France's postal service, La Poste, was paid $1.06 million for running a service with 268,000 employees. The highest paid public servant in Australia is the Secretary of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, Ian Watt, who earns more than $800,000 per year.”
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-06-11/critics-question-australia-post-ceos-multi-million-dollar-salary/5514682

Dear Shadow Minister,

You wrote;

“The alternative is to ramp up the cost of postage which is already one of the highest in the world.”

You must forgive me for checking but the very first one I investigated was the cost of sending a letter within the UK. The rate for a second class personal letter is 53p (95 cents AUD) and for a first class letter it is 62p ($1.12 AUD).

It should be noted that the Royal Mail has been privatised. Now even in the UK country folk may be left out.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/royal-mail/10915081/Daily-deliveries-to-rural-areas-at-risk-Royal-Mail-warns.html

Do you personally want to see Australia Post privatised and what good would you see that doing the country?

Dear SteeleRedux,

Thank You for this discussion.

I've come across an interesting article that gives
(in my opinion) quite a good take on the possibilities
open for the future of Australia Post.
It's worth a read.

"Approx. 60 percent of Australia Posts 4,429 retail
outlets operate in regional, rural, and remote Australia.
These outlets are often the hub of business activity in
small towns. Australia Post is also the only provider
of parcel services in many areas, even though nationally
this is a highly competitive market. As an agent for more
than 750 businesses and government entities Australia Post's
retail outlets provide access to services in areas where
they are not likely to be replaced by private providers."

"Any changes to existing CSOs will have implications for the
broader network of outlets and services that Australia Post
supports throughout rural and remote Australia.
The worldwide trend in demand for letter services suggests
that the decline in the need for this service is terminal.
However, people will still need to send parcels to each
other, get passports, and do other things over the counter.
Some level of obligation on Australia Post to maintain services
in areas the market will not go will be required to
guarantee basic service and cost equity in communications for
Australians."

"But Australia Post could also help to reduce and eliminate
the net cost of services to smaller communities, and at the
same time improve and expand services outside its
traditional letter business."

http://theconversation/the-future-of-australia-post-will-be-off-the-beaten-track-27448

‘morning Steelie,

The issue of TNT and privatized postal services doesn’t hold water.

TNT was acquired in 1994 by the privatized Dutch postal services “Royal PTT Netherlands NV”.

So the Dutch postal service are experts in global and pan-European mail and TNT are logistics specialists in 90 countries.

What is wrong with a postal services company running postal services?