Kretinsky called before MPs over Royal Mail performance

Daniel Kretinsky, the Czech billionaire investor who clinched the audacious takeover of Royal Mail’s owner last year, has been called to give evidence to MPs over “significant concerns” about its postal services performance.

The business and trade select committee has asked for Kretinsky, the chairman of International Distribution Services (IDS), the parent company, and Alistair Cochrane, the Royal Mail chief executive, to attend amid increasing scrutiny from ministers and Ofcom, the regulator, of its failure to hit delivery targets.

Kretinsky, who has invested fortunes raised from energy assets into food, media, logistics and sports stakes, including J Sainsbury and West Ham United football club, plans to attend the hearing. It will be the first time he has appeared before parliament.

Kretinsky’s EP Group, based in Prague, completed a £3.6 billion takeover of IDS last year after agreeing undertakings with ministers. These included creating a so-called golden share for the government, as well as reaching an agreement with the Communication Workers Union, representing frontline Royal Mail workers.

Kretinsky, who is known as the “Czech sphinx” for his inscrutable investment approach, told staff in an internal memo last year that they needed to be “on the same ship” in order for the 500-year-old service to succeed.

Under its previous management, Royal Mail was weakened by a bitter industrial dispute over pay and conditions that left workers “disengaged” and the company losing more than £1 million a day.

Liam Byrne, chairman of the Commons committee and a former Treasury minister in Gordon Brown’s government, wrote this month to Cochrane to “raise significant concerns about the quality of postal service being provided by Royal Mail”.

Royal Mail was fined £21 million in October for failing to meet its first and second class delivery targets in the year to last March. It was the third consecutive annual fine from Ofcom.

Blair McDougall, the business minister responsible for postal services, told the Commons this month he had made clear to Royal Mail that “the way they are operating is not good enough and that they are on notice”.

Dave Ward, general secretary of the the Communication Workers Union, said last week that Royal Mail’s company’s “failure to deliver for customers is a long-term problem”, and blamed a “recruitment crisis”.

In a statement, Ian Strawhorne, director of enforcement at Ofcom, said: “Millions of important letters are arriving late, and people aren’t getting what they pay for when they buy a stamp. These persistent failures are unacceptable, and customers expect and deserve better.

“Royal Mail must rebuild consumers’ confidence as a matter of urgency. And that means making actual significant improvements, not more empty promises. We’ve told the company to publicly set out how it’s going to deliver this change, and we expect to start seeing meaningful progress soon. If this doesn’t happen, fines are likely to continue.”

A spokesman for Royal Mail said that attending the committee’s hearing “will give us the opportunity to discuss the work we are doing to transform Royal Mail and the urgent need to implement changes to the universal service to deliver the services our customers want and ensure we are financially sustainable for the long term”.

Royal Mail bosses were called before the committee’s predecessor in 2023. The MPs produced a report accusing the postal service of “systemically” failing to deliver parts of its service obligation.

Krestinsky in his memo to staff last year said: “We recognise the importance of working together with our trade unions to ensure a successful future for Royal Mail and a fresh start for our industrial relations.”