Royal Mail is in desperate trouble – but the turnaround should be British-led

First, we need to rip up the rules that were put in place when it was privatised that protect the unions. The Royal Mail is ridiculously over-manned, and riddled with restrictive practices. 

Of course, we all sympathise with the posties who want a pay rise that matches inflation, and the unions are right to ask for that. But it should be accompanied by reforms that allow the company to operate more efficiently and with fewer staff.

After all, with record numbers of vacancies it is not as if people can’t get jobs elsewhere right now. If that happened, the staff that remain could be paid better, and the company would be a lot more profitable as well. 

Next, it should scrap daily deliveries where it wants to. No one has the right to get letters every day, and in many areas it is too expensive a service to offer. 

Sure, there will be lots of confected outrage about that, just as when the last remaining bank branch in the local village closes its doors. But no company can operate effectively when it is offering what amounts to a social service as well as a commercial business. If it doesn’t make money, and never will, then axe it. 

Finally, allow it to expand into new businesses. It has already done so at the margins with its separate parcels unit, and with local post office branches offering an increasing range of services from insurance, to banking to collection. But there is scope for plenty more.

There is no reason why the Royal Mail shouldn’t be delivering food, or just in time groceries, or partnering with the bewildering array of apps that were launched during lockdown to bring just about every service imaginable into the home. 

In reality, communications and logistics should be a great industry in the 21st century. Lots of companies have done extremely well from it. After all, if Amazon isn’t basically a postal business with a warehouse attached it is hard to know what it is really.

Likewise, Uber and Deliveroo are both fundamentally in the business of getting people and stuff from place to place as quickly and efficiently as possible. If they can make a success of it then so can the Royal Mail. 

But the company needs radical re-invention. That isn’t going to happen if a foreign bidder is allowed to take control, or if a cynical private equity firm is allowed to strip its assets. 

Nor is it very likely to happen with the well-meaning but ineffective chief executive Simon Thompson still in charge. In reality, It should be opened up to takeover by a British owner – and preferably an entrepreneur with a proven record of building new businesses – and perhaps then it could genuinely flourish once again.