It looks like beleaguered Royal Mail – everyone’s least-favourite postal service – could be about to be in the midst of a buy-out. The Communication Workers Union (CWU) has given the news a lukewarm response; understandable, given the mess the company has been in for years.
Royal Mail: about to be taken over?
As the Guardian reported:
The owner of Royal Mail received a takeover offer from a Czech billionaire who has stakes in Sainsbury’s and West Ham United football club.
Daniel Křetínský approached International Distributions Services (IDS), the owner of the struggling British postal company, this month.
In a statement, Křetínský’s EP Group, said the proposal at an undisclosed price was rejected by IDS but it “looks forward to continuing to engage constructively with the board”.
It noted that:
EP has until 15 May to either announce a firm intention to make an offer for IDS or walk away.
Years of mismanagement
Royal Mail has been dogged by disastrous mismanagement, willful neglect, and brazen bosses arrogance in recent years. As the Canary has documented it made a £1bn operating loss in the 52 weeks from March 2022 to 26 March 2023.
As we wrote at the time, this level of losses shows bosses’ management of the company was a shambles. This won’t come as a surprise to anyone who’s been following the dispute between the CWU and Royal Mail. The company has lurched from self-induced crisis to self-induced crisis.
From its (now former) CEO Simon Thompson lying to a parliamentary committee, to him and his cronies threatening to declare Royal Mail insolvent if the CWU didn’t bow down to their demands, the past 12 months at the company have been a farce.
Moreover, as anyone who still receives letters will tell you, its service is already dire – thanks to management. However, don’t take customers’ word for it. In November 2023, Ofcom fined Royal Mail £5.6m for missing its first and second class mail delivery targets for the entire financial year of 2022-23.
Then, there was the protracted dispute with the CWU. So, the potential takeover – while to be viewed with caution – cannot make the company much worse than it is already.
CWU: proceed with extreme caution – but it can’t get much worse for Royal Mail
Dave Ward, CWU general secretary, said:
The breaking news of an impending takeover bid for Royal Mail Group (IDS) by Daniel Kretinsky is another significant moment.
The truth is handing over the ownership of one of the UK’s most prestigious institutions to a foreign equity investor cannot be right. But neither is the current model or direction of the company.
The truth is Royal Mail needs a new ownership and governance model that builds a postal service for the workers and customers and not one built solely focused on shareholder payouts and driving down the service and the terms and conditions of the workers.
The CWU will be campaigning publicly and politically to deliver this change of direction.
Featured image via iStock
