{"id":4395,"date":"2015-06-04T16:38:42","date_gmt":"2015-06-04T15:38:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unitelive.org\/?p=4395"},"modified":"2015-06-04T16:38:42","modified_gmt":"2015-06-04T15:38:42","slug":"no-to-royal-mail-fire-sale","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/?p=4395","title":{"rendered":"No to Royal Mail \u00e2\u20ac\u0098fire sale\u00e2\u20ac\u2122"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"fb-root\"><\/div>\n<p>Unite today (June 4) has warned against another Royal Mail \u00e2\u20ac\u0098fire sale\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 which would short-change taxpayers and deprive the Treasury of a steady stream of income over the long-term.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<br \/>\nThe warning came as chancellor George Osborne announced plans to sell the government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s remaining 30 per cent stake in Royal Mail, leading to accusations from the union that it was selling off the last pieces of \u00e2\u20ac\u0098family silver\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 to pay for self-defeating austerity.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<br \/>\nThe sell-off of the remaining stake comes two years after Royal Mail\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s controversy ridden flotation which created a political storm. As well as accusations that the company was sold off on the cheap, the sale also saw preferential treatment for a number of investors including the investment arm of the government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s independent advisor on the sale.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<br \/>\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThis fire sale by the chancellor will short change taxpayers and deny the Treasury of a steady stream of income over the long-term,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 said Unite officer Brian Scott, who represents Royal Mail managers.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<br \/>\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bSelling off the last remnants of the family silver to pay for self-defeating austerity will further undermine the future of the universal postal service.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<br \/>\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bIt is likely that this will be another mishandled sale and we would urge the government to think again and retain its stake in Royal Mail.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<br \/>\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThe recent demise of Whistl, despite cherry picking mail deliveries and ignoring over 50 per cent of the country, demonstrates that the delivery of letters to homes and to businesses is a natural monopoly and one which government has a responsibility to maintain,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 Scott added.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Unite today (June 4) has warned against another Royal Mail \u00e2\u20ac\u0098fire sale\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 which would short-change taxpayers and deprive the Treasury of a steady stream of income over the long-term. &nbsp; The warning came as chancellor George Osborne announced plans to sell the government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s remaining 30 per cent stake in Royal Mail, leading to accusations from [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4396,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[76,178,314],"wps_subtitle":"Government warned against move to short-change taxpayers","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4395"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4395"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4395\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4397,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4395\/revisions\/4397"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4396"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4395"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4395"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4395"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}