Post Office turns against rail

Post Office turns against rail: 'Catastrophically late' first class mail may be moved back to road or air
From THE GUARDIAN, May 7th, 2001

By KEITH HARPER TRANSPORT EDITOR The Post Office last night threatened to remove first class mail
from rail and put it on the roads or even in the air because of a
failure by the rail industry to help deliver millions of first class
letters on time. The PO said it would take action unless the situation dramatically
improved. Most of the 8m first class letters carried by rail each
day are 'catastrophically late' and there is little sign of
improvement. The PO said it was in discussions with English, Welsh and Scottish
(EWS), the rail freight company which carries the mail, to see what
improvements could be made. Of the 59 mail trains which operate each
night, 20 or more are running 30 minutes late and miss vital
connections with delivery vans for onward transmission to sorting
centres. The PO is under pressure from the industry regulator to improve
first class mail deliveries. Last year it only achieved an 89.1%
success rate and this year it has been instructed by the regulator
to raise its performance to 92.1% or face financial penalties. Yesterday the PO said: 'This situation cannot go on indefinitely.'
It relies heavily on rail for its rail deliveries and its pounds 50m
contract with EWS is one of the most lucrative for the freight
company, which is losing millions of pounds a year. A spokesman for the PO, which has assumed the global name of
Consignia, said EWS had consistently defaulted on its contract,
which has a further five years to run. The PO could have taken legal
action against EWS but has so far refrained from doing so. The position has been made worse by the impact of the Hatfield rail
crash in October last year. The crash paralysed the industry, which
has still not fully recovered, but the effect on postal efficiency
has been particularly severe. Even in the 10 months before Hatfield, according to the PO, 95% of
its mail trains were running late. Although there has been some
improvement in the past few months, its services are still poor. Its relationship with Railtrack is only beginning to heal after a
clash at Christmas when Railtrack announced a closure of part of the
network for signalling improvements. This was done without any
consultation with the PO, whose services could have been severely
restricted for 10 days. Railtrack only relented and restored some
access to the PO after a strong protest from the company. The PO is reluctant to pull out of rail. It has invested pounds 200m
in its own rail terminal at Willesden in north London, a hub from
which its trains go to all parts of the country. This development
had the effect of taking hundreds of PO vans off the roads,
particularly in central London. The Willesden terminal has been supplemented by several regional
centres in Bristol, Manchester and Scotland. Some members of the PO's board want the company to review its
commitment to rail and revert to road. But this would require more
investment and, with mounting congestion on the roads, might be
counter-productive. EWS admits that its performance has not been good but says it hopes
to resolve its difficulties with the PO. It has introduced newer,
faster trains to haul the PO's mail fleet at speeds of more than
100mph, but large-scale engineering works by Railtrack do not make
them easy to test. Special report on transport in the UK at
guardian.co.uk/transport