Year: 2005

It is crunch time for La Poste as the French parliament today prepares to give its final vote of approval to an ambitious modernisation of France’s state-owned post office, designed to prepare it for liberalisation of Europe’s postal markets. While the law on La Poste is likely to be approved without difficulty, the government has been forced to tread carefully to avoid making it into a politically divisive issue only weeks before the hotly contested French referendum on Europe’s new constitution. The law, which is already two years late by European Union standards, will open up the French postal market to competition over the next five years. It includes a variety of measures to protect the quality of service at the former monopoly and to help it survive in a more competitive market, such as setting up an independent postal regulator and, more controversially, allowing it to establish a postal bank.