Public Service Alliance of Canada BC

source: Canwest News Service, Tuesday, September 02, 2008

OTTAWA - As the federal government launches into a strategic review of Canada Post, a new poll shows 69 per cent of Canadians oppose allowing private companies to deliver letters in Canada.

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The Ipsos Reid poll, commissioned by the Canadian Union of Postal Workers, showed 46 per cent of respondents strongly oppose and 23 per cent somewhat oppose private company letter delivery.

At the other end of the spectrum, nine per cent strongly support and 18 per cent somewhat support private-sector competition to the Crown corporation.

“The public is overwhelmingly against postal deregulation and supports a strong universal public postal system,” said Denis Lemelin, the union’s national president.

“Postal deregulation would allow private companies to deliver mail in the lucrative urban areas while the public post office is left to service the higher-cost rural and isolated areas,” said Lemelin. “This is a recipe for drastic service cuts, job loss and post office closures.”

Ottawa’s Conservative government announced in April a strategic review of Canada Post, appointing a three-member panel to assess such changing market dynamics as the decline in “transaction mail,” which fell for the first time last year as more people receive and pay bills online.

Also under review are how public policy, such as requiring Canada Post to maintain service in rural Canada, affects results, which services should be opened to competition and whether performance and financial targets should be updated. The government ruled out privatization of the mail deliverer.

The postal workers poll, with a sample size of 1007 adult Canadians and considered accurate to within plus or minus 3.1 percentage points, was delivered on the final day of submissions to the review, whose panel is expected to release a final report in December, the union said in a release.