by Keith Richmond
THE Government’s controversial plan to part-privatise Royal Mail has run into another problem – and this time it could prove fatal for the much-criticised idea. It appears that private companies do not have the cash to buy the stake the Government wants to sell during this credit crunch-inspired recession.
Although the Tories are backing the Government plan Peter Luff, Conservative MP for Mid Worcestershire and chair of the Business and Enterprise Select Committee, admitted: “This could be the wrong time – selling off a public asset on the cheap.”
Geraldine Smith, Labour MP for Morecambe & Lunesdale, and other backbenchers have been pressing the Government for a figure on what it thinks the stake it proposes to sell is worth. Lord Mandelson is reluctant to say.
Some cynics fear the Government will “bodge and bungle it” by putting “a bogus element for expertise” into the equation.
But Labour MPs – furious about job cuts, depot closures and part-privatisation of this popular public service – say the money simply isn’t there in the private sector at the moment.
