Union to fight privatization of Canada Post services

If anything needs to be privatized its Canada Post, these bastards go on strike almost every time the contract is up for renewal.

These whiners would fuckin die if they had to be posties in the US.
The USPS delivers mail on Saturday.
I dunno about cities, but in smaller towns I've been in, the USPS picks up mail from YOUR mail box that you want delivered. No driving around tryin to find a friggin mailbox.

And privatization??? You betcha!!! One less large group of government employees holding the taxpayer hostage everytime they want more is ALWAYS a good thing.

Good luck to them. Let's keep the good-paying union jobs.

The Post Office really does seem like a 19th-20th century entity anyway. There is no need for a national postal service in the 21st century. Shut it down. Virtually anything carried by mail could be done by e-mail and parcel postage can easily be handled by private couriers.

Well if they shut down the postal service they'll have to spend money guaranteeing everyone has access to affordable internet. Surprisingly many don't, mostly in rural areas.

I don't know about that. I live in rural area and we have internet. Most everyone I know has internet. You can't get much further into the sticks than I.

I don't know about that. I live in rural area and we have internet. Most everyone I know has internet. You can't get much further into the sticks than I.
As someone who is looking into buying a house in a rural area I've looked into my internet options. They vary from wireless, 3g cell coverage, and even sattelite. All services are basically capped at 5 gigs and range from $40 per month and up. That's not affordable internet. Especially when I can receive my bills in the mail for free.

Well I put something to the test. I read an article or letter to the Ed by someone who said they paid more to ship a parcel when they took it to Shopper Drug Mart. I send packages regualarly so I got two boxes the same size and put the exact items in each one. I took one to Shoppers and the other to the post office. I paid $12.15 for the Shoppers one and 9.23 at the Post Office.. they were both going to the same address. So either the people at shoppers are making a little extra or they don't know what they are doing.. But I am sure if we have much more of Harper there will little left of value other than more seats in the commons and more losers in the senate.

But if you compare "overnight guaranteed" from Canada Post with either UPS or FedX you will find that UPS or FedX actually guarantees it whereas Canada Post says they"ll try. I'd rather pay a little extra for a guarantee than Canada Posts "we'll try".



Same here, and it cost me almost the same as what I paid when I lived in the city.

Well if they shut down the postal service they'll have to spend money guaranteeing everyone has access to affordable internet. Surprisingly many don't, mostly in rural areas.

Not only that, you'd also have to guarantee regular mail access from Fedex or UPS or whoever replaces Canada Post, and courier service to rural areas is much more expensive and actually worse than the post office.

Try explaining to someone in Iqaluit that to mail a letter now costs them $10 instead of fifty four cents. Despite the fact that 80% of Canadians live in cities, the other 20% still have some rights to affordable mail service. And that's coming from a born and bred city slicker.

Now if you wanna argue about the distribution of MP seats and votes, that's another matter entirely!

I had a bad experience with some Christmas Packages that I sent to my son when he was in university.. I sent it UPS. He was at McGill, the package was sent to Québec city. They traced it and promised delivery by the 24th.. it arrived Jan 3rd. ever since then I used the post office.

Well I would say first that the workers, and especially the union, would probably love the opportunity for more work on Saturdays: more paid hours, more overtime and more employees in their union. Second, just because mail isn't delivered or picked up on Saturday, doesn't mean that people aren't working in the sorting centres and shipping the mail cross country to its local or regional centre.

How mail is picked up generally depends on your area and even your neighbourhood. In rural communities, its often with the personal mailbox with the little flag you flip up when you have outgoing. In modern developments, there is often a set of locked mailboxes on the street corner where residents go for BOTH their incoming and outgoing mail.

Lastly, I would point out that even if the services were privatized, the government would be paying that company with YOUR tax dollars, so remember YOU are probably not getting any break as a taxpayer. Any savings from the difference between current unionized pay rates and whatever the lower pay is with the private contractor will likely be eaten up by the private company's executives and shareholders and the govt will divert whatever is left (if there is any) to other programs. Remember, all the talk about private companies being forced to lower costs and improve service through competition is largely unapplicable here, since this Canada Post contract is basically a monopoly environment where there is no direct competition with other private companies.

Private courriers do not compete directly with CP as they offer a different service at a different (and much higher) price.

So at the end of the day, what this really comes down to is whether you prefer to see average middle-class Canadians earn less so that wealthy executives and investors can take more for themselves. Personally, I do not.

Sorry but I'm not having a lot of sympathy for an organization that actually suggested that we should have to pay Canada Post 5 cents per e-mail sent and recieved.

Let me guess, you got an email telling you that, right? A proposed Bill 602 for email tax, or something similar? And it asked you to forward that email to everybody you know to show your opposition to it?

That's a well-known hoax and there's a US version of it too. You can read the proof here: