Past

There’s an incredibly long and personal post I will be working on that one day soon I might make public. That’s all I will say for now.

I’m having a very lazy Saturday – which is always healthy. I’ve been reading a lot of disgruntled Royal Mail employees on Twitter, all “cutback after cutback” and “it was so much better years ago”. These employees all have one thing in common – they’ve all been there for at least 20 years.

Yes, of COURSE things were better, at just about ANY once nationalised monopoly company. I dare say I could find you BT employees bitter as hell after 25 years working there, wondering why they can’t all have all the same pay and all the same benefits as they did when they were Government owned.

Sadly we’re not living in some idealistic utopia. Sadly there are shareholders, and stocks, and there is also increased competition. Sure, if you want the land of milk and honey to return – watch as all your pay and benefits are restored….and then your company sinks and you’re out of a job entirely. Which is really the more preferable.

In any case, if you’ve spent 20 years or so in a company pre and post privatisation, you’re going to lack a perspective anyway. That perspective being, yes you guessed it – working in a fucking care home. 0 Bank Holidays, 0 Statutory Sick pay, 0 pay rise (or a derisory one at best – but most times none at all), 0 carry over for any unused annual leave days. Royal Mail give ALL of those, and those are just the main ones I can think of right now.

“Oh so you’re quite happy with less pay are you Stephen”. Well in an ideal world we’d get more. But this was, isn’t, and never will be an ideal world.