Consignia accused of wanting to stop more daily deliveries
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.Consignia accused its critics of scaremongering yesterday over allegations that it planned to cut more than 2,000 mainly rural Scottish households from daily deliveries.
Reports that Consignia wanted to persuade PostComm, the postal regulator, to increase the number of homes to which the company will no longer have to deliver mail six days a week caused widespread anger in Scotland.
Postwatch Scotland, which monitors postal services, said the company – formerly the Royal Mail – wanted to extend the number of exempt addresses from 43 to 2,284.
At least half of the possible new exemptions would have affected rural areas in the Orkneys, Shetlands, Western Isles, Aberdeenshire, Lanarkshire and Caithness.
The storm erupted during the ongoing consultation process between Consignia and PostComm in which the company provided examples of the type of exemptions that could be considered.
Under legislation introduced in 1840 the postal service has an obligation to deliver to households throughout the country six days a week unless there are compelling reasons why individual addresses should be exempt.
Postwatch Scotland said exemptions should only be made in "exceptional" cases and criticised Consignia's database, which contains details of addresses and the reasons they should be exempted, for being littered with inaccuracies.
Examples included a house listed as containing a "dangerous dog", which died four years ago, and a home marked "inaccessible" even though the owner said the road leading to it was regularly used.
A spokesman for Consignia said there was never any intention to increase that number of exemptions.
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments