Sat 18 February - Post office fines

"What a totally surreal world we are in.

"We have a postal service that has been messed about with over the last few decades, by various means and by a variety of political administrations, now they are all cocked up due to, in the main, this constant interference, they are to be fined substantial sums of money for their reward.

"The excuses being they fail to meet targets, they have seemingly lost control of security so that large quantities of items go missing, and they are no doubt remiss in other aspects also.

"How the Post Office can 'guarantee' that targets can be met is questionable, how they can tighten up on security when letters and packages are sent via an unsecure method (just a stamp on the corner of the envelope with no routing record), and whatever else they are deemed guilty of, also being open to question, defeats me.

"If I gave a bag of nails to my employee and told him to knock them in, whilst I was off doing something else, and he managed to pocket some for his own use later, unless I actually and physically counted every nail knocked in, I would have no idea whether he had done just that.

"The same applies to letters etc, the postman/woman leaves the sorting office with mail, ON TRUST, and if they decide to rifle through some of it for their own ends, how can the Post Office be blamed.

"When that guy went through the money at the bank and cost a few billions, I can only see blame on the directors of that company for employing him. So what is the Post Office to do, send them out in pairs, each keeping a close eye on the other just in case one decides to have a peek into someones mail?

"I am sure that would cut out the likes of the woman recently found to have hoarded some tons of undeleiverd mail, but it would do nothing for efficiency, think of the extra staff required to ensure security by that route, and in all honesty I can see no other sensible means to ensure thieving is curtailed.

"The final point being, it is YOU, the post office customer that is being fined, not the Post Office, they will have to recoup those penalty sums from somewhere, and their only resource is US who buy the stamps.

"WE therefore, are allowing OURSELVES to be fined for something that virtually is uncontrollable by presently utilised methods of control.

"More fool us, suckers each and every one."

Note - Morgan's views are not necessarily shared by the BBC