It will maintain the single price ‘universal service obligation’. The government will keep its ‘golden share’. And there are ‘legally binding obligations’ to protect the company. The Labour government may feel it has negotiated enough concessions out of the Czech billionaire Daniel Kretinsky to allow his £3.6 billion takeover of Royal Mail to go ahead. Here’s the problem, though. If the company declines even further, as it almost certainly will, it will be Keir Starmer’s government which gets the blame.
With approval from the government, Kretinsky’s acquisition of the Royal Mail now looks certain to go ahead. The Czech tycoon has made so many promises, it is hard to see how it could have been stopped. He has pledged to keep its headquarters and tax residency in the UK for the next five years.