It is evident that if Canada Post sticks to the status quo, its future sustainability will be jeopardized. A competitive and unpredictable e-commerce sector is now exacerbated by the growing insignificance of postal mail, as well as the loss of personalized postal services. This unstable environment is further complicated by Canada Post\u2019s need to follow through on the universal service obligation, requiring the delivery of fewer letters to more Canadian addresses. These realities call for substantial change. For commonwealth countries such as Australia and the U.K., change has come in the form of privatization. In Canada, this prompts the question: should our national postal service be privatized as well?<\/p>\n
Canadian public enterprise<\/p>\n
Any discussion on Canadian privatization, usually interpreted as the sale of federal Crown corporations to private investors, requires a little history. In contrast to the U.S., Canada has often been considered a \u201cpublic enterprise country.\u201d This set an arguable precedent that, at least in part, influenced the command and control of the nation\u2019s railway, aviation and oil sectors for several decades. In this context, the topic of privatization at Canada Post evokes mixed, unresolved perspectives, some of which stick\u00a0to the old ethos, while others champion a new vision consistent with some modern trends and standards.<\/p>\n
Within this unsettled sphere, large companies such as the Canadian National Railway, Air Canada and Petro-Canada privatized ownership structures\u00a0in tune with contemporary commercial demands.<\/p>\n
Considering Canada\u2019s public, federally oriented roots, Canada Post\u2019s Crown-controlled arrangement has endured beyond what some critics take to be its \u201cbest before\u201d date.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
From a sociological perspective, University of Toronto law and economics professor Michael Trebilcock claims Canadians have been largely indifferent to privatization waves that began picking up speed in 1986. In 2007, Trebilcock took note of this nonchalant reaction while co-authoring a report on privatization titled Rerouting the Mail: Why Canada Post is Due for Reform<\/a>. <\/em><\/p>\n
\u201cPrivatization happened and most people couldn’t care less. There might be some resistance but don\u2019t count on it enduring forever,\u201d says Trebilcock.<\/p>\n
Interest in privatization is hardly black and white however. Around the time that federal privatization took off in 1985 with the sale of Northern Transportation Company Ltd., the Economic Council of Canada reported in 1986 that public enterprise was, \u201c\u2026deeply embedded in the fabric of Canadian society.\u201d<\/p>\n
Foreign postal mail privatization<\/p>\n
Considering Canada\u2019s public, federally oriented roots, Canada Post\u2019s Crown-controlled arrangement has endured beyond what some critics take to be its \u201cbest before\u201d date. On an international scale, industrialized countries akin to Canada have, since the late 1980s, moved increasingly towards deregulation. Reforms in countries such as Finland, Germany and the Netherlands have concentrated on commercial, liberalized objectives in shifting the nature of postal mail systems.<\/p>\n
G7 postal mail ownership structures<\/h3>\n