I cannot resist being able to speak about letterboxes. To be honest, letterbox height is important. Even those of us who are seasoned leaflet deliverers do not have the same daily meeting with letterboxes of various heights as the posties do.
From the point of view of the people who are doing their daily rounds delivering mail, we ought to have letterboxes not just at the right height but of the right width, horizontal not vertical, and where you can push thin letters through without their being crumpled up. The hard brushes and spring-loaded letterboxes should be condemned to oblivion, in my view.
Just as important is the number of Royal Mail deliverers who find, when they put their hand through a letterbox to deliver a letter, that there is a dog at the other end that takes a snap at their fingers. When people in my ward help with delivery, we give them a ruler to push through. I can show you the bite marks on the ruler. Dogs are behind those letterboxes and therefore there ought to be safeguards at the other side of the letterboxes for those who are delivering.
I had to go to one house in Yorkshire that said on the door, “Beware of the cat”. When you tried to deliver a leaflet, a paw came out, with claws out ready to strike if you were not quick enough. Beware of cats in Yorkshire, and beware of dogs everywhere.
Although we are making light of this, it is important that it is addressed: that we get letterboxes at a height where posties do not have to break their backs to deliver Royal Mail. Get rid of those horrible hard brushes—there is no need for any of that, and let us get the height right. That will be to everybody’s benefit.