MANY years ago, I had a Christmas job as a postman. I learnt quite a few things that December; not least many new swear words, courtesy of the permanent postmen who sought to motivate us temps. On the first day, they used many colourful expletives to encourage us to follow the example of an Australian who had got his mail sorted and in the bag in double-quick time.

The next day we found out the secret of our antipodean colleague’s success. The only sorting he’d done was to separate the Christmas cards from the bills and other regular post. This was discovered by the police when they were alerted to an abandoned post sack and some ripped open envelopes in a nearby quiet alley.

But that was in the bad old days. Sure, some things have got worse but I feel there was more petty crime and fiddling going on in those days. A friend worked for a large catering organisation. Every other week, employees were encouraged to come in late one morning. That was so they could sign on. Another friend had a job driving children to a day centre. He used to park the minibus round the corner from the dole office and nip in to do the business. There were garages that would charge you double for an MoT, without seeing the car. As a society, we’ve cleaned up our act a lot.

Perhaps I’m just an optimist. I believe that the train will be on time, the police will listen to both sides and that road works will be coordinated and well organised. I believe that shops and pubs will never short change you and that Wiltshire Council has our best interests at heart all of the time. In short, I’m quite trusting.

As my mate Roger said “If we can’t trust people, we might as well give up”. I believe my fellow man is basically honest. And they – we – are. But a small minority must just see ‘mug’ written large on my forehead.

Over the past year, I’ve had at least three items of mail delivered in a plastic bag because the original envelope had been ‘opened in error’ or ‘damaged in transit’. One even had comedy tyre marks on it for added authenticity.

A couple of weeks ago, I posted some rail tickets to family in Yorkshire.

Trusting to the good people at Royal Mail, I stuck the tickets between a couple of bits of card, whacked them in an envelope with a second class stamp and posted it. That was on the Saturday. I was impressed to hear that the envelope arrived on the Monday. I was less impressed to hear that the enveloped had been crudely ripped and the tickets were missing, leaving just the cardboard in the envelope.

Naturally, I called Royal Mail to complain, having given up on their website which does appear to have been designed to make contacting them nigh on impossible. They were very polite and sympathetic but the upshot was basically ‘Tough. You should have used one of the signed-for services’. I should. My mistake. And a neat deflection of responsibility.

I’m pretty sure the tickets were removed by human hands so I contacted the police. They told me it was a civil matter. Just like they told another mate when his milk was nicked from the doorstep. Next I tried the rail company. I had a booking reference so I thought they would be able to cancel the (numbered) tickets and re-issue. No dice. As I’d collected them, they were my responsibility.

When all’s said and done, I trusted one of our national institutions and someone within that organisation betrayed that trust. I know lots of postmen. I like them; I know they’re honest. And I know that none would be so stupid as to risk their liberty and future over some train tickets. But there are some scumbags within their number.

This sort of petty theft will affect honest employees, and that is the vast majority. And it will kill off something of which we should be proud – our Royal Mail.