Metanoodle: Kill the exclusive clause. The Post Office can charge $1 or whatever it wants.

A dollar a stamp (March 31) and no home delivery by 2019 is a good deal for the Post Office. I'd like to see them make a profit. It's not a good deal for us until a clause changes in the Canada Post Corporation Act. It's illegal to collect or deliver letters unless you charge customers three times the first class rate.

14. (1) Subject to section 15: The Corporation has the sole and exclusive privilege of collecting, transmitting and delivering letters to the addressee thereof within Canada.

I remember licking this to a 1st class letter

15. (1) The exclusive privilege referred to in subsection 14 (1) does not apply to...
15. (1) (e) Letters of an urgent nature that are transmitted by a messenger for a fee at least equal to an amount that is three times the regular rate of postage payable for delivery in Canada of similarly addressed letters weighing fifty grams;

Most messages already bypass the post office and couriers, thanks to email. Email cleverly eludes the grip of the law but would surely have been targeted if lawmakers had seen it coming. In my foolish youth I pictured a local mail service that I would run out of a kiosk at the mall for half the price of a first class letter. A couple times a day I'd let myself in to sort mail into destination slots, all in the same town. The outside would be an attractive wrap-around bank of mail boxes with a door and a groovy logo. The threat of jail deterred me.