Royal Mail has turned to temps to deliver mail in Berkshire after making 45 workers redundant.

The company admitted to local papers that it had turned to the Reed employment agency to hire untrained workers to cover staff sickness or holidays. It has also scrapped second-class deliveries across the Reading area in a cost-cutting exercise and 45 postmen and women have taken redundancy as a result.

The staffing shortages became public after a retired businessman spotted three teenagers without uniforms helping a postman deliver mail.

A Royal Mail spokesman admitted that the company did sometimes use casual workers but added that many workers were off sick or on holiday at the moment.

He added that the firm’s first priority was its customers and that it only used casual staff as a last resort to fulfil its contractual duties.

Royal Mail has finally become profitable again after five years of financial turmoil.