Brian Rudman: Getting the message across with a simple sticker

The draconian $20,000 fine for distributing unwanted junk mail that North Shore, Waitakere and Rodney councils are proposing sounds like something from the "If I was a dictator for a day" wish list.

Like the desire to imprison a Stagecoach boss in a glass bus stop for a day whenever my bus fails to turn up on time of a morning.

The councils are proposing to fine any person up to $20,000 who "shall deposit, cause, permit or authorise the deposit of any unsolicited advertising mail, circulars, leaflets, brochures or flyers in any letter box which is clearly marked 'no circulars', 'no junk mail' or a sign with words to like effect, or on any parked vehicle ... in a public place."

All of which sounds pretty comprehensive. Embarrassingly comprehensive perhaps and not very well thought out, given the dependence our electoral process puts on direct marketing.

A smart politician would have at least snuck in an exclusion clause for his or her own election material. But there's no sign of one, for either local or national politics.

Which has left Labour Party president Mike Williams, a one-time direct marketeer himself, unimpressed and defiant.

"The message I give to the people who distribute our election propaganda is to ignore the 'no junk mail' stickers on the grounds it's not junk mail, it is material that affects the most important thing you do every three years, which is to exercise your vote."

He says all political parties also send mail to voters using addresses off the electoral roll. "This is addressed mail but it is not solicited, no one asked you to send it. Is the Post Office expected to make a judgment about delivering it?"

If you wanted to get tricky you could take the argument of Mr Williams a step further and suggest that most bills we receive by mail fit into this unsolicited advertising category. Certainly they're unwanted, and these days they inevitably come with a confetti of additional promotional material.

Then there are the charity appeal envelopes, the magazines seeking subscription updates and the big institutions like, for example, the Automobile Association, which regularly tries to sign me up for monthly payments in the big lottery of death insurance - kill yourself on the road and collect big time.

So that makes the Labour Party, the Post Office and the AA potentially guilty under the by-law. What test cases they would make.

The other approach would be to prosecute the delivery people. People like the family that sweeps down my street twice a week stuffing letterboxes as they go, or the elderly old dear who ambles along with her junk mail-filled delivery pram, rain and shine.

Of course the real estate agencies and supermarkets who are behind the bulk of the problem are harder to ping.

It's hard to see them suffering. They're not involved in the actual dirty work and will no doubt argue they told the delivery people to obey the bylaw. Perhaps a smarter alternative to tying up staff and money in bans and prosecutions is to encourage the wider use of "No Junk Mail" stickers in the first place.

A year ago, North Shore City conducted a study of 181 households. Of them, 23 per cent already had a "no junk mail" sign on their letterbox. During the trial, 50 per cent used the sign. The sign resulted in a 70 per cent reduction in unsolicited material. Those without a sticker received 3.65kg of junk mail a month, those with one received 1.1kg.

After the trial was over, 60 per cent of the "sticker" households continued to use the "no junk mail" sticker, compared with 23 per cent beforehand. Envision New Zealand, which conducted the trial, noted that if 60 per cent of North Shore City households used such a sticker, 1342 tonnes of junk mail paper could be avoided every year.

If more than half the households of North Shore, Waitakere and Rodney were to declare their opposition to junk mail, who knows, perhaps the industry would get the message and begin to consider other forms of promotion. And even if it didn't stop all junk mail, it does seem a better way forward than the expensive and uncharted course through the courts.