Khalid Masood had paper - Amber Rudd calls for cellophane envelopes

It is now understood that Khalid Masood had access to paper and may have passed a postbox just before committing his attack. He had access to Royal Mail's service and although there's no way to know whether he posted anything, the police can't act because Royal Mail don't insist on the use of transparent envelopes and photocopy every letter. Clearly they need to take more responsibility for public safety and desist from providing a safe haven for terrorist communication.

Of course warrants can be obtained where there is a legitimate threat, but as Masood was in no way considered a risk by the authorities, surely it would be better if royal mail were more proactive in keeping copies of every unencrypted (can we agree plain English) letter just in case the police need it later? It's their civic duty.

And you needn't worry about UPS, Hermes, Yodel, TNT, ... we'll get to those.

We do however trust those prepared to commit fatal atrocities for which they ultimately cannot be held accountable (due to their own death) to use bona fide UK-based third party services and not employ foreign or illegal services, or make their own private communication arrangements. That is surely a line even they wouldn't cross.

On a similar note there will be no impact on legitimate businesses or private individuals. We are confident that foreign businesses with whom UK companies do business will not be concerned with security, at least since we promise not to look at any of the juicy details without a warrant and neither we nor Royal Mail have ever lost anything.

Of course we would all like to avoid legislation so if we could just persuade everyone to use cellophane envelopes and write in English, that would be just great.