Royal Mail have released this year’s Christmas stamps, and yet again we’ve managed to create a perfectly horrible, ever more nauseatingly religious, set of designs – which isn’t helped by this ubiquitous barcode.

Royal Mail had (at least until recently) a policy of alternating religious and secular themes year-by-year. This seems to have gone by the board as the last five years’ designs have all been religious.

Yes, I know Christmas is supposed to be a religious festival, and this is a nominally Christian country. However it would be really good to (a) have some stamps celebrating the pagan Yule – or Roman Saturnalia which provided much of the Christian festivity – and (b) some decent, simple designs.

We’ve had special Christmas stamps every year since 1966 (thanks to the then Postmaster General, Tony Benn, whose idea it was). But to my mind there have been few really good designs. From all the years, perhaps the one I like best – for their clean simplicity – are the ones from 1980.

With 1969, 1973 and 1993 following on (not necessarily in that order).

As for the rest, they span the range from merely OK to abominably awful.

Not that other countries’ stamps are necessarily any better, although many are.