Over 1,000 Royal Mail workers in four distribution centres in Britain have voted in favour ofindustrial action against what their union described as “heavy handed” management handling of
changes to mail circulation.The Communication Workers Union (CWU) said that Royal Mail had imposed changes to workingpractices and failed to honour national agreements at the branches in Essex, Crick, London andNottingham.
CWU Assistant Secretary Terry Pullinger said: “Throughout the last few weeks the CWU has goneto great lengths to both appeal to Royal Mail and assure the business and public we serve, that wewish to avoid any strike and only want sensible dialogue, respect and agreement.”
Meanwhile, some 500 Post Office staff across 34 offices in Greater Manchester and South WestWales are being balloted for industrial action over the franchising out of Crown office services toWH Smiths, resulting in some 124 job losses at 34 post offices.
CWU Assistant Secretary Andy Furey said: “Our members are deeply unhappy over the continuingdowngrading of the service and are particularly alarmed at the emerging partnership between PostOffice Ltd and WH Smiths. Valuable public services and skilled staff are being lost toinexperienced retailers who refuse to take on Post Office employees.
“We are encouraging all local residents to boycott WH Smiths to force them to pull out ofthese unpopular franchise agreements which will lead to the loss of over 124 highly trained PostOffice staff,” he added.
