Leaders of the UK’s powerful Communication Workers Union were due to meet today to decide whetherto accept a 2.5%, below-inflation pay offer from Royal Mail or ballot 150,000 of their members on a
national strike at the state-owned postal operator.The union is planning to ballot members – on what would be the first strike at Royal Mail ina decade – on Tuesday next week, if it cannot reach a negotiated settlement with the group over payand cost cuts.
“It is clear that (Royal Mail’s) first offer on basic pay of 2.5% flowing through toeverything – although well below our aspirations – has come about as a result of the pressureapplied by the union. The offer remains conditional on unacceptable strings,” CWU deputy generalsecretary Dave Ward has written in a letter to members. Top-line inflation is approaching 5% in theUK:
Royal Mail is also offering employees lump-sum payments of between GBP 250 and GBP 550 eachif they accept radical working changes proposed in a GBP 350 million cost-cutting programme.
The cuts will see collections from post boxes reduced by half, with weekend and night shiftwork reduced at many mail centres. The union called the proposed changes a “cost-cutting frenzy”and has accused Royal Mail of panicking.
Royal Mail has been criticised for high labour costs by Postcomm, the UK postal regulator,and the group agrees its workers are already sufficiently highly paid, saying the 2.5% offer isfinal.
The CWU narrowly lost a national strike ballot four years ago over a larger pay offer, worth14% over three years.
