The British postal workers union is pressing ahead with a ballot on a nationwide strike as regionalstrikes continue this week and the backlog from several weeks of targeted stoppages mounts up.
Many delivery offices in London are on one-day strikes this week as the series of regionalstoppages continues. The Communication Workers Union confirmed a national ballot of all 130,000Royal Mail postal workers will be held this month and that further regional strikes will continuenext week. The ballot will run September 16-30.
At the same time, the CWU called on Royal Mail to hold “meaningful” negotiations onmodernisation measures instead of “imposing changes” on the workforce.
Dave Ward, CWU deputy general secretary, declared: “Royal Mail’s head in the sand approach tothe problems in the mail industry is now severely damaging services for customers with backlogsbigger than in the national strike of 2007. Management have been attacking our members throughbullying-in unagreed, often unworkable, changes. The dismissive attitude to staff at the same timeas cuts to jobs, hours and overtime and a pay-freeze has made Royal Mail a dismal place to work.”
He added: “We are successful at bringing in change by agreement. Royal Mail needs the backingof postal workers to make the company successful and make change work. We want them to see senseand negotiate agreements which make change work for the company, staff and customers.”
The CWU claimed that the mail backlog around the country after several weeks of regionalstrikes was now larger than at the height of the 2007 national strike, with well over 20 millionitems in London alone, and mail was being delivered with delays of over one week.
In response, Royal Mail attacked as wholly irresponsible the CWU’s threat to press ahead witha national strike ballot even as talks between senior management and the union leadership weretaking place. The ballot is simply the latest attempt by the CWU to oppose the essentialmodernisation of Royal Mail despite its public claims to support change, it said.
Royal Mail said it faces an absolute need to change and modernise to improve its efficiency,and ensure it can continue providing the one-price-goes-anywhere Universal Service. The changescurrently being introduced in a fair way were all agreed by the CWU leadership and are covered bythe 2007 Pay and Modernisation Agreement which the union signed in the presence of the TUC. Thechanges had already been successfully implemented in the majority of offices around the UK, itadded.
Paul Tolhurst, Royal Mail’s Operations Director, said: “We urge the CWU to abandon strikesand the threat of strikes, and focus on providing customers with the service they need and expect,rather than planning to hurt them with the threat of more strikes.
“The union keeps saying that it recognises change is inevitable and it claims to supportmodernisation – so why can’t it bring itself to get on with creating a successful future for thecompany and its people instead of hurting customers, damaging the job prospects of its members andignoring the reality of increasing competition, especially from email and the web?”
Tolhurst said: “Loss of traffic and revenue on this scale makes change inevitable andmodernisation essential – and lip service from a union actually intent on strikes is simply notgood enough, either for our customers or our people. Royal Mail’s future rests on providingcustomers with high quality, reliable services at great value-for-money and it’s time the unionrealised that customers have a choice in a market where there are not just many rival carriers butrival electronic means of communication.”
