UK post strike threat looms in pay dispute

The threat of a national postal strike was set to come a step nearer today when workers decide whether to set a deadline for resolving bitter disputes over pay and the future of the Royal Mail.

The Communication Workers Union has clashed with the postal organisation after a 2.9% pay rise was imposed and chairman Allan Leighton made clear his intention to press ahead with issuing shares to workers.

The union believes shares would open the door to privatising the Royal Mail, despite denials from Mr Leighton.

Delegates at the union's annual conference in Bournemouth will today discuss an emergency motion which sets a four week deadline for making progress, otherwise a national strike ballot will go ahead.

The motion calls for pay talks to be reopened and attacks the Royal Mail for trying to “marginalise” the union.

General secretary Billy Hayes accused Mr Leighton of being an “out of control civil servant.”

He added: “We are fed up with the nonsense and media speculation over shares for workers.

“We find ourselves in a crazy situation where an out of control public servant who was appointed by the Government to run a public company is pressurising that same Government to effectively privatise this public service. He has no authority to do this.”

Mr Leighton announced last week that 80,000 employees had responded to a Royal Mail consultation saying they backed shares.

The union will today announce the result of its own consultative ballot of workers on its vision of a publicly owned Royal Mail, as well as a telephone poll carried out by an independent market research company.

The CWU said it believed the ballot will send a serious message to the Royal Mail and the Government that postal workers were not interested in “selling out” their industry for a “short lived windfall.”

Peter Hain, Secretary of State for Northern Ireland and Wales told the CWU conference yesterday that he was opposed to Post Office privatisation “by the front door and certainly not by the back door.”

Mr Hayes added: “By carrying out this ballot the union has done what Royal Mail was afraid to do – give people a choice over their future.

“By imposing a pay offer rejected by the union, Allan Leighton rules by diktat rather than democracy.”

Dave Ward, the union's Deputy General Secretary, added: “Royal Mail needs to understand how serious we are about the imposition of pay. If they don't return to negotiations they will be faced with the prospect of a national strike ballot.”

Postal workers to debate four-week deadline
Financial Times UK, London Ed1, Sec. NATIONAL NEWS BUSINESS AND ECONOMY, p 4 05-23-2006
By By ANDREW TAYLOR
Postal workers will be asked today to set a deadline for a strike vote if Royal Mail refuses to improve on an imposed 2.9 per cent pay rise and negotiate on the future of the business.

An emergency motion at the annual conference of the Communication Workers' Union in Bournemouth will give Royal Mail four weeks to reopen pay negotiations or face a ballot for industrial action. The CWU represents 160,000 of Royal Mail's 200,000 workers

The union is in conflict with the state-owned company over pay, pensions, job cuts and the offer of shares to Royal Mail workers.

The CWU fears the share issue would open the way for a full-scale privatisation of the company.

However, Peter Hain, Northern Ireland secretary, told the conference yesterday that he would oppose any moves to privatise Royal Mail. He asserted: "I say no to Post Office privatisation, not by the front door and certainly not by the back door." Mr Hain, however, did not specifically refer to the plan to issue shares to staff.

The union has warned it will withdraw Pounds 600,000 a year in support for the Labour party if the government agrees to the share issue. The emergency mo-tion says the company's efficiency plans, which could lead to the axing of a further 40,000 jobs and measures to "introduce back-door privatisation", were "completely unacceptable to the union."

It says the government and Royal Mail should also "fulfil their moral obligations" to protect members' pensions. "If acceptable progress is not made on these objectives within four weeks, we will implement a timetable for an industrial action ballot."

The government last week announced a Pounds 1.75bn package towards Pounds 2bn to pay for modernisation. It would also assist the company to cope with a pension fund deficit, which has increased from Pounds 4.5bn to Pounds 5.6bn over the past three years. The package involves no subsidies, which could fall foul of EU competition rules, but extends an existing Pounds 900m loan facility, repayable at commercial rates of interest.