UK postal strike looms over pay row
The threat of the first national postal strike for a decade came a step closer today when union leaders decided to ballot 130,000 workers for industrial action in a bitter row over pay.
The Communication Workers Union said its members will decide over the next few weeks whether to launch a campaign of industrial action in protest at an imposed wage rise of 2.9%.
Ballot papers will be sent to postal workers on July 10 and the result will be known at the end of the month.
The union's deputy general secretary Dave Ward said the Royal Mail was being given a week to try to reach a deal, adding: “Royal Mail should be under no illusion that the CWU is prepared to take decisive action to defend the pay and future job security of our members.
“I would suggest that Royal Mail seize this opportunity and work hard to reach an acceptable agreement or a strike ballot will take place.”
General secretary Billy Hayes said: “Imposing an un-agreed pay rise was always going to create conflict. This is a serious decision, but the union has provided a window of a week for Royal Mail to use their energies to reach a settlement with our negotiating team.”
The union said the dispute was also over job losses and changes to working practices.
Delegates at the union's annual conference set a four week deadline last month for triggering a ballot if the deadlock was not broken.
The deadline has now passed, bringing the threat of the first nationwide walkout since 1996 much closer.
A spokesman for the Royal Mail said: “The Royal Mail remains very willing to talk with the union.”
The company said it was facing a huge challenge in modernising the postal business in an “increasingly tough” market.
Front line reps and managers had been invited to meetings this week with chairman Allan Leighton and chief executive Adam Crozier to talk about facing the challenges together, the spokesman said.
He went on: “We want the union to respond to us with their ideas as to how we can meet the challenges we face.
“We'll be entering into a series of tests to look at new ways of working and as part of that, we will clearly be happy to test any ideas that our unions put forward.
“We know we have to become more efficient and we have reiterated the company policy that any resulting job losses will be handled only through voluntary redundancy and natural turnover.
“Any moves to move people from full-time to part-time working will be entirely the choice of the individuals and no-one will be forced to change to part-time.”
The Royal Mail said that as well as the imposed 2.9% pay rise, the company will add an extra 1% through a productivity scheme, bringing the total rise to 3.9%.
“At a time when everyone in the company needs to pull together to ensure our success in a competitive market, it is really important that we focus on the competition and not on internal issues.”
Postal workers may be balloted on strike ROYAL MAIL
Financial Times UK, London Ed2, Sec. NATIONAL NEWS, p 4 06-27-2006
By By JOHN WILLMAN
Postal workers will be balloted on strike action unless Royal Mail agrees by the end of the week to increase the 2.9 per cent pay rise it imposed in May.
The Communication Workers' Union, which represents 160,000 of the company's 200,000 staff, has set a deadline of next Monday to reach agreement. If none is reached, members will be asked to support the first national strike since 1996.
Billy Hayes, general secretary, said: "Imposing a pay rise was always going to create conflict. This is a serious decision but the union has provided a week . . . for Royal Mail to use their energies to reach a settlement with our negotiating team."
The last ballot for national action three years ago resulted in a narrow rejection of industrial action. The union wants guarantees on job security and pensions and opposes plans to issue staff with shares representing 20 per cent of the value of the business. Royal Mail said last night it remained willing to talk to the union. Last week, it offered an additional 1 per cent to reflect productivity gains negotiated office by office, which the union regards as separate to the 2006 pay rise.
Some of the financial questions hanging over Royal Mail were resolved with a government-backed package last month that will allow it to invest Pounds 1.2bn in modernising its operations. The package also allowed it to reach agreement with its pension scheme trustees over plans to eliminate the Pounds 5.6bn deficit over the next 17 years.
However, price caps agreed with Postcomm, the industry regulator, in April assume the postal operator will find efficiency savings of 3 per cent a year. Royal Mail expects modernisation to lead to the loss of up to 40,000 jobs but has pledged that there will be no compulsory redundancies.
Meanwhile, the full opening of the postal market to competition on January 1 has increased the competitive pressure on the former monopoly.
Allan Leighton, Royal Mail chairman, and Adam Crozier, its chief executive, have invited all frontline CWU representatives to a meeting later this week to discuss the challenges facing Royal Mail.
Royal Mail said: "At a time when everyone in the company needs to pull together to ensure our success in a competitive market, it is really important we focus on the competition and not on internal issues."
