Fears for hundreds of Liverpool Royal Mail jobs
Empty collection vans outside the Royal Mail depot at Copperas Hill, Liverpool _320
Hundreds of postal jobs are under threat today over fears that Liverpool’s Copperas Hill sorting office could be axed.
Workers’ representatives fear a new review of resources could resurrect plans to shut the city centre site and transfer work to Warrington.
Mail officials tried to switch the work in 1997 in a proposed shake-up.
Royal Mail is half way through a six-week review of north west postal centres.
Communication Workers’ Union (CWU) Merseyside branch secretary Mark Walsh believes Royal Mail are ready to return with closure plans.
He has called a meeting on Sunday lunchtime to bring postal workers up to date with the review.
Since the last study there has been no investment in new technology at Copperas Hill.
Mr Walsh said the most modern machine, which could handle A4 envelopes, was removed last October while his members were on unofficial strike.
The review was a response to a fall in the amount of mail moving around seven mail centres within a 50-mile radius.
Mr Walsh fears redundancies will be necessary adding to what he claimed were 1,000 Merseyside job losses in the past 11 years, including 500 at a former Bootle parcels depot.
A Royal Mail spokeswoman said: “The current mail centre network is not capable of providing and sustaining the improvements to efficiency required for Royal Mail to meet the challenges of an open, competitive market in which mail volumes are declining.
“The review will identify where improvements can be made.
“The company is talking to its employees and the unions about the review and, once the outcome is known, its priority will be to support those affected through any changes.”
Merseyside’s 2,500 postal workers are being balloted next Monday on new pension plans.
