Royal Mail ups pensions attack

Royal Mail this week threw down the gauntlet to postal workers and their union by deciding to implement its proposed closure of the final salary pensions scheme with just seven days notice.

The company said that there would be no further negotiation with the unions, and that the “consultation” with the scheme’s members was over.

Royal Mail is also spreading scare stories that unless there is “pensions reform” the company could be put in liquidation.

This is nonsense. The idea that the state-owned company that delivers most of Britain’s mail could simply go out of business is politically untenable.

The postal workers’ CWU union is conducting a consultative ballot on whether to accept Royal Mail’s pensions proposals. It will now find that bosses have closed the scheme before their result is even announced.

It is vital that the union moves fast to reclaim the initiative on the pensions issue. The consultative ballot must be followed with a swift announcement of a ballot for national strike action in defence of pension rights – with the demand that the government must be forced to step in to deal with the pensions deficit.

Royal Mail this week threw down the gauntlet to postal workers and their union by deciding to implement its proposed closure of the final salary pensions scheme with just seven days notice.

The company said that there would be no further negotiation with the unions, and that the “consultation” with the scheme’s members was over.

Royal Mail is also spreading scare stories that unless there is “pensions reform” the company could be put in liquidation.

This is nonsense. The idea that the state-owned company that delivers most of Britain’s mail could simply go out of business is politically untenable.

The postal workers’ CWU union is conducting a consultative ballot on whether to accept Royal Mail’s pensions proposals. It will now find that bosses have closed the scheme before their result is even announced.

It is vital that the union moves fast to reclaim the initiative on the pensions issue. The consultative ballot must be followed with a swift announcement of a ballot for national strike action in defence of pension rights – with the demand that the government must be forced to step in to deal with the pensions deficit.