Unions call for UPS talks over €5bn TNT Express acquisition
International union groups are calling on UPS to get round the negotiating table to discuss the rights of its workers around the world regarding its merger with TNT Express. UNI Global Union and the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) said today they wanted to safeguard the jobs and working conditions of current TNT employees and ensure UPS respects the collective bargaining rights of the acquired workforce.
UPS is in the process of buying TNT Express for around EUR 5.2bn, although the deal remains subject to shareholder and regulatory approvals. It could close by the third quarter of 2012.
Not including any synergy-related job losses, the merger would create a global logistics company with a workforce of 475,778 as of the end of 2011.
This would be the largest workforce in the world for a global integrator, topping Deutsche Post DHL’s 423,348-strong work force and FedEx’s 255,573 staff and contractors, though falling behind the world’s biggest postal service, the US Postal Service, which has a current work force of 547,222 (January 2012).
The two global unions said today they wanted UPS to extend its “culture of cooperation” with workers across its growing worldwide network.
The ITF and UNI said they hoped to ensure UPS and TNT workers were not “pitted against each other” as the two corporations are integrated, and that existing union agreements are honoured.
“Example”
The ITF’s general secretary, David Cockroft, said: “UNI and the ITF will ask that the new, larger UPS sets an example to the logistics industry by negotiating with its unions around the world and entering a formal dialogue.”
Cockroft added that the union groups had been pleased with last year’s recognition by UPS of the Turkish Motorised Transport Workers’ Union after a 272-day protest by its workers.
Unions in Belgium and the Netherlands have written in recent days to the TNT Express board expressing concerns about the acquisition, and demanding safeguards for both jobs and working conditions under existing labour contracts.
TNT Express has denied media reports in the last few days that the takeover by UPS could result in 20,000 job losses in the Netherlands.
UPS chief executive Scott Davis said on Monday that it was “way too early to talk about redundancies”, as the company plans out a potentially four-year process of integration.
However, he did warn that the $500-$720m of synergy cost savings could prove “difficult” despite his company’s desire to use attrition before other options to reduce overlaps in the combined work force.
