Royal Mail proposes 6% three-year pay deal to CWU

Royal Mail has put forward a proposal to CWU which includes a 6% three-year pay deal for CWU-grade people. 

Shane O’Riordain, Managing Director of Regulation, Corporate Affairs and Marketing, Royal Mail said: “This means an increase, including the first hour of the shorter working week, of more than 16 % between 1 April 2018 and 31 March 2023. We have said that we can only afford to do this if we deliver on the Plan we announced to our stakeholders in May 2019. To do this, we need to change more quickly than before.

“Our proposal underlines our commitment to being the best employer in our industry. It maintains our policy of no compulsory redundancies for frontline operational colleagues. We will not become a gig economy employer. We will not introduce zero hours contracts for permanent employees.

“Nor would we look to outsource Royal Mail’s core operations. We want to invest £1.8 billion in the UK. We need to turnaround and grow our UK business. This means the further automation of parcels, including the deployment of three new automated parcel hubs. Most of our parcels are currently hand sorted, just as they were in the Victorian period.

“We will introduce a second van delivery in most parts of the country. This is about capitalising on the growth of “night owl” shopping. We will do this by introducing around 7,000 dedicated van delivery routes from c300 delivery offices by 2023.

“Delivery of letters and small parcels will remain unchanged through our existing Delivery Office network UK letter volumes are expected to decline by 75 % in the 2004 – 2024 period. So, over the next four years, we plan to carefully reduce the number of daily walks from c58,000 to c50,000. Alongside this, we want to invest in the upgrading of the infrastructure that delivers the Universal Service. This means £115 million invested in upgrading our facilities, and £400 million in new vehicles to improve the fleet.

“Our plan is about a modern, contemporary Universal Service. It is about what our customers want. It is about ensuring we remain the best employer in our industry. We hope to convince the union to support us to grow Royal Mail.”