Royal Mail PLC to strike as 1,000 workers to be axed and ‘fired and rehired’ on lower wages

Royal Mail PLC (LSE:RMG) faces UK-wide strikes over plans to axe 1,000 managers.

The union Unite claims the postal group is planning to sack the staff and hire them back on lower salaries – a practice known as “fire and rehire”.

Royal Mail denies the claims.

Unite now plans to ballet staff with industrial action possible by next month, the Guardian reported. 

Letter and parcel services across the UK would be hit by the strike if the 3,000 Royal Mail workers walked out of the company’s 1,500 workplaces.

Unite alleges employers have been moving the goalposts during negotiations on proposed reforms.

As a result of an initial consultation with Unite’s members, nearly 67% of workers supported industrial action.

According to the union, Royal Mail plans to cut hundreds of existing postal manager jobs and introduce a new salary lower band for managers.

“Royal Mail has no excuse for announcing these job cuts,” Unite general secretary, Sharon Graham said. “Especially at the same time as ‘new’ bands on lower pay. That is just ‘fire and rehire’.

“They are not even losing money – Royal Mail’s private shareholders are doing very nicely out of the UK. Our members are determined to prevent this destruction and they have the full backing of their union every step of the way.”

The union claims the job cuts are driven by shareholder greed, despite the company’s record profits of £311mln, and the real plan is to eventually end the six-day delivery service altogether and move to the 3-day service model used in some European countries like Denmark.

In 2021, Royal Mail laid off 1,600 employees, leaving it seriously understaffed.

The union said it can’t afford to lose more business-critical jobs at a time when the company is already struggling to meet quality targets set by the regulator Ofcom.