Royal Mail workers now need union’s full support

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While leaders of the CWU are seeking deals, workers feel victimised—but are ready for more action says Nick Clark

Union leaders at Royal Mail were still striving to get a deal with top bosses a week after they’d hoped to end the fight over pay and jobs. But anger among workers at attacks on jobs and conditions and victimisations of union activists isn’t making it easy for them to compromise with bosses’ negotiators.

In a statement on Friday of last week, CWU union leaders said talks had been “extremely difficult.”  They added that this week would be “critical to the outcome of this dispute.”

The union leaders had hoped to get a final agreement on Sunday 12 March. But by last Friday they had to announce talks would carry on this week, with both sides recognising they were “at a crunch point.”  Under orders from above, ­workplace managers have pushed through cuts to make collection and delivery routes fewer, longer and harder.

In a “joint statement” earlier this month, CWU leaders agreed to changes—known as revisions—going ahead if union reps were involved. In practice, it made CWU reps responsible for agreeing and implementing cuts alongside managers.

At the same time, managers have also carried on victimising reps and activists. One Royal Mail worker in Bristol told Socialist Worker, “The delivery offices are in an absolute mess. People are going off sick with stress in higher numbers, but managers are demanding ‘stress review meetings’ instead of accepting doctors’ notes.

“I know somebody in a delivery office who’s been there for 37 years. Suddenly he’s had his delivery route cut, and now he’s a reserve.”

CWU leaders said on Friday, “There is no prospect of us ­reaching an agreement with the employer unless we can urgently alleviate the pressure out in the field— including achieving justice for members and representatives who have been outrageously targeted.”

And they blamed the continuing attacks on “an out-of-control senior management team.” It is at least the third time in the dispute that bosses have offered to ease attacks on workers during talks—only to double down on them and demand union leaders sign up to their agenda.

Yet this time union leaders were careful not to mention the possibility of calling more strikes. They only said that their postal executive committee would “act to defend our members,” and that they would end talks “one way or the other.”

The worker in Bristol said his workmates were frustrated at not having been called out on strike since December last year. “They want action,” he said. “We had a second ballot for strikes this year and we’re not striking.

“We’ve got one branch secretary who’s back facing disciplinary charges that were dropped last year.  “I’ve heard one rep saying if he goes we’re walking, no question about it.  

“The key problem now is trust in the union. But if the bosses keep coming back at us then people on the ground are going to say that enough is enough.”