Royal Mail split threat grows as bosses say ‘change will happen with or without union agreement’

© Reuters. Royal Mail split threat grows as bosses say 'change will happen with or without union agreement'

Proactive Investors – Royal Mail (LON:) bosses said they will push through their intended workplace reforms, including increased automation, with or without an agreement with workers.
Keith Williams, chairman of parent company, International Distributions Services PLC, and Simon Thompson, who is chief executive of the UK postal business, said a £1.7bn war chest has been built up to invest in the business, despite their claims that the business is losing £1mln a day.
Thompson and Williams said that 12,000 postal workers are regularly crossing the picket lines in recent weeks, up from around 2,000 in the summer.
The Communication Workers Union (CWU) has launched a series of strikes in the run-up to Christmas after negotiations over pay and conditions broke down, including a two-day walkout this week and again on 23 and 24 December.
Williams and Thompson want to improve efficiency at Royal Mail using more automation, changing working hours and contracts, which they say is essential for the future of the business, threatening to split the group in two “in the event that significant operational change within Royal Mail in the UK is not achieved.
Williams said “the change is going to happen anyway” in an interview with the Telegraph, “regardless of whether there’s an agreement with the union or not”.
The CWU said it was “an outright assault on our members and your postal workers”.
Williams and Thompson said office workers including those from the finance and legal teams were “on the front line delivering post”, with a recent initiative to get ‘friends and family’ to come into work as the company looks to clear the backlog of parcels, where the chairman said Christmas has meant despite the strikes the parcels market “holds up nicely”.
With the CWU due to ballot its members at Royal Mail for another six-month mandate to strike in January, Williams said the CWU saying the company is threatening 25,000 compulsory redundancies “is nothing more than a scaremongering tactic”.
The threat of Williams and the board to split Royal Mail from international parcels arm GLS, which has its own separate CEO, would not be easy and might not receive shareholder support, analysts have warned.
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