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(Bloomberg) — Royal Mail Plc workers voted in favor of a strike that could affect the busy year-end holiday period, potentially throwing the world’s oldest postal service into disarray.
About 97% of members backed a national walkout, the U.K.’s Communications Workers Union said on Tuesday. Details of the plan, including the timing, will be determined over the next few weeks, General Secretary Dave Ward told reporters in London on Tuesday.
The result gives the service’s 110,000 unionized employees extra leverage in an ongoing dispute over issues such as shorter working weeks, pensions and job security. Apart from religious holidays such as Christmas, a strike could affect the shopping bonanza that is Black Friday on Nov. 29.
The timing “is a matter for our executive to determine but we will go there if we can’t get the agreement back on track,” said Ward, referring to a 2018 deal between the union and the company. “I would hope that the public understands that we are about defending the service.”
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Royal Mail, which was government owned for almost five centuries, is battling with the shift to online messaging from letters and is seeking a greater share of the growing market for parcels. In May, the London-based company slashed its dividend to free up 1.8 billion pounds ($2.3 billion) for a planned overhaul after earnings fell.
The service was state-owned until 2013, when then Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne sold the business to reduce the nation’s debt. The initial disposal of a 60% stake was heavily criticized for underestimating demand and therefore under-pricing the company, and the stock at first soared above its initial public offering price of 330 pence.
The shares have since slumped, and are down 20% this year. They erased daily losses when the strike was announced, gaining 1.7% to 216.40 pence at the close in London.
(Updates with union comment starting in second paragraph)
To contact the reporter on this story: Siddharth Philip in London at sphilip3@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Anthony Palazzo at apalazzo@bloomberg.net, John Bowker
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