by Richie Venton
The Scottish Socialist Party is in full support of the thousands of postal workers who are staging strike action and other protests on Friday 17th July, in anger at arbitrary cuts to staffing levels and service levels to the public.
These cuts are being imposed by Royal Mail bosses in flagrant breach of the 2007 Pay and Modernisation Agreement, signed after strike action that year.
Delivery Ofices and Mail Centres in Edinburgh and East/Central Scotland will walk out, as will Irvine posties the next day. This is part of a growing groundswell of strikes across the UK, with 400 other offices requesting ballots for strike action.
High-and-mighty Royal Mail bosses are imposing cuts to staff and services; managers are using bully-boy tactics to impose the cuts, and ever-increasing workloads are being heaped on the shoulders of a shrinking workforce. Pressure and stress is at breaking point for postal workers, who are hitting back with escalating strike action.
John Brown, Scottish Regional Secretary of the Communications Workers’ Union (CWU) told me what lies behind the rolling anger and action by posties.
“Royal Mail is trying to impose cuts way beyond levels acceptable to either staff or the public who rely on the service we deliver. They are totally intransigent, refusing to negotiate and abide by the 2007 Pay and Modernisation Agreement, which stated that the union would be fully involved at all levels at all stages of modernization.
“They want 10 per cent savings across the board and insist that this must mean 10 per cuts to duties. There are not compulsory job losses as such, but they are sneaking through job losses. For instance, Royal Mail are forcing people to leave the industry; alongside their ‘savings’, a redundancy package is on offer, so when people who are fed up and want to get out of the job leave, they are not being replaced.
“The press is trying to play up the idea this strike action is about pay. Well, in reducing the numbers in Delivery Offices, Royal Mail is offering full-time workers part-time jobs – which obviously involve big pay cuts.
“But this is primarily strike action against the attack on the public service provided through arbitrary reductions in staffing levels.
“And these are NOT cuts due to the introduction of new machinery. The national Agreement means any new technology can only be introduced with the full agreement of the union and its members. So far only 4 or 5 pilot offices have had the new machinery tried out, and as we expected, they have not led to the savings Royal Mail predicted.
“But the cuts members are striking against are before the job cuts that new machinery will involve. By striking, members are effectively saying we cannot provide the level of service to the public expected of us because of the arbitrary cuts being imposed through executive action by the employers.
“There have been little or no local negotiations. Senior management of Royal Mail has failed to even turn up to the previous talks with the national union. Today (15th July), they are supposed to meet the union in London. Maybe the strike action in London will have concentrated the minds of the Neanderthal men in senior management and force them to make concessions!”
With the Royal Mail making £900,000 a day in profits, there is even less excuse for these cuts to jobs and services.
The New Labour government has been dealt a bloody nose on their plans to part-privatise Royal Mail. Now is the time for this wounded beast to be pursued through united, national strike action against their cuts.
These attacks are partly motivated by a desire for revenge for the defeat of privatisation on the part of Royal Mail bosses and Lord Mandelson, the Prince of Darkness and Dirty Deeds, who has announced his desire to accustom workers to a full decade of austerity, so as to enrich his friends in industry and the banks.
The growing revolt, through spreading strikes, could now be escalated into national strikes – accompanied by withdrawal of funding of New Labour by the CWU – which is an increasingly abusive relationship, akin to voluntary payouts to an arsonist to buy the fuel to torch your home!
The SSP stands unashamedly on the side of workers striking to preserve a vital public service.