14/10/26 Mount Pleasant Bulletin

[jimallen]

Hi, here's the Mount Pleasant bulletin of 14 October - we welcome your comments!

THE STABLE DOOR AND HORSE COME TO MIND...
CWU leaders have finally given up their charade that everything was hunky-dory in Delivery-Method-2026-land, and announced on Friday "a pause" to the "DM26" attacks on our conditions. In fact, DUMs have already implemented DM26 in the vast majority of DOs - and we've already been "pausing" it - by refusing to work it!

IT WAS US WHO PUT PAID TO DM26!
Union leaders now say DM26 was "not the union's preferred option"? But didn't they recommend that we vote for it, even though this DM26 didn't change anything substantial to the so-called Optimised Delivery Method (ODM) which it replaced? At the time, 78% of us either didn't vote, or voted against it... that says it all.

PAUSE… AND REWIND!
Why are delivery rounds with just one worker per van becoming the rule? We used to be two, not just so that we could share the work, but also because of security issues. So, more than a "pause" to DM26, what we want is a total "rollback" of the bosses' attacks - which only we can enforce!

WORKING BETTER, OR JUST MORE?
DUMs are "revising" walks, making them longer. While one day half the frame gets priority and the next day the other half, 1st class and tracked will still have us walking almost the whole route. Cue more late finishes, with it getting dark in a couple of months? Or simply (a lot!) more undelivered mail coming back to the office?!

100% OVERTIME BAN?
On Processing we've been told that the old "foreseen" and "unforeseen" Xmas S/A is going to be available again. But in addition, there are to be new, guaranteed slots on offer which managers would otherwise have given to the Xmas temps - though only on condition we commit 100% to attend. If we don't show up for any reason, we hear we'll be penalised by being banned from doing any overtime for 3 months!? Well, if this is how they want to play it, we can do some banning of our own...

CONFUSING FOR ANYONE!
The sheets of paper to submit with our Xmas S/A preferences have the dates on offer in such small fonts, we need a magnifying glass... and they're confusing as hell! If we choose Mondays, we'd be working all of them except 28 Dec. If we choose Thursdays, the 24th and 31st are missing. And Part-Timers are offered only Saturdays Lates and Nights... including 26 December, which is usually off!

RESTING LORRY
On the Platform, a 7.5T lorry from last century broke down on Monday... which meant that, for two hours, we were supposed to work around the broken lorry on the busiest day of the week. But some of us took a leaf out of the lorry's book and just took a rest.

WE'LL GO WHEN WE NEED TO GO!
The manager on the PSM now tells us that the reason we need to ask permission to go to the toilet is so that several of us don't go at the same time - so that the Parcel Sorting Monster is not left unmanned... But should we remind him that there were always supposed to be 12 of us on duty on the PSM, not 10? If there aren't enough hands on deck, it isn't our problem!

UNACCEPTABLE
The resign on Distribution started last week, and on Lates, many of the duties include more Saturdays. We certainly don't intend to give up our weekends with family and friends for the sake of RM's Distribution Network plan! So, shall we return it to sender?

NIGHT SHIFTS BAD ENOUGH...
On Distribution Nights, not many changes were introduced... but many of us are still meant to start shifts between 11.30pm and 12.15am when public transport has already wound down and we have to wait hours for night buses! There are rumours that managers want to push start times even later, at 1.30 am?! And pay our taxi fares?

FANCY PANCY RECRUITMENT
A few of our cleaner workmates are retiring or are just about to... and we wish them all the best on their release from HMP! Now managers are recruiting to replace those who've left, but they're asking for"references" and "job interviews"... as if they were recruiting for MI6!

LET'S KEEP THE CLUB ALIVE!
A couple of weeks ago, we got a letter from the secretary of our Mount Pleasant Sports and Social Club explaining that membership dues for the club will no longer be deducted directly from our wages. The club relies on these dues to stay alive - so if we want it to continue into the future, maybe we need to organise our own reliable subs system!

SMASH OPEN THEIR PIGGY BANKS
Last week RM announced 2,500 job cuts, affecting mainly managers in Farringdon 185 (part of the Unite CMA union), but also revenue protection workers who are part of the CWU. They may not be "compulsory" redundancies, but they're job cuts and we are against them! The owners of RM say it's to save money - just after they've increased their collective pay packets to £9.8m, more than double the £4.2m paid to them last year!