Perspective

[drb]

As a unit rep,(who has finished their duty and union duty at 15:15,( and commenced duty at 05:00) I am offended that some would come on this forum and make a blase statement as "never doing a hard day's work in their life". I was going to make a comment of a Royal Mail director spending a day with a unit rep. However I will change that to a lay member. Perhaps both!

It is far too easy to hide behind backbench sniping. It is far harder to stand in the coalface. Conduct interviews after conduct interviews. Answering members fears from pay to pensions and receiving phone calls from morning to night,(members fears of financial hardship due to striking..but they would support their union).

Jingoist?

Well what do you actually want? This bleating on and on about past agreements. Show me someone who gets everything right and I will show you a liar. Turn your antagonism towards the employer please,as it is the employer's HR department wringing their hands in delight at certain members hate towards their trade union...and writing about it!

There are good reps around,with a trade union attempting to place one in every function rather then regionalise them. When you do get a unit rep,help them,don't come on here and make brush dismissive comments. No wonder it is hard to recruit new reps who not only have daily pressure from the employer,judging by the comments made here,maybe they should watch their backs from "certain" bitter members.

[fishtank]

That's a very confused position drb.
Is all this the membership's fault?...Really?
Is it the fault of unit reps not getting enough from agreements?...Really?

Do you want to think about that a little harder?

[cloherty1976]

Who would you say works harder Dave or moya?

[drb]

That's a very confused position drb.
Is all this the membership's fault?...Really?
Is it the fault of unit reps not getting enough from agreements?...Really?

Do you want to think about that a little harder?

Not really. Not difficult to make a collective local agreement from a national one. Not difficult to organise and inform. Not difficult to use the IR framework for union release and create surgeries for members. Not difficult to make "wins" happen. Bad days? Yes. You do get them! I am not blaming every member mind you..just the ones who do not know what they want and take the easy way out,by some criticizing a role,(yes a voluntary role). Stranger still...putting that critisism in writing,for all to see! Some have that luxury, some don't,(and neither do I want it).

[fishtank]

Not difficult to make a collective local agreement from a national one.

Attendance call sampling tool 1.8d
Duty Builder 3.2d
Geo route - 2008
Attendance Call Forecasting Tool v2
IWT v 7.51
Delivery Traffic Forecast Tool v2
Model Week Work Aide v2
Frame Calculator v2
MIRA - Manual Intervention Revision Aide (2 call rate) 4.2.7, and MIRA (3 call rate) 4.3.7

How much training does your average rep have in these tools?
How much have you had?

I am not blaming every member mind you..just the ones who do not know what they want and take the easy way out,by some criticizing a role,(yes a voluntary role).

Members are just people drb,I don't see many criticising the job most local reps do.
This isn't about local reps(voluntary) is it?

[drb]

The training is there and always has been. For the record I have been trained on the a fore-mentioned..by myself then taught others. If I had a comment,(or motion) to make I did it via a "transparent democracy" or letter and constructively critisised. Views from the outdoor department to myself where exchanged and debated..constructively. Help was given and phone numbers exchanged. No issue and no problem. In fact this is still on going. Bitterness is a wasted energy..or perhaps this is jingoist language?

[chrisj]

It is a bit touchy to be concerned about other people's criticism. Also it is hard to understand the outrage about someone writing their feelings down on a forum.

There should be absolute freedom of expression even if some of the comments might be misguided, wrong, annoying and negatively stereotypical. You think it is alright for us to criticise our employer and politicians, bankers and so on but we should all stay quiet and bow in deference to Union Reps or Union hierarchy - it does not work like that.

This is a forum read by a tiny minority of postal workers so the opinion might not even be representative and even if that is the general sentiment, the last thing you want to do is silence people - it becomes even more counter-productive!

Union folks should stop feeling so 'precious' - it is voluntary as you said... Moreover, it does come with a certain amount of clout and some Rep have even moved on to the dark side to become managers. Some also abuse their position and get special favours from management - you are not all saints.

Why are so many of your posties conduct coded and all these pastoral phone calls about losing money from strikes and other things - there is a help line for that...

Personally, I think this thread and some of the things that we have heard in the last 2 weeks is just to soften members up whilst at the same time scold them like naughty unappreciative confused kids... Like Fishtank wrote, the expectations of a lot members especially in delivery has been raised and they were asked to prepare for a battle whilst the war cabinet had really no interest in any real sort of conflict.

The agreement is becoming less of a big agreement as built up but more of a work in progress - and there is nothing wrong with that as long as the people involved keep up the interest and pressure. The Union simply cannot escape there poor information to the members!

[cloherty1976]

Chrisj I have lost count of the amount of union reps that have gone on to management normally after they have been voted out!

[drb]

The feelings and actions should be firmly placed on the feet of the employer. The question begs whether collective bargaining be gained on the gate or at the negotiation table. That is the debate. However in regards to this forum, is it created to merely slag off the CWU and not the employer.The employer must be a fantastic employer then!

In regards to reps becoming managers,well I must say,the ones that have would struggle in most units in regards to their knowledge of national agreements. They then turn into idiots who do as they are told. Some even to DSM's! (LOL!)
I always thought this forum was to help members and use valuable and knowledgeable experience to help. A lot of units do not have reps and this would be a good place to "remotely" guide those without representation. Oh well! Got it wrong!

Now? Where is the luxurious sniper gun and backbench? Who needs the hassle?

PS:..and don't call me "precious" LOL!

[fishtank]

This was never about local reps but some like to turn it into that kind of argument because it's obviously bad form to criticise someone for doing a voluntary job.

The people who are being criticised are not local reps,they are well paid by the members to do a job,It's not a charity and if the members feel they are not getting value for money they are entitled to voice their criticism in any way they like,If you simply try to silence them they will grow more frustrated and resentful and use the only sanction left open to them,withdraw their funding and then where will we be?

If the union believes the membership's perception is wrong then they have to show them why,not simply tell them they are wrong. The reason for dingo's post is poor communications,the details of the delivery negotiations have been hidden from the membership so the membership have filled in the blanks themselves.

We shouldn't be that surprised if they have different answers.
While I can understand the need for confidential discussions the membership has no idea what the union went into delivery negotiations to achieve and that is unacceptable.How can you claim to negotiate on behalf of 115,000 members if those members haven't a clue what you are negotiating?

[drb]

They have a clue because those on delivery are suffering and it was not falling on deaf ears. However the new " senior manager" of Royal mail,(appointed 4 years ago), was from an engineering background who's scientific background included spanners and bolts and more importantly BSI. Did you know? Me neither. However we either learn from it or do nothing. WE meaning WE. Not him or her or who ever.

Can I help anybody else? Perhaps blame anyone as I do not know the answer or do we research it? Nah! I'll blame someone else! LOL!


PS: Love you by the way Fish! XX

I'm off to edit the Froch Vs Groves Fight On New Funk Radio for Saturday..Good fight innit?

[POSTMAN]

I think that we should all now reserve our position on the words of the agreement when it eventually comes out.

And therein lies our biggest problem.

[drb]

Look Forward to the new agreement..Yum Yum!

[Glenno]

Perspective..... When this agreement finally finally comes out of the trap (possibly in the next couple of days) it's down to us all to read and understand the words that are written because if voted on positively they will supposidly become Legal & Binding and be long lasting, so like any insurance policy read the small print before signing on the dotted line, Dingo you will always have the freedom of your opinion and your posts are very well regarded by members of this Forum, but like the rest of us you always have to be guarded to you

[dvbuk55]

Perspective is great - in hindsight. I criticise the CWU because it should be OUR servant and not the other way around. We have entered into negotiations blindly because we do not know what the criteria on the issues are. You cannot make an informed decision as to the success of negotiations if you do not know what the aims are. Concessions have been made isn't a measurable quantity. There have been many things wrong with the conduct of the union in its treatment of the members regarding information, it is not a secret society and these people are paid well to represent US not themselves. Too many union bods are afraid to mention the elephant in the room and that is the waning power of the union to effectively represent the membership.