Postal strike hits Portsmouth

[TrueBlueTerrier]

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About 200 Portsmouth posties were on strike today.
Workers belonging to the Communication Workers' Union started a 24-hour walkout at 10pm last night as part of an ongoing dispute with employer Royal Mail.

The staff all work on the deliveries side, but managers from the company were providing a skeleton service so that some special delivery and high-priority mail would still get through.

The Royal Mail said that the strike would not affect collections or sorting of mail.

The unions say the area affected will be all of Portsea Island, Paulsgrove, Farlington, Drayton and Cosham - covering postal areas PO1 to PO6.

The dispute centres on changes to the routines of postal workers and greater use of motor transport and sorting machinery.

Around six weeks ago workers in Portsmouth balloted overwhelmingly to take industrial action over the planned changes, and claims from the union that there has a lack of dialogue between the CWU and company managers.

About ten workers joined a picket line outside the Slindon Street depot in Portsmouth this morning before leaving to take part in a demonstration at the Labour Party conference in Brighton.

Duane Turish, the Communication Workers Union delivery representative for Portsmouth, said: 'We had 25 staff on night duty five years ago and now we have about six.

'This is about a fear for the level of service we can give the public. We walk the streets – we can see the decline. We were the finest post service in the world 20 years ago, but now we are not.

'We have seen cuts in the hours allowed to do a job, increased pressure on delivery staff to perform above their level and we're seeing them try to impose an rate of work which we cannot achieve.'

Royal Mail spokeswoman Jacquie Stenson said the CWU was 'focusing all its efforts on strike action and political porturing.'

She added: 'Their claimed support for change is no more than lip service, but their determination to damage services and undermine the future health of the business and the Universal Service is increasing.'

The Universal Service is the Royal Mail's one-price-goes-anywhere service for UK post.

The Royal Mail said that there were pockets of action across the country today, but around 90 per cent of staff were continuing as normal.

Other delivery strikes taking place included Swindon, Middleborough, Peterborough, Bristol, London Greenford, Bognor Regis and Newport on the Isle of Wight.

[pickaname]

Most of these managers are acting managers...some of them still members of the CWU.

Disgrace. Kick the f***ers out.