We strike because we must

[POSTMAN]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree ... royal-mail" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;



As I went to work on Thursday, a woman walking her dog spotted my mailbag and hailed me, saying: "You're not going to work are you?" I explained that as a delivery postman I wasn't on strike until Friday. She was relieved. I was glad to be able to put her right – to be mistaken for a strike breaker - horrible thought! I had to explain the same thing to various customers, nearly all of whom were supportive. Unlike, of course, the media.

Postal workers are under a barrage of criticism: we are apparently dinosaurs for standing in the way of "modernisation". A curious sort of modernisation, this, that if Royal Mail gets its way will result (and is already resulting) in later deliveries and fewer collections, the closure of post offices, and the replacement of your regular postie by part-time casualised labour.

Like the rest of London and quite a lot of the rest of the country, I've been striking one day a week for nearly four months now. We are doing so in response to the imposition by "executive action" (without agreement) of massive changes such as job cuts, increases in work loads, and the replacement of overtime by compulsory coverage for absent colleagues, for no extra pay. Sometimes the changes plainly don't even work, but management presses on regardless in order to meet demands coming to them from higher up. The London vote for strike action was more than 90%, the national vote a still very decent 75%.

We are not happy to be losing money and have at times felt that the union has been far too slow to escalate the action. Only now do Royal Mail and the government seem to be taking our strike seriously. There has been an attempt to paint the Communication Workers Union general secretary, Billy Hayes, as an Arthur Scargill-type figure. In reality, most posties wish he had been more militant! In the run-up to the strike this week there was a lot of concern that the union might call it off without resolving the issues. Quite a few people in my office said they would leave the union if that happened.

We want a clear commitment by Royal Mail to reverse the changes it has imposed, and then talks can ensue. If next week's action is called off merely so that talks can take place at Acas, I and many others will feel failed by and angry with the union.

Some believe our action is suicidal. What we know is that if Royal Mail get away with these proposals, the job will be finished. For example, Royal Mail intends to replace most delivery posties with part-timers. I can't pay my mortgage and feed my family on a part-time wage.

Here's a final thought on the newly competitive world to which we are supposed to be adapting. Nobody is actually going to offer a network that competes with Royal Mail. We are under an obligation to deliver the letters of its competitors at a low rate so that the more profitable parts of the business - the collection and processing of bulk mail - is done by private companies. Then Royal Mail is forced to deliver their letters the 'final mile' at a loss. "Naturally" Royal Mail has started to suffer as an economic entity, and "naturally" it attempts to deal with this by slashing costs in the form of jobs and services. In other words, the attack on the workforce and reduction of unprofitable parts of the postal service is preciselywhat competition was designed to achieve. Who gains from all this? Well, a lot of profits are made.

The public support is gratifying. People know that every political party is promising savage cuts to public services after the next election. I hope that our action encourages others to fight back when they face their own Croziers and Mandelsons.

[erwisia]

[left739]

This piece on guardian online has produced a pretty lively comments discussion with a mixture of supporters of us plus a few parroters of market dogma:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree ... mentpage=1" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I haven't been able to read all of them but there are some great posts.

One example of a good post on our side:

"The CWU and its members neither created the pension fund deficit, nor instigated the EU competition regime, backed by Mandelson, that the UK government preferred to apply here earlier than required and earlier than other EU partners.

Both the pension deficit and competition are major factors in the pressure to reduce operating costs and improve productivity.

Investment in technology offers some scope for this and hasnt been opposed by the CWU who signed up to a modernisation agreement producing change and a significantly reduced workforce. That this change also involves reduced service to the public is the result of management decision-making that the workforce is allowed nowhere near.

The wellspring for the strike action is, of course, the day today experience of the posties and their treatment at the hands of their managers.

What is being resisted is management by dictat: deliberately contrived departures from collective agreements (voluntarily made with the CWU by the Royal Mail) and an overbearing, brow-beating approach to getting the work done which involves threats, bullying and an expectation of people working extra time for no pay.

It was inevitable that this approach would produce strikes; a scenario that Mandelson and top managers are entirely relaxed about because the trade union and the strength of its workplace organisation is probably the single major obstacle to the privatisation of the industry and successfully kibboshed their plans earlier this year.

The notion of a public service run effectively and profitably in a competitive environment and holding on to a final salary pension scheme is their nightmare and cant be allowed to happen.

The posties are resisting this race to the bottom involving casualisation, lower pay and conditions, and effective de-unionisation.

They are right to do so and Im proud to support them."

An example from the other side:

"The political elites have realised that we are going to have to work a great deal harder if we are to survive. The essentially Luddite attitude of the British union movement creates the impression that technological advance can be resisted; it can't, and it is a cruel deception to say that it can. The false reality of non-job creation will always, in the end, be engulfed by the Tsunami of technological change."

to which someone replies:

"Where to start with this? The "political elites" are convinced that the lower orders in society, not themselves, are going to have "to work a great deal harder" and be screwed into the ground in order that the political elites and their friends can "earn" even more obscene profits than they already do. The Royal Mail dispute has nothing to do with the union and the posties resisting technological advance - they have accepted the need for change as a result of these advances - but, if you bother to read Sam's piece properly it has come about because of the way those changes are being unfairly implemented by the incompetent senior management at Royal Mail. Yes Tim Berners-Lee's invention has revolutionised the way we communicate and probably reduced to some extent the amount of paper-based written communications we send through the post but conversely it has had the effect of increasing dramatically the amount of physical objects we order online - objects which eventually have to be delivered to our homes by your humble postie.

Your patronising words are also wrong - people understand more about the operation of our technological society than you will admit - it is your "political elite" who are the ignorant ones - remember Blair's total inability to handle emails or the internet let alone understand them? Funny also isn't that it's always the ordinary people, the workers at the coal face who have to make sacrifices, work harder and accept changes never the "political elite" or the City whiz kids, the get-rich-quick bankers, the wunderkind who have plunged the world into the worst recession in history and in the process destroyed the lives of millions of ordinary working people. No they don't suffer they climb out of the bucket of s**t smelling of roses and continue to claim their obscene bonuses.

Listen everyone, support the posties they are simply fighting for decent humane treatment at work and not hindering progress - unless by "progress" you mean introducing a worse postal service than the one you have now."

[Yahoorsur]

Some very good replies from a guy called jonniestewpot,he's certainly taken the neo cons on the Gruinard to task,well done sir
Just a pity that they wont accept my user name 'as it may cause offence'

[opgpat]

great post left, good work.

Looks like there is a good deal of understanding out there, needs to be more, obviously some people will never be convinced!