SPEECH TO CLEVELAND AMAL AGM Billy Hayes

[Big Daz]

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This has been a very tough year for CWU members in the postal industry.

This time last year we had the announcement from Lord Mandelson that Royal Mail was to be privatised.

Consequently, from last December to July this year, we had to place a huge amount of resources to oppose the Postal Services Bill.

This was a difficult campaign – and many said we couldn’t succeed.

But we used good tactics – and the commitment of activists and members was even better.

We produced our alternatives:

• A pamphlet “Case Not Made” which challenged the economics of the Hooper Report.
• Another pamphlet “Modernisation by Consent” – demonstrated that Royal Mail could be modernised while remaining in the public sector.

We organised meetings up and down the country.

We toured a giant postcard around the country – had a week of events in every region of the country around the postcard.

We organised many lobbies of Local MPs and a number of national rallies and lobbies.

I must say that the lobbying work done by Branches in the North East Region was absolutely outstanding.

It won a lot of Labour MPs to opposing the Government plan – and this was decisive.

There was a division in Government – not all Ministers agreed with Mandelson’s plan.

Consequently – all your work in contacting MPs had a direct response inside Government.

We also helped the opposition inside the House of Lords.

Tony Clarke played a heroic role in leading the opposition inside the House of Lords.

The debate took place in sittings occupying many sessions. In total there were 35 hours of debate.

Tony put dozens of amendments, and really stretched the Government to answer his criticisms.

The pay off came in July when the Government let the Bill fall. This was a notable victory to which you all contributed.

Of course, there are problems remaining – most notably on the deficit in the pensions.

When the Post Office announced a the 4% rise in profits this week – Adam Crozier also suggested that the deficit might be ten billion pounds.

Clearly – Royal Mail has no future if the Government does not take its responsibility for the deficit.

The difference is clear – Royal Mail is spending £280m a year to just pay down the deficit.

If the Government took the deficit then this money would be available for investment on innovation, services and staff rewards.

But that £280m is on a deficit of £3.5b. If the deficit goes up to £10b then repayments will nearly triple.

This would wipe out the profits, and put the company deep into the red.

So the deficit has to be addressed – there were going to do it had it been privatised, so they must do it anyway.

We got the Labour Party Conference in September to carry an Emergency Resolution insisting that the Government must deal with the deficit.

We are pressing MPs and Ministers on this. Next week we will be mailing every Constituency Labour Party in the country with a package of material in support of our case.

Now everything that I have said previously has had an impact upon workplace relations this year.

Remember the 2007 strikes came after we had defeated Leighton’s proposals to privatise the industry?

Well this year we have seen a similar pattern.

Royal Mail management refused to negotiate sensibly with the Union for the whole period that they thought Royal Mail was going to be privatised – up to July.

And after July they have so set themselves up for confrontation with us that the Union had to call a national strike ballot.

As you know we got a 76% YES vote.

That shook management – they thought you would all be cowed by the recession.

But it took the two national strikes to really bring management to their senses.

The strikes were wonderfully well supported. So management finally crumbled and were forced to sign up to the interim agreement.

This gave us two things we didn’t have:

• A commitment to review and renegotiate in the many areas of the country where change had been imposed.
• An acceptance that modernisation will be negotiated with improvements to terms and conditions for the workforce.

This was a break though for us.

The national talks are proceeding well – the involvement of ACAS has been very helpful.

The Unions national negotiators are committed to getting a final agreement by 23rd December.

That’s a tall order – but any final agreement will be put to the membership for voting.

So it has been a difficult year – but your support has allowed the Union to find a way through it.

Thanks for listening.





WH/SB/JM
11.12.09

Posted by Billy Hayes | @ Sat, 12 Dec 2009 14:41:28 +0000

[norbert]

Harman is supposed to have thrown the bill across the Cabinet Room , not sure if Mandy was present or it was thrown at him

Sounds like a big fan of Mandy - the best anecdote was Mandy asking Brown if he could have 10p to " phone a friend " - Brown is alleged to have said - " there's 20 - phone them both " .

Hayes & Ward were " counselled " not to oppose Part Privatisation - I hope Mandy didn't know where they lived . Mandy once said " Nobody is bothered except for the Unions , it's to save the pension " - A Backbench MP told him " You've not been a MP for some time Peter , I think you're a bit out of touch " .

[ulster postie]

But it took the two national strikes to really bring management to their senses.

YEA AND I BELIVE IN SANTA

[stokes11eg]

" So. Big Billy thinks everything he has done has had an impact on working realtions?!!! for the worse, Billy ,for the worse.