National Negotiations – Extended into next week,and the next

[belle smith]

WE pay the CWU to look after OUR interests and pay their wages.

Wrong, the Royal mail pays a large proportion of the CWU's wages.
All the reps, all the area reps etc, they all receive a pay cheque from RM.

would that be the same cheque you recieve? ie thier wages for working for RM. and in the case of reps they do the same work as the rest of us.

[La Poste]

They aren't the ones negotiating laposte, it's the full time union officials whose salaries we do pay, if they took a smaller slice of the pie, then the reliance on Royal Mail to subsidise union activities would only make the union stronger - you can't have a football match if one side threatens to bugger off with the ball and I strongly suspect RM use that as a negotiating tool.

I agree but the CWU knows that if Royal mail wanted to they could pull the plug on their funds and fuk them financially.
This is a very weak position for the CWU to be in when starting negotiations.

[fishtank]

the truth wrote
"Now please be in no doubt Royal Mail "s commericial delivery strategy ie delivery methods , geo route , walk sequencing and the change to the work plan is not dependent on whether their is an agreement."

Be in no doubt it very much is otherwise Royal Mail would not be sitting in the seats opposite our negotiators.
If they thought for one minute this plan could be implemented without an agreement it would be Dave who? and Bob who? and please close the door on your way out.

[dvbuk55]

the truth wrote
"Now please be in no doubt Royal Mail "s commericial delivery strategy ie delivery methods , geo route , walk sequencing and the change to the work plan is not dependent on whether their is an agreement."

Be in no doubt it very much is otherwise Royal Mail would not be sitting in the seats opposite our negotiators.
If they thought for one minute this plan could be implemented without an agreement it would be Dave who? and Bob who? and please close the door on your way out.

Pretty much what they had been doing up until the national strike brought them to the table - lets hope that wasn't a wasted exercise.

[Martin Walsh]

Imagine if the CWU published another delay everyone would rightly moan that this will go on forever.

I know you all think otherwise but all sides are determined to reach agreement if possible over the next few days. Remember the week is not over yet.

However dont under estimate the level of change involved in this deal. It scares me and I know most of what is being planned.

Now I know some will disagree but lets face facts members in the main vote for a deal based on its benefits. Thats why for years and years people like Keggie and Johnson before used to agree pay deals months after the then October pay date ( that was our old pay date ) knowing a lump sum in December of January sold the deal.

SDD was sold in that way as was Pay and Mod.

Now La Poste I am paid by Royal Mail as are some of the PEC members involved in the negotations, I have organised over 20 different strikes unofficial and officials including last years London dispute . I have represented members at disciplinary hearings for almost 22 years and at tribunals and I have negotiated on members behalf and the members always have the final say. So I am not in Royal Mail"s pocket and neither is any other union official I know. Yes we can all make bad decisons that with hindesight is wrong but we do it with the best of intentions.

Now with regards to Check off ( deducting union subs ) we pay Royal Mail a healthy sum for this privilage. Yes in the future they might decide to stop it but other unions learn to cope with that like RMT etc.

Personally I will reserve judgement on the agreement until I see all of it , I suggest you all do that too. Of course if there is eventually one.

[mitzi]

Imagine if the CWU published another delay everyone would rightly moan that this will go on forever.

I know you all think otherwise but all sides are determined to reach agreement if possible over the next few days. Remember the week is not over yet.

However dont under estimate the level of change involved in this deal. It scares me and I know most of what is being planned.

Now I know some will disagree but lets face facts members in the main vote for a deal based on its benefits. Thats why for years and years people like Keggie and Johnson before used to agree pay deals months after the then October pay date ( that was our old pay date ) knowing a lump sum in December of January sold the deal.

SDD was sold in that way as was Pay and Mod.

Now La Poste I am paid by Royal Mail as are some of the PEC members involved in the negotations, I have organised over 20 different strikes unofficial and officials including last years London dispute . I have represented members at disciplinary hearings for almost 22 years and at tribunals and I have negotiated on members behalf and the members always have the final say. So I am not in Royal Mail"s pocket and neither is any other union official I know. Yes we can all make bad decisons that with hindesight is wrong but we do it with the best of intentions.

Now with regards to Check off ( deducting union subs ) we pay Royal Mail a healthy sum for this privilage. Yes in the future they might decide to stop it but other unions learn to cope with that like RMT etc.

Personally I will reserve judgement on the agreement until I see all of it , I suggest you all do that too. Of course if there is eventually one.

Welcome back Dingo.

[dvbuk55]

I'll tell you what would focus their mind on settling - call a national strike again and lay it on the line - this is what we'll settle for and nothing less so stop buggering about, wasting time and lets get going. The longer it goes on the less we will achieve.

As for officials being paid by RM lets put a stop to it and like some unions have the subs paid by direct debit - one company made a serious error of judgement by assuming that only those paying subs through pay were members of a union until the strike stopped them in their tracks. Reason was they assumed the 30% who paid dues and all voted to strike wouldn't seriously disrupt their service, and how wrong they were.

[DirtyHarry]

Here we go again, the PEC have been called to a two day meeting next week and everyone starts saying its a sell out again.

Talks are still continuing as we speak to thrash out whether there can be a deal.

It was and always will come down to what goodies are in the deal and if that does not meet the unions aspritations then there wont be a deal full stop.

The PEC being called to a two day meeting Weds and Thurs came today. The PEC were already due to meet on Tuesday in any case.

If an agreement is thrashed out in the next 72 hours then yes the deal will first go to the PEC that is ensurined in the CWU Rule book. However if there is not a deal then it may well be a full report on the current talks and what the unions moves should be next.

Now of course senior managers will be briefed on the agreement if there is one.

Now please be in no doubt Royal Mail "s commericial delivery strategy ie delivery methods , geo route , walk sequencing and the change to the work plan is not dependent on whether their is an agreement. Royal Mail have paid the money for the machines and 420 million on delivery methods they have not done that to not introduce their plan. This agreement was always about getting safeguards and benefits from these in-evitable plans.

To give you just one issue where we are still having problems and shows the scale of what Royal Mails changes will bring is that they wont give a commitement that everyone who wants a full time job within Royal Mail will be guaranteed one.

Its very easy to do down the scale of change but Royal Mail have played a great game in not revealing the scale of their change to staff. Instead they want the union via a national agreement to explain the change and take a lot of flax.

However be in no doubt the Royal Mail"s changes are not going away.

So, that's that, is it?
The arrogant idiots ruining Royal Mail, simply waste hundreds of millions of pounds on machinery that means deliveries will only be possible in the late afternoon, decide in their infinite stupidity that work patterns will alter drastically to fit in with this glaring fault in modern technology, invite the CWU to meetings where they're told, "too late, we've done this, spent that, now your members can just lump it," but it's not a done deal unless the "goodies", as you put it, meet with the union's aspirations.

The "goodies", if they're anything like the "goodies" the CWU have "won" for us in the recent past, won't be good enough, not by a feckin' long chalk, mate.
Your members are currently in jobs already fecked-up thanks to major change, more major change will drive a lot of our members to despair, we will definately lose a hell of a lot union members because the sheer physical aspect of this bloody job will be beyond most postal workers over the age of 45.
This deal, I fear, will open the floodgates for the useless w*****s ruining Britain's postal service, it will enable them to medically retire people, sack people on so-called "performance", and there'll be merry hell to pay for any postal worker who goes up to their DIM and says, "sorry, but this is simply too much, there's only so many hours in the day, and I only actually work 7.5 of 'em."
The DIM, usually being the biggest cnut God ever put on earth, will then open his ignorant gob, and say back, "well, you're union signed up to it, not only can your impossible workload be done, it will be done."

I can see what's coming, I wish to God I couldn't, but if only half of what I fear will happen, does happen, then you will never see my ass on a picket line again, and I've been on every picket line all my working life. Enough, is feckin' enough. Over £1000, money I, and many others, can ill afford to lose, and that was just last summer/winter.

For feck's sake, give your members something to bloody shout about for a feckin' change.

[wranglered]

Now La Poste I am paid by Royal Mail as are some of the PEC members involved in the negotations, I have organised over 20 different strikes unofficial and officials including last years London dispute . I have represented members at disciplinary hearings for almost 22 years and at tribunals and I have negotiated on members behalf and the members always have the final say. So I am not in Royal Mail"s pocket and neither is any other union official I know. Yes we can all make bad decisons that with hindesight is wrong but we do it with the best of intentions.

is this the same Dingo who claimed he was just an ordinary rep? I don't think so....paid by RM eh?

amazing how you spring out of the woodwork again....smacks of a last desperate attempt to try and convince the regulars on here that the CWU is actually worth paying for...

although I do think you are smart enough to know we don't count . It all depends on the silent majority away from RMC who are just going to be duped with all the "goodies" you have on offer....

in my neck of the woods all officials are confident of a YES vote...I am afraid I agree with them for once...

a done deal...as we will see next week when RM managers will be telling staff all about what they are about to recieve...

congratulations to the "extremely talented" negotiators of the CWU.....

[Big Daz]

Hey Mr W

Im not convinced that the members in my D.O will vote yes, not at all!!!!

Vans, trolleys later start times its like their worst nightmare coming true.

[wranglered]

don't share your optimism big daz...anyway, thought you were asleep till it was all over???

[Big Daz]

I was, but I was suddenly filled with hope

[TrueBlueTerrier]

I was, but I was suddenly filled with hope

This early

[The truth!]

I'll tell you what would focus their mind on settling - call a national strike again and lay it on the line - this is what we'll settle for and nothing less so stop buggering about, wasting time and lets get going. The longer it goes on the less we will achieve.

As for officials being paid by RM lets put a stop to it and like some unions have the subs paid by direct debit - one company made a serious error of judgement by assuming that only those paying subs through pay were members of a union until the strike stopped them in their tracks. Reason was they assumed the 30% who paid dues and all voted to strike wouldn't seriously disrupt their service, and how wrong they were.

Dvbuk the Industrial action ballot is dead , its been 3 months since the last action. So to call further national strike action we would have to launch another campaign to achieve a yes vote. The question on the ballot paper would be about getting an acceptable agreement but in reality it would be about stopping Royal Mail from using the machines which they purchased to the cost of over a billion borrowed from the Government in particularly on Saturdays. Is that a dispute even if we get a yes vote we would win ???

I am always up for a row and if I and my division dont think the deal is acceptable then we will organise to reject the deal including a campaign to get another national ballot if it assisted in getting a better deal but it wouldt be about stopping the machines because that would be a fight which we cant win and would mean it would cost our pensions as well.

Look I know the lack of detail from the talks has meant that some have only heard about the bad things from the deal , but believe me there are a lot of other good things included in the deal , and if the union achieved the benefits package they want well I think everyone will accept that it is reasonable.

Of course no one likes change so everyone will be nervous about the deal and it will need to be probably explained.

Royal Mail chat has given a lot of members and reps a vehicle to air their views and to report what is happening in their own offices. So no one can deny with or without a national agreement we have seen offices some with agreement some with the use of execuitve action all the following introduced, later starts have come in , car derived vans have come in , longer spans have come in and we have seen offices openly accepted the use of geo route/ peagsus.

This is not a dig its just the facts of what we know.

So in the past like the way forward we knew if we rejected the agreement we could hold the line in the vast majority of offices so they couldt introduce their change, in fact back then no fit to delivery revisons ever got deployed in London even when the second way forward was eventually agreed.

This time it will be different. I am not saying dont reject it but i am saying make sure if you are rejecting it that your rejecting it on something which we can change even if we have to fight for that change.

Now the union cannot afford to pay the wages of every reps , the union has lost members in both BT and Royal Mail. We have a facilities agreement called the IR framework which Royal Mail have signed into which is a recognition agreement and provides for the CWU Reps release, most unions operate with this.

[dvbuk55]

So the truth is finally out - the strike ballot is dead! So it is just a question of lump it.

You are now suggesting that the acceptance of the deal, no matter how bad, is going to ride on the pensions issue - something that had been de-coupled from the agreement last time. The pension issue is quite clearly a political issue and has always been so - and I point you to Dave Wards repeated statements to that effect.

Lets just get this out in the open and get the issues debated at the grass roots level where these issues aren't just a talking point but reality. We are the ones who are going to be saddled with the changes not you and the negotiators so let us decide what we will accept and get the facts, figures and ballot on the move.