UPDATE FROM HQ

[Big Daz]

dingo

I have never accused you of rewriting history, im trying to get a understanding of timescales of all things pegasus at National level and at my branch level.

What I was told by my ADR is slightly different from what you have posted, my understanding was that branches were told to get agreements based on the criteria that CWU HQ wanted, this was a tatical move if I recall to force RML into a national agreement but getting local agreements that were superior to what RML at national level wanted thus bouncing RML into a national agreement. The agreement included the training aspect of that conference motion.

[Puppetmaster]

My Office this morning a buz with a rumour, a deal was signed,and included many things we know already but loosing our early shift allowance in exchange for a lump sump of £500.
Already many are talking of leaving CWU .In strike action we had the best supourt ever and better than most offices.

People are beleiving this rumour and stating we did not go on strike for this.

[wabbithunta]

My Office this morning a buz with a rumour, a deal was signed,and included many things we know already but loosing our early shift allowance in exchange for a lump sump of £500.
Already many are talking of leaving CWU .In strike action we had the best supourt ever and better than most offices.

People are beleiving this rumour and stating we did not go on strike for this.

Then these people are idiots.
The CWU has to put any proposals to the members to vote on and they then act according to the members wishes. They have no right to decide what we can or can't have, if they think that this is already decided they are stupid to say the least. All they, the CWU, can do is to negotiate the best possible deal on our behalf.
They work for us. We put them there to act in our best interests. This does not, nor should it, entail them telling us what they have negotiated for us, without us agreeing to any of it.
If this means any or all of the negotiations being rejected then they will have to go back to the table to re-negotiate another deal.
We went on strike for a number of reasons... and no doubt we will be out on strike again... even if it means hardship for us then we should be prepared to stand our ground and not give in to RM bully-boy tactics with regards to the negotiations.

The CWU have no right to accept any deals or offers on the table. They have to come back to us with any offer and then we have to decide on what we think of what is or isn't a good deal for us. They have a mandate from us, the members, and that is to secure the best deal possible... not to go in there and accept on our behalf a deal they thrash out behind closed doors and then say yes to it without referring back to the membership.
If they value their positions in the CWU, which is at present a somewhat tenuous one to say the least, and going on what people are saying on these forums I would suggest that they are on very thin ice. The they would be extremely stupid to accept on our behalf a deal that we know nothing about, apart from hearsay and rumour and expect us to say yes to it.
Would you poke your head in a gas oven simply because you were told to do so? I think not, as you would think twice before doing anything like that. So why would we want to accept a pay deal that we know nothing about?
I for one will want to know all the details of what will be sure to have a massive impact on our jobs and future working practices and also any paydeals that will be affected by any of the negotiations.

[Martin Walsh]

dingo

I have never accused you of rewriting history, im trying to get a understanding of timescales of all things pegasus at National level and at my branch level.

What I was told by my ADR is slightly different from what you have posted, my understanding was that branches were told to get agreements based on the criteria that CWU HQ wanted, this was a tatical move if I recall to force RML into a national agreement but getting local agreements that were superior to what RML at national level wanted thus bouncing RML into a national agreement. The agreement included the training aspect of that conference motion.

Daz that was not the correct postion. What in fact happened was that as usual some Branch"s decided that they would attempt to reach local agreements , some got good deals the majority didt get good deals. Royal Mail took a position that why should they reach a national agreement if hundreds of offices were already willing to agree pegasus revisons without one. I still have a letter from Paul Toulhurst stating that fact.

I remember the conference debate as well and remember what Bob Gibson stated from the rostum. Thats why some divisons never made any deals on geo route.

[Glenno]

feet firmly on the ground this bloke wabbithunta!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[dvbuk55]

Daz that was not the correct postion. What in fact happened was that as usual some Branch"s decided that they would attempt to reach local agreements , some got good deals the majority didt get good deals. Royal Mail took a position that why should they reach a national agreement if hundreds of offices were already willing to agree pegasus revisons without one. I still have a letter from Paul Toulhurst stating that fact.

I remember the conference debate as well and remember what Bob Gibson stated from the rostum. Thats why some divisons never made any deals on geo route.

When was the conference and did Bob Gibson then commit his statement to an LTB and send it to Branches and if so when?

Anything prior to the 2007/9 Agreement should have been included in that agreement as it would be presumed to be part and parcel of the negotiations. It is certainly presumptive to assume that local reps on whose shoulders these negotiations fell are capable of and have time for in depth agreements at local level.

I point you to the fact that this agreement has taken more than 3 months for full time officials and has still not been concluded.

[Martin Walsh]

My Office this morning a buz with a rumour, a deal was signed,and included many things we know already but loosing our early shift allowance in exchange for a lump sump of £500.
Already many are talking of leaving CWU .In strike action we had the best supourt ever and better than most offices.

People are beleiving this rumour and stating we did not go on strike for this.

Not true. There is no longer an allowance for starting at 0500 or 0530. What some people still recieve is grandfather rights for these allowance sercured by the union under pay and mod when Royal Mail as a result of Network 07 were moving everyone to later starts. This payment is not going to be traded in for any lump sum and will continue but in a new supplement.

The benefits currently on the table is over 1 billion pounds , on top of this Royal Mail will pay in the region of 500 million in redundancies and 420 million in car derived vans and 40 million in extra hours as a result of having door to door into workload.

Royal Mail has given the union figures that show that Royal Mail will not start making a profit on the transformation plan until year 4.

Before anyone states I am supporting the agreement then I tell you the London postion at this moment in time agreed by all Branch"s. Some of you seem to think the London membership has some how got off lightly in the past despite having 6 mail centres close.

Well we had 109 offices have executive action imposed last year because we held the national unions policy of no agreements even thou like others could have done a deal. Despite ACAS help we still have 78 offices which we have not yet reached agreements on in regards to 2.3 of the interim agreement.

We have told Royal Mail and we have told our headquaters until we have resolved those issues we will not be supporting any agreement. That has caused a lot of pressure on both sides and over the last 72 hours things have moved but we still have a limited time to resolve all of those offices.

So thats Londons postion Royal Mail know we have form for doing what we say as do the union.

Dvbuk it would be in that agreemnent as we still dont have an agreement on geo route as it stands. All be it if there is a deal there will be. Bob Gibson done that in replying to the motion in 2006. Pay and Mod never included an agreement on geo route and no one should have agreed a revison based on that system.

[smokerjim]

My Office this morning a buz with a rumour, a deal was signed,and included many things we know already but loosing our early shift allowance in exchange for a lump sump of £500.
Already many are talking of leaving CWU .In strike action we had the best supourt ever and better than most offices.

People are beleiving this rumour and stating we did not go on strike for this.

Then these people are idiots.
The CWU has to put any proposals to the members to vote on and they then act according to the members wishes. They have no right to decide what we can or can't have, if they think that this is already decided they are stupid to say the least. All they, the CWU, can do is to negotiate the best possible deal on our behalf.
They work for us. We put them there to act in our best interests. This does not, nor should it, entail them telling us what they have negotiated for us, without us agreeing to any of it.
If this means any or all of the negotiations being rejected then they will have to go back to the table to re-negotiate another deal.
We went on strike for a number of reasons... and no doubt we will be out on strike again... even if it means hardship for us then we should be prepared to stand our ground and not give in to RM bully-boy tactics with regards to the negotiations.

The CWU have no right to accept any deals or offers on the table. They have to come back to us with any offer and then we have to decide on what we think of what is or isn't a good deal for us. They have a mandate from us, the members, and that is to secure the best deal possible... not to go in there and accept on our behalf a deal they thrash out behind closed doors and then say yes to it without referring back to the membership.
If they value their positions in the CWU, which is at present a somewhat tenuous one to say the least, and going on what people are saying on these forums I would suggest that they are on very thin ice. The they would be extremely stupid to accept on our behalf a deal that we know nothing about, apart from hearsay and rumour and expect us to say yes to it.
Would you poke your head in a gas oven simply because you were told to do so? I think not, as you would think twice before doing anything like that. So why would we want to accept a pay deal that we know nothing about?
I for one will want to know all the details of what will be sure to have a massive impact on our jobs and future working practices and also any paydeals that will be affected by any of the negotiations.

Why can't the Union put out an LTB every week giving a brief overview of how the negotiations are progressing ( I know the negotiations are secret, but we wouldn't need details if a steady flow of information was maintained ), something like "Agreement has been reached in the following areas of the business..., but further talks are needed on the remainder" or even "The talks are approx 70% complete" - possibly the most damaging aspect of the "period of calm" is the feeling of being abandoned by the leadership, which in turn leads rumours & Chinese whispers to snake through this site and / or though the grapevine and to grow like tumors ( and almost take on a life of their own ).

[dvbuk55]

Dvbuk it would be in that agreemnent as we still dont have an agreement on geo route as it stands. All be it if there is a deal there will be. Bob Gibson done that in replying to the motion in 2006. Pay and Mod never included an agreement on geo route and no one should have agreed a revison based on that system.

I believe you are being deliberately obtuse here dingo by calling a reply to a motion in 2006 a stipulation that there should be no agreement on geo route which was not specifically ruled out in the 2007/9 agreement and union guidelines stated that local agreements could and should be made. Under the agreement many changes have been introduced prior to the union issuing an embargo in January of 2009.

I absolutely believe that you do your best for and understand your area and its needs but I also feel that the spectrum under which you operate is limited and that you believe everywhere is like London and believe me it isn't.

Area and Div Reps certainly in the area I work do not negotiate for the benefit of the members if they negotiate at all so you can understand my unwillingness to leave things to local agreement. The first leaflet I had from the Branch Secretary in the last five years was a request to vote for him in an election! When I asked for details of the AGM I received a reply several hours after it had taken place. I don't believe this area is in isolation in the representation we receive and so if I were you I would be a little bit circumspect when listening to tales of alls well with the world because it may be what they want to tell and not the reality of the situation.

[anTi]

[ There is no longer an allowance for starting at 0500 or 0530. What some people still recieve is grandfather rights for these allowance sercured by the union under pay and mod when Royal Mail as a result of Network 07 were moving everyone to later starts. This payment is not going to be traded in for any lump sum and will continue but in a new supplement.

Does this translate into a reduction in the amount???

[dvbuk55]

Dingo are you suggesting the talks are being delayed because London has not reached agreement on Interim Agreement 2.3?

TBH I didn't think the interim agreement was still ongoing - take a look the posts on here at various offices round the country, this is being imposed or that is being imposed and so on.

[Martin Walsh]

[ There is no longer an allowance for starting at 0500 or 0530. What some people still recieve is grandfather rights for these allowance sercured by the union under pay and mod when Royal Mail as a result of Network 07 were moving everyone to later starts. This payment is not going to be traded in for any lump sum and will continue but in a new supplement.

Does this translate into a reduction in the amount???

No there will not be a reduction

[dvbuk55]

[ There is no longer an allowance for starting at 0500 or 0530. What some people still recieve is grandfather rights for these allowance sercured by the union under pay and mod when Royal Mail as a result of Network 07 were moving everyone to later starts. This payment is not going to be traded in for any lump sum and will continue but in a new supplement.

Does this translate into a reduction in the amount???

Well I can't be certain but you remember the £30 pay increase which had a peculiar wording like including various allowances? Well if you already receive £15 quid for that and then it will be £15 for the D2Ds but if you don't already receive it...................

I may be wrong here but it won't be the first time we've financed our own pay rise.

I presume the £1 Billion is over three years, the 500 million for EVR would be a ball park figure because if it is an open offer they could well need more than that. The 420 million on car derived vans - well they must have already spent that because there are 10,000 in a field somewhere or other.

The finances are very interesting really because they were given 2.5 billion which by all accounts hasn't all been spent and there was reputed to be something over a billion left - now those euro lottery winners only won 56 million but that would accrue interest at 190,000 a month - RM have had that billion kicking it's heel for more than two years so how much has that earned?

I know it's all conjecture but it does make you think.

[Martin Walsh]

Dingo are you suggesting the talks are being delayed because London has not reached agreement on Interim Agreement 2.3?

TBH I didn't think the interim agreement was still ongoing - take a look the posts on here at various offices round the country, this is being imposed or that is being imposed and so on.

No I never said that ! But London is a powerful part of the union and both royal mail and Cwu hqs know that. In any case royal mail cannot introduce anything else in London until we have resolved the executive action

[onetwothree]

Will the pay deal start from April 2009 Dingo or are we being asked togo without a rise for a year while RM coins it in also are any allowances at risk i.e driving and shift