UPDATE FROM HQ

[Big Daz]

[quote="MinisterofCucumber"]."

Is there any reason that the recommendations of the Hooper report have to be taken as a package?

quote]


Hooper belived it was a combnation of three aspects that would fully restore RM, however he did not say thay must be implemented all at the same time, he did not say or recomend that pensions be put on hold or regulatory reform be put on hold in the event of Government unable to find a suitable buyer.

I would put out simply having the PSB passed by parlimebnt will not automatically guarantee a suitable buyer, which suggests the governmnet are too scared to put the PSB through the commons!!!

[lovejoy]

Linkin I have to ask you where have you been we have had a number of campaigns against regulation which got the commitment in the labour manifesto to a review into unfair competition which became the hooper report. This report got hijacked by mandleson and his desire to privatise the industry. This so called hopeless union defeated this plan by getting the labour party mps against it. This so called useless union has now stopped privatisation 3 times. British telecom before privatisation had 200000 workers now they have 60 000 .

In terms of pensions the union has pushed this issue time and again we have had lobby after lobby at the commons but you must know it is a political hot potato! Public spending is out of control yet we want the government to take on 10 billion and growing defcit. As much as we have a case , it is not an attractive proposition for an outgoing government.

So we have to deal with the fall out of both unfair competition and the fact for every pound royal mail make 30 pence goes to plug the pension defecit. It is easy to have a slogan to solve those issues it's a dam sight harder to achieve it.

In the meantime you either want the union to deal with the changes you are going to face or you want the union to stand on the sidelines and let royal mail introduce the change into your office without an agreement

for god sake you have not even seen the agreement and yet some are calling it a sell out ! Well where was your office in terms of striking when they were putting longer spans , to many part time staff , geo route revisions , to big a budget cuts and car derived vans or was that the thought of Cwu headquaters as well. I tell you where I was I was helping lead one of the biggest and longest strike this union has seen .

This union has to many people who play the blame game . That everyone else is to blame except yourself. Well the stength of this union has always been that some offices are wiling to fight for a better deal ! Which camp are some of you in?

This is going to be one of the major problems with the deal. The branches / areas / divisions who took action locally had leadership. Reps that saw that Royal Mails ambition was to smash the Union and put through all of their changes by dictak.

Now we are in a position where the strikes have forced RM to invest in renumeration and reward and it seems the people who gave the least (in terms of strike) expect the most.

Big Daz you said you had no issues Executive Action in your DO......... neither did dozens of Delivery offices and mail centres that took local action. It's just that their representatives and members refused to except Royal Mail sidelining the national union.

I think everyone should wait and see exactly what the agreement says before judging it.

Everyone is frustrated at the length of time the negotiations have taken but the fact is if it wasnt for the sacfrices of the brave members in the localities last summer then this Union would be finished and Royal Mails 3 year plan would be No pay rise, no lump sums, no shorter working week, no national delivery revision tools and no voice for the workforce.

[POSTMAN]

Just a quick one,when you are copy/pasting parts of other peoples posts can you highlight it as it can be confusing to read ,or do this ....http://www.royalmailchat.co.uk/communit ... =7&t=22296" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

cheers

Just a quick one,when you are copy/pasting parts of other peoples posts can you highlight it as it can be confusing to read ,or do this ....

[Big Daz]

Now we are in a position where the strikes have forced RM to invest in renumeration and reward and it seems the people who gave the least (in terms of strike) expect the most.

Big Daz you said you had no issues Executive Action in your DO......... neither did dozens of Delivery offices and mail centres that took local action. It's just that their representatives and members refused to except Royal Mail sidelining the national union.

I think everyone should wait and see exactly what the agreement says before judging it.

Everyone is frustrated at the length of time the negotiations have taken but the fact is if it wasnt for the sacfrices of the brave members in the localities last summer then this Union would be finished and Royal Mails 3 year plan would be No pay rise, no lump sums, no shorter working week, no national delivery revision tools and no voice for the workforce.

lovejoy

With all due respect I don’t like all this we made a bigger sacrifice and if it wasn’t for us type talk, it goes against our motto of unity is strength. The national union is being sidelined and what do top brass do, they go and be pansies and hesitate on calling national IA whilst expecting local offices with no problems to request IA ballots. If there is a national problem that warrants IA then call a national ballot.

Now I am frustrated at the length of talks, but I am umpteen times more frustrated at the communications. I do not believe HQ can hide behind Roger the Dodger on this issue. There is no reason why we cant be kept more upto date as to where we are in the process of trying to reach agreement.Take the activity today, where is the formal LTB to tell us this is taking place along with the reasoning, communications need to be more proactive!!

[fishtank]

I totally agree Daz,
Nothing splits the membership more than the old "We were strong and you were weak" song.
It is childish and pathetic and i expect more from the leaders of a NATIONAL union.
Why did HQ sit and fiddle with themselves when they should have called a national ballot?
We have never really had an acceptable answer to that one.
Speaking from our experience we called a local ballot because of local executive action.
We had too much on our plate to be worrying about HQs seat at the table.
Everybody in this union has a vioce and everybody who wants to be heard should be.

[chelmsfordpostie]

There is very little activity going on today, all thats going on is the div reps are having a presentation fro Higson on Royal Mails finances. They wont brief the div reps until the document has gone in front of the ec which i will gather will be early next week. As for comms , what are they supposed to say 'talks are ongoing' , which is exactly what theyve done all through the talks or are people expecting to be drip fed the document paragraph by paragraph.

[Big Daz]

The meeting today and the PEC meeting(s) scheduled for next week would have made a very good LTB?

Monday was uppoosed to be the last day, I hada communcatiojn from my branch to say that, where the LTB to follow on from that to say what the next move is from CWU HQ. Surley there is info posted on this site that could be put out in LTB's without upsetting Rodger the Dodger

[fishtank]

There is very little activity going on today, all thats going on is the div reps are having a presentation fro Higson on Royal Mails finances. They wont brief the div reps until the document has gone in front of the ec which i will gather will be early next week. As for comms , what are they supposed to say 'talks are ongoing' , which is exactly what theyve done all through the talks or are people expecting to be drip fed the document paragraph by paragraph.

That's the point though we have been drip fed the document unofficially.And the question is why?
This has caused confusion in the membership to the point that no-one knows what to believe anymore.
The negotiators on both sides know it is being leaked on here and appear to be fine with this. Why?.......

[heapsy]

Lovejoy, Dingo or whoever.. Is it my imagination, or does the PEC seem to have a more southern slant to its make up? We don't have rep any more, he stood down for personal reasons. I work in a big office and it has pretty much been very supportive of the union at national level. Despite a handful of strike breakers. However, our former rep always recommended that we vote for a northerner, come the elections. Mainly due to the fact we don't trust the southerners. It has to be said, with good reason in my opinion. The differences between offices is driving a wedge right down the middle, or, more accurately, through the middle, hence the north/ south divide. This has to stop!

[Martin Walsh]

The deal will be done tonight even if it takes all night !

[Big Daz]

Lovejoy, Dingo or whoever.. Is it my imagination, or does the PEC seem to have a more southern slant to its make up? We don't have rep any more, he stood down for personal reasons. I work in a big office and it has pretty much been very supportive of the union at national level. Despite a handful of strike breakers. However, our former rep always recommended that we vote for a northerner, come the elections. Mainly due to the fact we don't trust the southerners. It has to be said, with good reason in my opinion. The differences between offices is driving a wedge right down the middle, or, more accurately, through the middle, hence the north/ south divide. This has to stop!

http://www.royalmailchat.co.uk/communit ... 25#p242797" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

"there are 3 people on the pec from Scotland , two from the North West , one from the North East , one from the Midlands , one from South Central , one from wales , 3 from Anglia and 5 from London."

Thats six up North/Scotland and eleven from down south.

[Big Daz]

I vote based on their election pitch/record geographical location has never ever influenced my vote. The whole concept of it doing so is very alien to me and somewhat bizzare.

[Cut Off King]

The deal will be done tonight even if it takes all night !

We've heard that one before

[belle smith]

This is going to be one of the major problems with the deal. The branches / areas / divisions who took action locally had leadership. Reps that saw that Royal Mails ambition was to smash the Union and put through all of their changes by dictak.

Now we are in a position where the strikes have forced RM to invest in renumeration and reward and it seems the people who gave the least (in terms of strike) expect the most.

What happened to it's not about money! and anyway judgeing by the 'rummors' RM aren't going to invest in renumaration and reward there just withdrawing some of what we already have as opposed to all of what we already had. Again judging by the rummors it seems like the achievment here is slowing RM schorched earth policy down.

Big Daz you said you had no issues Executive Action in your DO......... neither did dozens of Delivery offices and mail centres that took local action. It's just that their representatives and members refused to except Royal Mail sidelining the national union.

Really they balloted for local industrial action because the national union was sidelined, was that how it was worded on the ballot? did they go through the IR frame work? or were they balloted as branches or divisions when there was EA in there area?
If it's the latter Lovejoy then that comes down to good organisation at branch or divisional level....For which those branch officials and Divisional reps should be appluded don't know if that includes you i know it does include dingo.....so well done. But it's hardly the fault of ordinery posties if their Branches were not so well organised...Ours was, be we (unlike most offices in our branch) didn't take any official action prior to the national action...partly because not enough staff turned up to a meeting to request ballot and partly because when we did request a ballot HQ never sent it out.

I think everyone should wait and see exactly what the agreement says before judging it.

We probably should, but that seems unlikely.

Everyone is frustrated at the length of time the negotiations have taken but the fact is if it wasnt for the sacfrices of the brave members in the localities last summer then this Union would be finished and Royal Mails 3 year plan would be No pay rise, no lump sums, no shorter working week, no national delivery revision tools and no voice for the workforce.

There would be lump sums " coulege shares". Not sure there will be a shorter working week now if you exclude being creative with tea breaks. no national delivery revision tools There deffanetly would be those thats what the EA was all about! Has the "voice" of the work force been won round on them....if so i hope with more reasonable work rates....if not i will be leaving the union.....when i'm sacked for poor performance.

[watdeadlyone]

Re risk assessment for longer days.

Did or did not the Courier have a leaflet in it last summer telling us to avoid being in the extreme heat between 11am and 3pm.
How do we do this if working till 3 or 4?