A question for Dingo, Lovejoy or The Truth:

[Straight4ward]

What will happen if the agreement is rejected by the members?

My fears are that Royal Mail would then refuse to return to the negotiating table claiming that the union was unable to carry its members and therefore no longer represented them?
Could Royal Mail then ignore the agreement completely, canceling out any gains, and impose whatever changes they wanted by executive action, or am I being unnecessarily despondent?

[lovejoy]

What will happen if the agreement is rejected by the members?

My fears are that Royal Mail would then refuse to return to the negotiating table claiming that the union was unable to carry its members and therefore no longer represented them?
Could Royal Mail then ignore the agreement completely, canceling out any gains, and impose whatever changes they wanted by executive action, or am I being unnecessarily despondent?

This is one of the questions we will all consider when we cast our vote.

The overwhelming opinion at last weeks briefing was that whatever your thoughts on the deal there is no option B.

The reward package in this deal is worth over £1bn and will / cannot be increased.

The industry has stumbled from row to row and at some point things have to settle down.

In short though if there is a no vote then we are back on the street - end of. Then will come the judgements about can we sustain a NATIONAL dispute on d2d or saturdays or any other individual functional issue?! I think the membership have had enough of strike action and would welcome a period of stability.

On your point of what RM would do..... well if I were them yes i'd cancel the deal, put all the pay rises into one lump sum (saving them the ongoing costs) and say to members all the change will go through for say a £5k payment. This would sideline the union and destroy and gains we have made through this process............ because it has been admitted many times on here before that a % of members will do ANYTHING for a lump sum bribe.

Just my view straigh4ward.......... but I am miserable git!

[fishtank]

So now that reasoned argument has failed to convince it is time for the strong arm.
There is absolutely no basis for the argument that there is no plan B.

Lovejoy wrote
"The reward package in this deal is worth over £1bn and will / cannot be increased."

No it is not for it contains very little new money.
Let us see a break down of this ficticious £1bn.
Lovejoy wrote
"In short though if there is a no vote then we are back on the street - end of."

That is a lie.
There would need to be a new national ballot in order to be "back on the streets".....end of.

Straightforward wrote
"Could Royal Mail then ignore the agreement completely, canceling out any gains, and impose whatever changes they wanted by executive action?"

Royal Mail can and have done this at any time agreement or no agreement.
Is last year really such a long time ago?

[lovejoy]

So now that reasoned argument has failed to convince it is time for the strong arm.
There is absolutely no basis for the argument that there is no plan B.

Lovejoy wrote
"The reward package in this deal is worth over £1bn and will / cannot be increased."

No it is not for it contain very little new money.
Let us see a break down of this ficticious £1bn.
Lovejoy wrote
"In short though if there is a no vote then we are back on the street - end of."

That is a lie.
There would need to be a new national ballot in order to be "back on the streets".....end of.

Straightforward wrote
"Could Royal Mail then ignore the agreement completely, canceling out any gains, and impose whatever changes they wanted by executive action?"

Royal Mail can and have done this at any time agreement or no agreement.
Is last year really such a long time ago?

So where do we go then after a no vote? You are all very big and clever with your criticism but I am yet to hear one single way of dealing with the aftermath of no agreement.

No agreement, no stability, more strikes looming, no ability to approach gov to resolve pensions ...... Come on where do we go? Never mind me reasoning with you on why you should vote yes. You tell me how we will get to where we need to go via a no vote!

[Dogs of War]

Put the lump sums into D2D Payments. 20.60 for doing 700 address points while the fellow next door only does 200 and gets the same payment as me. Lovejoy the figures don't add up.

[steven100]

The union shouldn't be asking us to vote until our pension fiasco is sorted. They've gone on about pensions etc all through the agreement, when the pensions issue is sorted then when should be asked to vote. Voting no is my only option because the union have failed to deliver on this promise. I'd only consider voting Yes when the pension issue is sorted.

[Cut Off King]

\lovejoy - This is one of the questions we will all consider when we cast our vote.

The overwhelming opinion at last weeks briefing was that whatever your thoughts on the deal there is no option B.

Why was there an arrogant asumption that there would only be a YES vote ? or was another opion deliberatly not planned for so as to frighted the members into voting yes[/i]

The reward package in this deal is worth over £1bn and will / cannot be increased.

Yes but we have been told that there is no new money, so what this £1bn is made up of is money that was coming to us in D2D payments, NDA, C Shares etc. anyway

The industry has stumbled from row to row and at some point things have to settle down.

Thats not our fault, RM chose to go with Executive Action....And they'll us it again if they think that the CWU is week and see the union members roll over and accept a sub standard deal.

In short though if there is a no vote then we are back on the street - end of. Then will come the judgements about can we sustain a NATIONAL dispute on d2d or saturdays or any other individual functional issue?! I think the membership have had enough of strike action and would welcome a period of stability.

NO, we would be back to where we were pre strike, doing our jobs properly, no cars on delivery, no coming in early, working our hours and nothing more.
If we had pressed home the advantage before XMAS, we would have been in a LOT stronger bargaining position than when we called of the strikes

On your point of what RM would do..... well if I were them yes i'd cancel the deal, put all the pay rises into one lump sum (saving them the ongoing costs) and say to members all the change will go through for say a £5k payment. This would sideline the union and destroy and gains we have made through this process............ because it has been admitted many times on here before that a % of members will do ANYTHING for a lump sum bribe.

More scaremongering - RM and the CWU would end up going BACK to ACAS to broker a more accepable deal for the membership - NOT A DEAL THAT SEE's MEMBERS LOSE £1000 + pounds each and every year that they have remaining at RM. As for the union being destroyed , well they're doing that FOR RM by recomending a deal that splits part timers / delivery staff from the rest of the members.

Just my view straigh4ward.......... but I am miserable git!

Just my view straigh4ward.......... but I am a MORE miserable git than you!

[fishtank]

Lovejoy wrote
"You tell me how we will get to where we need to go via a no vote!"

It may have been better Lovejoy if you had laid out your final destination before hand as i'm not convinced you are in the same taxi as the membership.
We did not enter this dispute looking for money but we did not expect a pay cut.
We entered this dispute to put an end to Royal mails tactics of cuts after savings plans after more cuts that were making our working lives intolerable.
And we have walked out the other side with increased workloads and no definitive limits on anything.
If the membership rejects the agreement Lovejoy then the place you have to visit is reality.
This deal is simply not good enough and the money side of it ,although headline grabbing ,is not it's greatest sin.
It's greatest sin is it's failure to understand the monster that is Royal Mail management.
And that is a failure we will all pay for.

Where we need to go is a re-negotiation of our terms and conditions from both our members perspective and our employer's not just Royal Mail's stategy for the future.

[MinisterofCucumber]

So where do we go then after a no vote? You are all very big and clever with your criticism but I am yet to hear one single way of dealing with the aftermath of no agreement.

No agreement, no stability, more strikes looming, no ability to approach gov to resolve pensions ...... Come on where do we go? Never mind me reasoning with you on why you should vote yes. You tell me how we will get to where we need to go via a no vote!

A no vote will mean that existing agreements still stand. RM will have to renegotiate only it will be against a backdrop of the union providing an effective defence against so called 'executive action.'

'Executive action' is like Saddam Hussein's 'mother of all guns.' If management break policies, a simple grievance will reverse their action. 'Executive action' is used more as a threat. Management at my place call the union rep in and tell him that they will bring in something bad by EA unless he agrees to something not quite as bad. By using this hitlerian tactic they get what they want.

What I want to know is why are high level union officials encouraging the myth of 'executive action'?

[lovejoy]

So the national union will just 'go back in with acas and re-negotiate'

I'll tell you what I won't respond to this because its unbelievable.

If you really want a debate PM me your office and I can see my reps and hopefully they can get someone up to you for a face to face debate.

[banner18]

If there is a no vote, it will at most be a narrow one. A narrow no vote means after a little feedback, RM and the union could renegotiate a few items and avoid the proverbial sh*t hitting the fan.
This is the much more likely outcome as far as I see it.

Usually, when a union recommends a deal, it goes through, but then again with all thats gone on maybe things will be different this time.

We need a maximum delivery span for starters and is one of the biggest sticking points for me.

[Broxi51]

If it is a NO vote and RM use executive action to bring things in locally then we vote for IA locally.
Whilst others want the unity of the union nationwide, I prefer local units on IA. Why? Because RM have a duty
to cover the IA by drafting in managers to deliver. If it is UK wide then it is a total shutdown with no deliveries.
This plays into RM's hand as they dont have a responsibility to deliver whereas in local IA's they do and this costs them
a fortune.

I would hope that this would not be necessary and that when/if the NO vote is the majority, RM will sit down and try again once the CWU had given them a list of why it was a NO vote.

I think it will be a NO vote because it is a crap deal. It may be the best the CWU can get from RM but it is still crap and what is more it is unfair on PT delivery staff and this should not be the case as the Union is about unity and NOT winners and losers.

[BELIAL]

So the national union will just 'go back in with acas and re-negotiate'

I'll tell you what I won't respond to this because its unbelievable.

If you really want a debate PM me your office and I can see my reps and hopefully they can get someone up to you for a face to face debate.

Can you please clarify this statement !!!!!!!


I do hope you are not even IMPLYING that if the membership reject this job cutting ;wage cutting;workload raising "agreement" that our national REPRESENTATIVES will REFUSE to perform their duties and ignore the democratic decision of the members. I Await your reply with interest

[phantomshare]

Pro-rata for part time on D2D is a very contentious issue.

What about looking at it this way: D2D with a yes vote will become workload, just like a piece of DSA or 1st/2nd class.

so when a part time employee comes in to your office tomorrow does he have to do 3/4 of the delivery he/she is on because he is part time? i think that would be a No.

So this is where the pro rata comes in, he/she would not be prepping the D2D.

now i know that this may not always happen, then that is an argument to make some PT staff up to full time because you require more indoor hours.

if this agreemnet gets voted in we have to use it to our advantages, that means reps and offices being strong and demanding the agreement is adhered to.

[Dogs of War]

lovejoy the cwu talked 4 months to come up with this crap deal. I will take dave and billy on face to face anytime. They are overpaid assholes.