Pete Keenlyside report - personal view of Pete

[lovejoy]

Deal Goes Out to Ballot

February/March Report

Business Transformation

The Postal Executive voted by a majority to accept the draft Agreement on Business Transformation at it’s meeting on 5 March. The 3-year Agreement is lengthy and has already been widely circulated so there is no need to go into detail. But for those who have yet to see it, briefly it deals with transforming the relationship between the CWU and Royal Mail, changes to the MTSF Agreement, a Delivery Framework Agreement, a Mail Centre Rationalisation Framework Agreement, agreements for change in Logistics, Engineering, Fleet Maintenance and MDEC’s and a section on reward. This involves the offer of an hour off the working week and pay rises for the next three years of 2%, 1.4% and 3.5% with a re-opener clause in year three if inflation goes over 3%. There are also lump sums of £400 if the deal is voted in and £1000 tied to revisions.

There were 14 amendments tabled at the meeting, covering issues such as pensions, pay increases, shorter working week, world class mail, MTSF, job losses and continuing problems with the Interim Agreement. Only one minor amendment to the draft itself was carried concerning consolidation of the addition in pay in lieu of the shorter working week to engineers. When it came to the debate on the Agreement itself, the majority view was that it was not a bad deal when taken in the context of the state of the business and what was happening in the world outside. The meeting was reminded that Unite were recommending a 3% pay cut to their members in BA. The view was that it dealt with all the issues involved in our dispute and that there was no prospect of getting anything further from the business in negotiations. Neither was there an alternative plan on offer. I voted against the agreement on the basis that I didn’t feel the reward on offer, either on basic pay or shorter working week, was adequate.

It would be fair to say that the two issues that have been raised with me most since then, both in meetings and on the floor, have been the changes to door to door and Saturday working in delivery. The feeling on Saturdays was that it would be difficult, if not impossible, to stop later finish times once the business changed the work plan. Better to concentrate on trying to achieve fewer Saturdays and the Agreement commits the business to at least 1 in 4 Saturdays off. On D2D, the objections lie both with the increase in work due to the cap being lifted and the change from individual payment to a delivery supplement. Lifting the cap and putting D2D in workload should lead to an increase in walks and jobs, as this would have to be taken into account in revisions. The Postal Executive accepted that there would be winners and losers with the supplement but believed that achieving a guaranteed weekly payment for all in delivery that will increase with every pay award is ultimately better than one that depends on the work being there forever. Which might not be the case. The problem is that while this makes sense from a collective view, from the point of view of the member currently getting £20-30 a week or more it might not seem so reasonable.

The Postal Executive agreed that before the deal could go out to ballot there would have to be significant progress on resolving the outstanding problems of the pensions deficit and issues arising from the Interim Agreement in London and elsewhere. When it does go out, members in delivery and elsewhere will have to make up their own minds as to whether it is acceptable or not. If the vote is to reject, the negotiators will have to go back to the business but there is no knowing how they would react or what else could be gained.

Walk Sequencing

We met with management in early March to receive an update on walk sequencing. Of the 550 CSS machines on order, 85 have already been installed in the Manchester, Warrington and South Midlands areas. At the moment, around 5.6% of mail is being sequenced. We discussed the issue of how to select who operates the machines. Management produced statistics to show that where this was done by seniority alone, this led to a high turnover of staff and poorer performance. We pointed out that we already had an agreement for appointing staff in the trial offices that required applicants to be assessed for suitability by an engineer. After that, seniority would be the deciding factor. This had worked in those offices and we would expect this process to continue. Management also informed us that they were looking to bring in a leadership allowance where offices doing the sequencing had reopened at night and where there was no manager present. We will now discuss and agree the criteria for doing this. A further meeting is planned this month to go through the results of the trials in Gatwick and the Bristol area.

ILSM’s

The trial of the ILSM’s at Jubilee, Peterborough and Edinburgh has more or less come to an end. It showed that the machines are fast, operating at around 38,000 items an hour as opposed to 25,000 on the old machines and that there are no major design flaws. National Officer Martin Collins has now signed off the agreed TPM tasks for operators and these have been circulated to the offices concerned. The issues still outstanding include the numbers needed to staff the machines and how they are selected. Management are looking for a maximum of three and seem to want to create their own handpicked teams. We are looking for a larger number and don’t see why selection should differ from that for any other machine under the terms of the Way Forward. As we speak, new machines are being installed at the South Midlands Mail Centre and in Warrington so it’s important we resolve this quickly.

Weekend Processing Operation

The Postal Executive in March agreed the Terms of Reference for the revision of the weekend processing operation in mail centres. This had originally come to us in December but was deferred until after the agreement on transformation had been negotiated. It allows for the ceasing of all Sunday night processing operations in all mail centres except Northern Ireland and Inverness and during the Xmas period. Area and local Reps will be fully involved and all proposals to change duties will be subject to the IR Framework and MTSF. The aim will be to minimise the impact on notional weekend duty holders who have reserved rights.


Post Office Limited

The Postal Executive agreed a new IR structure for POL in February. Whilst maintaining most of the old procedures, the new structure allowed for 20 new full-time Area Reps and 4 full-time H&S Reps. A view was expressed that 4 might not be enough but it was agreed to leave it at this for the time being and to review it in the light of experience. The proposal was put to a Branch ballot and overwhelmingly accepted. Elections are now going on for the positions, although many were filled without the need for a ballot.

Pete Keenlyside
19 March 2010

[numan]

Good to see Pete K voted against.

[belle smith]

Good to see Pete K voted against.

How do you know that?

Cheers for posting this lovejoy....informative.

[Pinky 1]

Good to see Pete K voted against.

How do you know that?

Cheers for posting this lovejoy....informative.

This, lifted from the posting .......

I voted against the agreement on the basis that I didn’t feel the reward on offer, either on basic pay or shorter working week, was adequate.

[belle smith]

note to self don't skim read.

[donut]

"The postal executive accepted there will be winners and losers"

How dare the union let these words pass there lips ....would unite utter such words , i don`t think so !!
SO WEAK !

[TrueBlueTerrier]

"The postal executive accepted there will be winners and losers"

How dare the union let these words pass there lips ....would unite utter such words , i don`t think so !!
SO WEAK !

The BA section of Unite wouldn't even they are talking to BA about the size of the reduction in pay and T&Cs for their members not if it will happen just the size.
Lets not mention the CMA section of Unite.

[tojobevred]

pete chaired meeting on thurs in manchester was very quiet
but wot else was he to do
keep up the good work pete

[numan]

Have any other PEC members owned up to which way they voted?