National Guidelines for the Two Week Programme for IA!!!

[evilc]

National Guidelines for the Two Week Programme for Industrial Action

The following Guidelines have been produced to assist Branch Representatives and provide more detailed guidance on the action that has been planned on a Functional/Site specific basis.

Functional/Site Specific

The clarification of the above is - all Royal Mail Employees (regardless of grade e.g. OPG, LA, Mail Screener, Engineers etc) employed on the Site irrespective of their function.

Example 1:
A Mail Centre may also have a Delivery, Distribution and Network function on the same Site. In these instances all of the members from these four functions would be involved in the Industrial Action on the days scheduled for the Mail Centre/Cash Handling Units but will not be expected to take action on the days scheduled for Delivery (i.e. 27th - 28th July 2007 and 2nd - 3rd August 2007) or Network offices (i.e. 1st - 2nd August 2007 and 7th - 8th August 2007).

Example 2:
A Delivery Office may also have a Distribution/Collection Hub on site. In this instance again the members from both Delivery and Distribution would be scheduled to take action on the days scheduled for Deliveries.

Example 3:
A Delivery Office, Mail Centre or Network Unit may have a Walk Bundling Centre on site. In these instances again the members from the Walk Bundling Centre would be scheduled to take action on the days scheduled for the Delivery Office, Mail Centre or Network Unit as appropriate.

This same principle will apply to other Sites e.g. International where more than one Royal Mail function may be employed.

Rotations

Where members rotate weekly between functions for example Mail Centres and Delivery they will be due to be involved in the action scheduled for the offices they are working in on that particular week.

Example:
Week 1 working in a Delivery office, Week 2 working on a Mail Centre Site for Distribution. The action taken would be in line with Deliveries in the first week and Mail Centres in the second week.

The only exception to the above would be Cash Handling members who regardless of which Site they are based are due to take action with the Mail Centres.

Total Action

Over the two week Programme (which is scheduled over a three week period) no individual should be required to be involved in more than two 24 hour strikes.

Programme of Action

We have detailed below the Programme scheduled by Function/Site to clarify the dates of action in each week.


Mail Centres and Cash Handling

Week 1
All duties, Scheduled Attendance and overtime commencing at or after 19.00 Wednesday 25th July 2007 until 19.00 Thursday 26th July 2007.

Week 2
All duties, Scheduled Attendance and overtime commencing at or after 03.00 Tuesday 31st July 2007 until 03.00 Wednesday 1st August 2007.


MDECs

Week 1
All duties, Scheduled Attendance and overtime commencing at or after 12.00 noon Thursday 26th July 2007 until 12.00 noon Friday 27th July 2007.

Week 2
All duties, Scheduled Attendance and overtime commencing at or after 03.00 Saturday 4th August 2007 until 03.00 Sunday 5th August 2007.


International/HWDC

Week 1
All duties, Scheduled Attendance and overtime commencing at or after 12.00 noon Friday 27th July 2007 until 12.00 noon Saturday 28th July 2007.

Week 3
All duties, Scheduled Attendance and overtime commencing at or after 19.00 Monday 6th August 2007 until 19.00 Tuesday 7th August 2007.


Deliveries and Separate Collection Hubs

Week 1
All duties, Scheduled Attendance and overtime commencing at or after 19.00 Friday 27th July 2007 until 19.00 Saturday 28th July 2007.

Week 2
All duties, Scheduled Attendance and overtime commencing at or after 03.00 Thursday 2nd August 2007 until 03.00 Friday 3rd August 2007.


Airports

Week 2
All duties, Scheduled Attendance and overtime commencing at or after 12.00 noon Monday 30th July 2007 until 12.00 noon Tuesday 31st July 2007.

and

All duties, Scheduled Attendance and overtime commencing at or after 19.00 Friday 3rd August 2007 until 19.00 Saturday 4th August 2007.


Network

Week 2
All duties, Scheduled Attendance and overtime commencing at or after 03.00 Wednesday 1st August 2007 until 03.00 Thursday 2nd August 2007.

Week 3
All duties, Scheduled Attendance and overtime commencing at or after 12.00 noon Tuesday 7th August 2007 until 12.00 noon Wednesday 8th August 2007.

Disciplined Approach/Difficulties of Unofficial Action

This Programme of action has been designed to have the maximum impact on the business without increasing further the loss of pay to our members. If carried out as planned it should cause a major disruption to the service throughout the three week period and fresh negotiations with the employer.

There are however clearly many issues that will arise that could, if not managed in a disciplined way, may lead to unnecessary difficulties. We have listed below a number of examples that immediately spring to mind:

Already, as representatives will be aware from the previous two 24 hour strikes, members have been finishing their shifts while other members are on strike due to the varied shifts not all commencing at the same time. This will still be the case and it is imperative that we continue to avoid this leading to unofficial action because picket lines have put undue pressure on members who are actually due to be at work in line with the strike scheduled by the Union.

Where there are individuals who due to their personal conscience refuse to cross a picket line even though they are due to be at work it must be recognised that they will lose additional pay for that period because it will be classed as they have taken strike action. It should also be noted that they must return to duty as early as possible to ensure this additional strike action is not extended longer than necessary.

With the Functional/Site specific strikes planned further examples of members of the same Branch and in the same area being due to work while others are on strike will obviously occur e.g. the Mail Centre and attached Delivery Unit may be on strike on one day while the neighbouring separate Delivery Offices are due to be at work. This could also lead to management asking our members to go and work in the office that is on strike which, although we appreciate will be very contentious, Union discipline again must be maintained to prevent unnecessary problems.

Transfers of traffic from one office to another office will also clearly be an avenue that may be explored by the business without any consultation or agreement in an attempt to disrupt our disciplined action.

The use of agency staff will still be illegal where Units are on strike however clearly the business will seek to use agency staff before and after each strike and throughout the period in offices that are still due to be operationally working.

Management will also continue to use casuals wherever they can so that they can keep overtime at minimum levels to wind our members up further but again we need to avoid unofficial action over these issues at this point in time.


We fully appreciate that the above may be difficult for everyone to manage but it is essential that we do if we want the action to work and hit Royal Mail where it hurts.


Additional Enquiries

If Branch Representatives still need further clarification on any points they should in the first instance contact their Divisional Representative or Regional Secretary who should be able to provide the appropriate advice.









National Postal Executive

[larsson1971]

Macca i was just thinking about this as well , What do drivers that come from delivery offices going to mail centres on I.D days what is the driver to do .

[Macca]

Macca i was just thinking about this as well , What do drivers that come from delivery offices going to mail centres on I.D days what is the driver to do .

My personal view and that of some of my colleagues is...the mail center staff have their day of action on one day, and delivery units will have theirs on a different day, i dont believe that if someone has a conscience (in regards to this particular Industrial Action) they can refuse to cross a picket line when their day of action has either been and gone or is still to come, so, if your from another office that isnt on strike then you cross the picket line, and those on the picket line should be made aware by their rep why you are doing this.

Thats my opinion anyway, and one my branch will be telling members to do, this is not a perfect strike, it is a strike to cause maximum impact on the business and part of our discipline must be to prevent it becoming an all-out strike!!

[bigsharkboy]

have posted this else where but have copied and pasted it hope you guys find it helpful

was sent this by email by my branch sec to help with issues on the strike days starting wed
hope it helps it will in our area



Dear Colleague

This letter confirms that I work as a driver from ******** delivery office. My day for industrial action is to commence on --------------, in the interest of maintaining C.W.U discipline during the dispute please allow me to cross through your lawful picket line. If you need further clarification please phone ---------- the area distribution rep on ************ or --------------- my unit rep on ************

:cfo :lfo





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