The truth behind the London Mail Centre plan

[Martin Walsh]

it is fair for people to question why when other mail centres are closing around the country that London is different.

Royal Mail`s decision to annonce it at the same time as the colleague share announcement was a clear attempt to ensure that members around the country would possibly not support the arguement in London.

However lets be under no illusions here , how Royal Mail are treating staff in London mail centres is totally different to other mail centre closures.

When a Mail centre closes normally anywhere than staff have a choice they either can move with the work to the mail centre where your work is going or if jobs are reducing take VR.

In London`s case there are not enough jobs available as I will explain below and that will mean complusory redunacies in particular for full time processing staff.

South London`s work is going to three mail centres , the Mount , Croydon and Jubillee. However the New Mount office is reducing from 944 full time staff to 410 meaning a reduction in the only mail centre staying open in London of 534 jobs. No one from South London can move to the Mount with any work. There are 543 full time staff in South London and there are only 222 jobs available in Croydon and Jubillee meaning a surplus of 321 staff without a job 69% of the workforce.

In East London`s case it is even worse there are 351 full time processing jobs but only 69 jobs in Romford meaning 282 staff are left without a job that is 80% of the workforce.

Royal Mail`s decision to push ahead will lead to complusory redunancies, we believe there is a risk of part timers also being made complulsory redundant. Why are Royal Mail doing this now because the prize they get for selling Rathbone Place , part of the mount and South London is worth treble what they are getting for closing 6 mail centres in the North East. Now tell me what do the union do ?

Do we say to those members well sorry we are not supporting you ? Because make no mistake once they start making people complusory redundant it wont stop there it will become the normal. Now I dont care where the area is they do it in but I would fight to stop it as that is what a union shoud do

You choose how you react but dont believe for one moment that it cant happen to you !

Getting people to fight is never easy but when you can say to someone if you dont fight then you face not having a job then most will fight.

[dvbuk55]

Yeah, life's a bitch right enough

[Dogs of War]

You can fight all day long dingo, royal mail will win in the end, as they do all the time. Who would ever believe we are delivering door to doors for nothing.

[fishtank]

Are you saying that Royal Mail will not offer an alternative job in another unit to those displaced or are you saying that the travelling involved will make it impractical?

Big difference dingo....as the guys in the North East now travelling 30miles+ to work will tell you.

[feduppostie]

i'm sorry Dingo but blah blah blah

London is different

no it is not

we are ALL Royal Mail it does not start and stop in London

now i realise you are based there and therefore have a vested interest in it

but all the rest of us see is that now you are getting the same treatment we have been having for the past few years

we couldn't stop it neither can you

it is going to happen end of

the rules have changed, strike if you want to but don't ask the rest of the country to save your jobs we have a hard enough job saving our own

in short 'welcome to our world' the CWU is so far out of touch with it's members ( of which I am no longer one) it is unreal ( and by that I mean the higher levels not the 'ordinary' reps)

they went on a tour to convince us the latest deal was ' the deal of the century' maybe it was but not for us

we said time and time again it wouldn't work - we expected RM not to listen we did not expect our union to ignore us

guess what we were right

so I am sorry but as far as I can see it's everyman for himself - make the best of this job while we still have it

if that sounds defeatist that's because it is

I will not lose one single day's pay anymore for your union cos it won't make a damn difference to anyone

and before anyone starts telling what the union has secured for us and how much worse off we can be, come to my office

things could not be any worse unless we were out of a job and that may happen anyway

have a look around thousands of people would grab our jobs for whatever pay they could get

it's time the union wised up

these are not the 1970's or the 1980's I for one do not want to go down the route of the miners

[dvbuk55]

You can fight all day long dingo, royal mail will win in the end, as they do all the time. Who would ever believe we are delivering door to doors for nothing.

Well lets see, what was it, 19 days lost pay and to finally end up with.................well closures and compulsory redundancies, the very thing this agreement brokered by the CWU was supposed to prevent.

[General Mannerheim]

Yeah not much noise came out of London when the mailcentres in the North West went.

[DirtyHarry]

Dingo,
when the CWU agreed with RM management "2010 & Beyond," an employers dream, and must surely have been the envy of any number of twats in the CBI, I knew I would never reach retirement age in this two-bob outfit. However it's done, I will be out on my ear before I even get within spitting distance of 65. Many of us will.
Even now, the language used in the union literature is maddening. "We understand the company is in dire financial straits." What's to understand about a claim being made by people who are born liars, and treat postal workers with a contempt we had once consigned to the history books?
I refuse to understand Royal Mail's supposed predicament, I refuse to understand the CWU continuing to turn a blind eye to the utter, and open contempt, shown to each and every postal worker on the front-line.

[dvbuk55]

Dingo,
when the CWU agreed with RM management "2010 & Beyond," an employers dream, and must surely have been the envy of any number of twats in the CBI, I knew I would never reach retirement age in this two-bob outfit. However it's done, I will be out on my ear before I even get within spitting distance of 65. Many of us will.
Even now, the language used in the union literature is maddening. "We understand the company is in dire financial straits." What's to understand about a claim being made by people who are born liars, and treat postal workers with a contempt we had once consigned to the history books?
I refuse to understand Royal Mail's supposed predicament, I refuse to understand the CWU continuing to turn a blind eye to the utter, and open contempt, shown to each and every postal worker on the front-line.

This agreement could well be classed as the day the union died.........or at least copped out from it's responsibilities to the membership who are the paymasters and not Royal Mail.............although you'd be hard pressed to know that.

[DirtyHarry]

dvb,
2010 & Beyond, that was one let-down too many, not just for me, I suspect, but for a good many others too.
The CWU will learn to regret that deal, of that, I'm sure.

[Tamsky]

As a member from the West of Scotland I am well aware of the lack of sympathy with London, for whatever reason, but Dingo is right. The issue is not the closure of the Mail Centres, as others have said MC's have closed with shamefully little fight from the CWU nationally. The issue is compulsory redundancy. EVR, the traditional method of dealing with 'surplus staff' provides enhanced payments. Compulsory redundancy, as I understand it, provides only the legal minimum payment.

If RM enforce this in the London area, we will all be next.

Hopefully the position will be clearer after the national briefing, but this is no time to give up the fight.

PS I was against the business transformation agreement.

[Danelectro]

Dingo,do you not think there has to be some explaining to be done?and apologies made?The situation we are in
is the direct result of following the experts in HQ,the same HQ who seem to have been invisible over the last year
and have for instance agreed to revisions going ahead at xmas and then blaming the failure of these revisions on everybody but themselves,do you not think they should hold their hands up and at the very least say sorry we f****d up and got
it totally wrong,the leap of faith has left us in a far far more desperate place than before the 2009 strikes.

[Body Beyond Repair]

Its the CWU nationally thats gave up the fight............ thats why we need change........ to little to late and yes we'll all be next!!!

[dvbuk55]

Well there is truth and there is the truth as others wish to portray it.

[Fluke]

Its a pity there wasn't the same hue and cry when RM were ignoring national agreements when they decided to close distribution in Stoke-On-Trent. National officers got involved and did feck all, despite the fact that RM chose to ignore the MTSF. London are not the first to see agreements ignored, they're just starting to see what the rest of the country has had to put up with since this shite agreement got pushed through.