Romford, Croydon, Jubilee, Gatwick & Greenford Mail Centres

[POSTMAN]

A joint communication agreed by the following Divisional Committees: Anglia, London, South Central and South East

An Open Letter to CWU Members in Romford, Croydon, Jubilee, Gatwick & Greenford Mail Centres

Dear Colleague

Last Thursday (28 February) Royal Mail rejected the CWU’s alternative proposal for London. This alternative proposal would have closed one Mail Centre in London, closed Rathbone Place Delivery Office, and kept open East London pending a review post the Olympics 2012. In addition, it demanded from Royal Mail an absolute guarantee that there would be no compulsory redundancies as part of their decision to close the London Mail Centres.

Royal Mail’s decision to reject the union’s counter proposals will mean that for the first time ever, Royal Mail will be imposing compulsory redundancies on CWU grades. Royal Mail’s plan is to shut Rathbone Place Delivery Office, close East London Mail Centre, close South London Mail Centre and reduce staffing levels in the Mount Pleasant Mail Centre by 57%.

Under Royal Mail’s plan there will be 1,100 less jobs for London postal workers. This means that 1 in every 3 individuals will not have a job under Royal Mail’s plans. For full time processing staff the figures are far higher.

No full time processing staff in either East or South London will be able to move with their work to the Mount as full time jobs will be reducing from 944 to 410.

In East London’s case there are currently 351 full time duties. However, there are only 69 full time processing jobs in Romford. This means that 4 out of every 5 full time processing staff will not have a job when East London closes.

In South London they currently have 543 full time processing jobs and there are only 104 on offer in Croydon and 118 in Jubilee. This means there will be an unresolved surplus in South London of 321 staff (2 out of every 3 staff).

Royal Mail know that their plans will lead to compulsory redundancies. However, they believe it is a price worth paying to achieve their expected net profit value. We are banned from the Official Secrets Act from telling you how much Royal Mail stand to make but it is far higher than any other Mail Centre closure programme ever.

Royal Mail has sent out an unagreed preference exercise which only has one question on it. That question is: Do you want to leave the company on VR? This is unlike any other preference exercise and has been done to deliberately scare individuals into thinking that they have no other choice. Moreover they have now told all staff that unless they attend what they call an individual career decision with Clear Choice they will forego their right to select a duty. Clear Choice is a company called Reids who are employed by Royal Mail to achieve their peoples target and will do everything in their power to achieve it. In other words they offer staff the Godfather approach (an offer you can’t refuse).

These tactics are a clear demonstration of the worst kind of bullying by Royal Mail designed to force people into either leaving the business, or move to HWDC. The CWU will be informing the media of Royal Mail’s unprecedented and sustained campaign to bully workers in the London Mail Centres who are scared about their futures.

Yesterday (4 May), Royal Mail in typical fashion, announced that they intend to start moving work from London Offices as early as next week with work moving to Gatwick from 16 May. Work will go to Romford, Croydon, Jubilee and Greenford from June.

There is no agreement for this work to go from South London, East London or the Mount. In addition, there is no agreement from any Distribution Hub for this work to go to any Mail Centre.

You’re Division and local Branch has also not agreed for this work to come into your Mail Centre. There are no agreed duty schedules and this is unagreed work.

There is absolutely no doubt that if Royal Mail get away with moving the work to Romford, Croydon, Jubilee, Greenford and Gatwick, and this work gets performed, then individuals in South and East London will be made compulsorily redundant-forcing Members to leave Royal Mail against their wishes.

London Mail Centres will be balloted next week for Strike action and we believe that it is the intention of CWU Headquarters to ballot your Mail Centre in the forthcoming weeks over the issue of solidarity action.
Remember if they get away with compulsory redundancies in London then no one is safe.

Royal Mail’s new unagreed business plan states that their target is to reduce the number of Mail Centres to 30 which may mean that your Mail Centre will come under review next. Remember if Royal Mail gets away with Compulsory redundancies that will become the norm in the future.

Remember Royal Mail are breaking the Business Transformation Agreement. This Agreement states that the overarching objective is to avoid compulsory redundancies.

The CWU are therefore seeking your support to the following:

Support Your London CWU Colleagues By Rejecting Royal Mail’s Decision To Move Unagreed Work From London Which Will Trigger Compulsory Redundancies.

Support Your London CWU Colleagues By Not Agreeing To The Work Coming Into Your Mail Centre.

Support The Union By Voting Yes In The Industrial Action Ballot To Reject Compulsory Redundancies.

The Postal Executive will be holding meetings at your workplace over the next couple of weeks. Royal Mail have banned the CWU in London from holding meetings in workplaces as they do not want the members to hear the truth so it may well be that they will have to hold meetings outside. Please make sure you attend.

05 05 2011 - Open Letter divisional.pdf

EXPOSING ROYAL MAILS LIES AND BULLYING TACTICS...
A statement by London Divisional Committee:PDF...

45610_6th Ballot m.pdf

[Judgee]

So just how low can RM bosses go? Everytime you think they have reached the bottom, they dig a little further!

[MrGoose]

So just how low can RM bosses go? Everytime you think they have reached the bottom, they dig a little further!

Thats how moya makes the royalmail a great place to work!
Make everyone redundant first!!

[norwichchris]

This is why we need a national all out strike asap!

[knackers0191]

Yet they told us last December that the mail centre I work in in Middlesbrough and others in Darlington, York & Doncaster would be closing and the union do absolutely nothing and just accept it, although for what use they are I wasn't surprised. 2 close in London and there is uproar!

[dvbuk55]

Yet they told us last December that the mail centre I work in in Middlesbrough and others in Darlington, York & Doncaster would be closing and the union do absolutely nothing and just accept it, although for what use they are I wasn't surprised. 2 close in London and there is uproar!

Well you see knackered, the NATIONAL CWU LEADERSHIP have said absolutely NOTHING, it is the London CWU Divisional Committee who is banging the drum.
Using the CWU Logo gives the impression that it is an official communication, when in fact it is not at all. The National CWU has made NO statement on the situation and is not calling for a strike, or indeed any action whatsoever........................and I would be mightily surprised if they do.

The figures quoted are merely conjecture from concerned London officials and they are right to be concerned, but it has not yet come to compulsory redundancies and even by their own admission there are jobs on offer, albeit not necessarily ideal.

I would be surprised if anyone who does not subscribe to RMC knows anything about the closures and I very much doubt local branches will be calling a meeting to explain the position because attendance may well be a little thin on the ground.

[pinewood]

amazing when london in trouble we all have to walk out what happens anywhere else[noth of watford] dont give a sh@t .this has been happening last couple of years to other mail centers up north

[jmcg]

it is certainly a fair point that the london offices have a much higher profile than the rest of the country...but this is a very disturbing situation which should concern us all...crush london and the rest will fall...i truly despair of the cwu executive..

[dvbuk55]

it is certainly a fair point that the london offices have a much higher profile than the rest of the country...but this is a very disturbing situation which should concern us all...crush london and the rest will fall...i truly despair of the cwu executive..

It is certainly being painted as a disturbing situation, though it speaks volumes that HQ has not actually made any determination on the situation as is and is probably waiting for hard facts rather than conjecture to make a decision. It would seem that when the reality of the 2010 Agreement has come home to roost then some have got cold feet.

[Martin Walsh]

Dvbuk your misleading people, the CWU National Leadership have endorsed the London Ballot and have written to the London membership expressing the Unions support. In addition in the letter to the national membership it explains the seriousness of the situation in London.

Now we realise the mail centres are closing in the North East and elsewhere but this is not about bricks and mortar. Its not about saving mail centres its about stopping Royal Mail compelling people who want to stay in Royal Mail to leave as there are no jobs available including in delivery offices.

[TrueBlueTerrier]

Dvbuk your misleading people, the CWU National Leadership have endorsed the London Ballot and have written to the London membership expressing the Unions support. In addition in the letter to the national membership it explains the seriousness of the situation in London.

Now we realise the mail centres are closing in the North East and elsewhere but this is not about bricks and mortar. Its not about saving mail centres its about stopping Royal Mail compelling people who want to stay in Royal Mail to leave as there are no jobs available including in delivery offices.

Thing is people in the North West felt compelled to take VR because the jobs that were on offer were not acceptable, which is what London Posties will face. There were posts on here, and plenty of News Stories about it, but Nationally the CWU appeared to do nothing and did not "seem" that concerned. Now some in the NW feel that now London is facing what they did all of sudden there is some noise being made.

You may not think that the situation is the same, but ultimately that does not matter, there are members outside London who do think its the same, and to get a coordinated or national response you'll have to take those views on board and target your campaign appropriately. If you don't, despite the support of us "militants" then London could get isolated.

[dvbuk55]

Dvbuk your misleading people, the CWU National Leadership have endorsed the London Ballot and have written to the London membership expressing the Unions support. In addition in the letter to the national membership it explains the seriousness of the situation in London.

Now we realise the mail centres are closing in the North East and elsewhere but this is not about bricks and mortar. Its not about saving mail centres its about stopping Royal Mail compelling people who want to stay in Royal Mail to leave as there are no jobs available including in delivery offices.

I'm not misleading anyone dingo. Although I may have missed the media headlines, the LTB, the CWU TV live comments, issued by the NATIONAL CWU - I did catch the London Division missive with the CWU logo. What I didn't catch was the letter from the CWU about the seriousness of the situation in the North West, North East and Midlands. Many of whom have already faced the serious situation now faced by London.

What you have not answered dingo is how you provide work for all the people who don't want to leave Royal Mail, perhaps you could bring it in from other MCs and that they should close? You talk about jobs as though that is a seperate issue, it isn't, it is dependent on the work being available.

[hatetheboss]

If this was an issue in other areas my question is, why did not these areas put up a fight like London? and if they never had the bottle for it why would they support a fight for London?

[dvbuk55]

If this was an issue in other areas my question is, why did not these areas put up a fight like London? and if they never had the bottle for it why would they support a fight for London?

Not the bottle, but the support - Area and Div Reps were too busy looking after their own interests to be concerned about shop floor issues, which IS something you cannot accuse the London Reps of.

[hatetheboss]

Agreed, I think the stuffing has been knocked out of the membership and this might be a battle too far.Not enough die hards left because Royal Mail have sacked them or they have left the business.