public bodies paying for union officials

[fishtank]

the fact of the matter will be when we are privatised there will be no full time release for area and div reps , the business will not pay div reps, we wont get free office's on site, the world will be a tougher place, but will we feel a bit more independant?

There will be big changes after privatisation.
It is possible for the union to continue to represent members...look at BT.
However BT hasn't had a national strike since 1987..and union density is now much lower than Royal Mail
You can draw your own conclusions from that.
One thing is for sure it won't be pretty for us at the bottom or for those at the top.
I don't personally see the union continuing on it's own but that's just a personal opinion.
If the company is allowed to casualise as it appears to be in the early stages of with Angard...we're screwed.

[silly suffolk]

the fact of the matter will be when we are privatised there will be no full time release for area and div reps , the business will not pay div reps, we wont get free office's on site, the world will be a tougher place, but will we feel a bit more independant?

There will be big changes after privatisation.
It is possible for the union to continue to represent members...look at BT.
However BT hasn't had a national strike since 1987..and union density is now much lower than Royal Mail
You can draw your own conclusions from that.
One thing is for sure it won't be pretty for us at the bottom or for those at the top.
I don't personally see the union continuing on it's own but that's just a personal opinion.
If the company is allowed to casualise as it appears to be in the early stages of with Angard...we're screwed.

the independance we may feel will come at one hell of a price, and your right, the total lack of any aggressive posturing over the casual labour situation is poor to say the least.

[andy2007]

I'd go further than that: It's embarrasing! I've raised this locally, but as we mainly have Manpower Agency Workers, there's little we can do at a local level. Why isn't HQ doing something to deal with the shameful treatment of the people on Angard's books!?! After all: Angard is part of RMG, so surely they can put some pressure on them on our behalf. I've never been one to push for Strike ballots (I prefer to exhaust ALL other options first), although I always Picket when there is one, and have often voted in favour of them, when balloted. But to be perfectly honest, I think things have got so bad, that IMHO it's time to ballot everyone who has Agency (whether Angard, Manpower, or any other Agency for that matter), to go out until RMG DO something about Angard, and make a public apology for the way they've treated those on their books!

We should be properly staffed, which should mean offering Angard staff at least an FTC after a site has needed Agency workers for a prolonged period, even if they keep changing who it is.

[Martin Walsh]

Dvbuk make up you mind !! On hand you accuse people like me of being in the chattering business and then when we dont answer a response you say the silence is deafening.

Fish the issue of the central billing was always going to work out less than it was orginally asked. Royal Mail had not dealt with the central billing agreement in the correct way it was agreed on many accounts.

The central billing bill was also on top of a bill Royal Mail wanted for the CWU share of the national appeals panels. In the end Royal Mail agreed that the CWU should not pay for the cases which they were succussful at the national appeal which was the vast majority and then agreed to reduce the central billing bills in most cases by 2/3rds.

The Branch`s are then responsible for paying the central billing bills out of their rebate.

In addition the CWU agreed to a new reps discpline appeals procedure which would no long use Professor Roy Lewis who was charging a small fortune for his role of which Royal Mail and the CWU have to pay. Instead there will still be independent chairs but their charges have been kept to a miniumn.

Now in terms of what happens after the company is sold who knows but British Telecom who are a private company has more paid release than a Branch has in Royal Mail.

[dvbuk55]

The devil is in the detail though - why did they agree to cutting the bill by 2/3rds. There must have been a compelling case put forward by the CWU on behalf of the CWU to persuade RM that they had in fact got it wrong. If only that expertise was measured across the whole of negotiations. I've always been highly suspicious of the unholy haste for the leadership to get on the road to persuade the membership that BT 2010 was a good deal but hey there is such a thing as coincidence..............I suppose.

Actually dingo I was suggesting that the enquiry would fall on deaf ears............chattering comes naturally to some, especially when being paid to do it, there is of course no measurement applied to it and so effectiveness can only be judged on results and not performance.

[fishtank]

I think you would have to be very naive to believe that the issues of check off,central billing and pre-scheduled release would not affect the bargaining position of any union never mind a union that draws so heavily on support from one or two employers.
Just how much this affected the final agreement can only be guessed.
Would i like our union to be more independent?....of course.
Are we too far down that particular road now for it to be practical or even possible?....probably.

What i would like is some honesty.
If other issues have to be taken into account when negotiating an agreement those issues should not be hidden from the membership with bluster,chaff and embarrassing roadshows.
I don't want to be told that an agreement is the best thing since sliced bread if it plainly isn't.
If it's painful but necessary i want to know exactly why it's necessary then i can judge whether the pain is acceptable based on the full facts.

I don't think that's too much to ask from a union.