Outdoor E Bulletin September 2012

[Geezer]

For CWU members working in Royal Mail Deliveries, Collections, SPDO’s and ROMEC Cleaners
ISSUE 10
SEPTEMBER 2012

Outdoor Secretary’s Introduction

In recent months there has been an increase in the number of reports/queries coming into the department regarding bullying and harassment of our members in delivery offices. Stories of members feeling intimidated on a regular basis with most of this centring on members being forced to work beyond their time in order to complete deliveries or being accused of under performing or being slow. This type of approach will not be tolerated and we are currently gathering evidence from around the Country to raise this with Royal Mail at the highest level. If you have been or are subject to this or know someone who has or is please let the dept know by letter, or phone call or preferably by email to outdoorsecretary@cwu.org
Bob Gibson – CWU Assistant Secretary Outdoor

DELIVERY ISSUES UPDATE

General Delivery Talks Update
We have been in discussions with Royal Mail regarding what appears to be a centralised move to undermine the national agreement BT2010 and other national guidelines and joint statements. The falsities that feature most at the moment are
 Delivery Spans must be at least 4 hours long
 Start times must be no earlier than 07:00
 Indoor Performance must be 100BSI
 Revisions must have a flightpath to improve performance
 Revision must deliver at least a 5% savings target.
None of the above has been agreed with the CWU and all are contrary to the national agreement. Our advice to representatives is to register disagreement wherever this becomes an obstacle, unilaterally if necessary and get the problem into the IR Framework.

World Class Mail in Delivery - Update
Further to LTB 609/12 which updated Branches and Reps on the current position for WCM within Delivery, the department has recently undertaken visits to a number of offices which Royal Mail had stated were fully involved within WCM.
The outputs from those visits will now form the basis of discussions with Royal Mail so we can agree a set of words which will enable the ‘roll out and deployment’ of WCM within deliveries and as part of the WCM Agreement.
Branches will be kept updated on any developments to the previous message contained within LTB 609/12.

Top 10% in Delivery
Branches and Representatives will be aware of the following statement within the BT 2010 Agreement:
“In line with the above-mentioned approach, we want to bring everybody’s actual performance up to the level of the top 10 per cent performance consistent with good employment policy, appropriate equipment, safe working practices and consistent with national agreements. This will be achieved over the course of this agreement in line with any relevant functional sections in this agreement.”
In recent months during talks between Royal Mail and the department, it has been clear they have become obsessed with Upper Decile although there is no reference to this term within the National Agreement. In our opinion this is because they are looking for a measure(s) of performance in delivery that undermines the agreed measures of performance and also cuts across the current agreements we have in place.
Therefore a piece of work has been undertaken by the department on our position and provides an alternative approach to Royal Mail. This will now be placed before the Postal Executive for endorsement and further updates will be shared with Branches when they become available.

Primary Driver Training
Following a new agreement being reached with Royal Mail on a new RTA procedure and previous updates on the position with regards to training interventions which were contained within LTB 575/12, we have now reached an agreement on the roll out of Primary Driver Training (PDT). This has been communicated to Branches via LTB 714/12.
PDT is one of a number of initiatives being undertaken as part of the Zero Accident Programme (ZAP) and is a training intervention for Royal Mail drivers.
This programme is being introduced to support the ZAP and Road Traffic Accident procedure (RTA) and is designed to help reduce the large number of road traffic accidents that involve Royal Mail drivers each year.
A Joint Working Group has been set up to review aspects of Driving Initiatives and PDT will form part of this going forwards.

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This month’s frequently asked questions?

Q. Our Delivery Office has been told that we must extend our duty by 30 minutes if the mail is heavy, but that the time will be paid back within one week is this correct?
A. No, Flexibility was covered off within the Pay & Modernisation Agreement and if individuals extended their duty / attendance by 30 minutes then that time would be paid back during the current week and NOT rolled over into the following week.

Q. My delivery office manager has stated that all staff within the office must undertake minor repairs to our vans within the office as there is a new agreement, is this correct?
A. There has been an agreement reached on the issue of minor repairs being performed. However as of yet we have not finalised the safety documentation that goes with the new tasks. We hope to be in a position in the near future where information on the agreed tasks and the new agreement can be sent out until such time no one should be doing any minor repairs.

Q. Last month there was a story about possibly reviewing Door to Door is there any news on this?
A. We are currently in talks with Royal Mail about Door to Door in general but also looking to improve some of the Quality of Service figures nationally. Therefore we are looking at trialling some offices in each Division on some new ways of working and a system for collating information on when items are delivered. Further information will be contained in next month’s edition.

SPDO Update
There is a common misconception amongst many SPDO members that if a manager requests them to attend a formal meeting for either attendance, conduct or grievance hearings that they must attend where and when the manager says - in the main this is correct. However, a number of principles MUST first be met for these meetings to take place!
All members who are requested to attend formal meetings must have been given written notice 48 hours in advance of the planned meeting for the above processes and are also entitled to nominate a CWU rep to be present at all stages of those procedures.
The meeting must also be away from the work area if others are working there (if all staff have vacated the work area & there is no chance of interruption then this should be ok). If no rooms are available in your workplace to hold the meeting, one should be made available at another site (travel should also be arranged through the manager at no cost to the member).
All members also have the right to postpone any planned meeting for up to 5 days - this is part of ACAS guidelines. Any SPDO member who is asked to attend a formal meeting without those principles above being met should contact their Area Rep or Branch Office to highlight this fact.

ROMEC CLEANERS UPDATE
CWU members working for maintenance and facilities firm Romec will be aware of the protracted 2012 pay talks. During this time the Union has sought to reach an agreed position which would achieve a substantial improvement on the company’s offer.
Union negotiators Bob Gibson and Ray Ellis our aware that members are becoming increasingly frustrated at the "stubborn failure" of the firm to recognise the contribution hard-working front line staff have made to Romec's success. Romec initially made an offer of 1.5 per cent, while the latest offer consists of two unconsolidated payments for this year and next year, with consolidation dependent on the outcome of contractual negotiations between Romec and Royal Mail. Both pay proposals also shift the annual settlement date from January to April - in each case reducing the real value of the awards, while news that managers at the company have received bonuses of between 9 per cent and 15 per cent has further increased resentment among workers. With all of the above in mind, the negotiators believe, supported by the PEC, we have reached a point where there is nowhere else to go other than to move to a strike ballot as contained with LTB 718/12.
It is important that we use the full weight of our Branch and Representative structures across all sections of the Postal membership to galvanise support for and amongst our Romec members for a strong yes vote.