Two-week strike over as posties head back

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POSTAL workers are due back at work today after striking for more than two weeks.

Distribution and processing staff at Royal Mail's Leek Road delivery office in Stoke walked out on August 11 over plans to move their work to Wolverhampton.

But after meetings yesterday afternoon, it was agreed that they will return to work at noon today.

Communication Workers' Union (CWU) divisional representative, Mick Kavanagh, said: "The issues that are on the table will hopefully be resolved within the next week.

"We are now going to be testing out whether Royal Mail will be carrying out the national agreement about personal circumstances and voluntary redundancies, which we believe they have broken."

However, the 15 workers in the cash transit depot in Stoke have now announced they will stage their own industrial action next Tuesday and Wednesday.

CWU secretary Andy Plant said: "They gave the company the required seven days' notice on Tuesday."

Royal Mail has unveiled plans to close the depot and union representatives say seven workers have been asked to transfer to Sheffield, Chester or Birmingham, with the rest facing redundancy.

However, Royal Mail bosses insist there will be no compulsory redundancies, and everyone who wants to stay with the company will be offered the chance to do so.

Delivery workers at Royal Mail's Leek Road depot also brought their unofficial strike to an end yesterday.

They walked out on Friday after being told they would not be paid if they refused to cross their colleagues' picket line.

CWU area delivery representative, Malcolm Brundrett, said: "The guys here have supported their colleagues in distribution and collections in their dispute over the closure of their office. That dispute is at a critical point now and our guys decided the time was right for them to go back into work."

The unofficial action affected delivery services in the ST1, ST2, ST4, ST9 and ST12 areas of the city.

A Royal Mail spokesman said: "We're doing everything we can to get services back to normal as quickly as possible, and we apologise to any of our customers who have been inconvenienced."

Meanwhile, thousands of postal workers across the country are taking part in a series of one-day strikes in a separate dispute linked to Royal Mail's modernisation plans.

Staff at Burslem's delivery office held a 24-hour walkout last Friday, and workers in areas including London, Birmingham, Bristol, Leeds, Warrington, Middlesbrough and Edinburgh are planning strike action today, tomorrow and Saturday.

The Government has refused to intervene in the increasingly bitter row, and the union has accused ministers of "letting the industry rot".

Deputy general secretary, Dave Ward, said: "The postal industry needs the Government to address the crucial issues of pensions and regulation that they themselves identified."