The dispute cannot go forward unless workers take matters into their own hands. Their policing the class struggle gave the Tories the breathing space they needed to assemble the most right-wing government in British history. With the government in meltdown following the resignation of Boris Johnson, the unions blocked the growing calls for a general strike. Despite proclamations about a “summer of discontent”, the CWU isolated Royal Mail workers from BT and other striking workers, holding out the illusion of a negotiated settlement. CWU officials, like those at the RMT, ASLEF, Unite and other unions, are working to divide, delay and suppress industrial action. Royal Mail has no intention of backing down on its agenda. The company has also denied it is in “secret talks” over a private equity buyout, but the vultures are circling, with Vesa Equity having raised its stake to 25 percent. On September 1, Royal Mail executives awarded themselves shares worth over £2 million. Yet the workers who generated those profits are resorting to foodbanks.
Royal Mail workers explained on picket lines today that the company and its shareholders reaped record profits with the boom in online sales in the pandemic. As analysts told the New Statesman, Amazon has a “competitive advantage” because they “are able to treat workers as a more disposable resource”. Postal workers will be reduced to minimum wage workers with no protections. Royal Mail, just like the National Health Service, railways, buses, BT and countless other sectors, will be cherry-picked, asset stripped and looted while basic services for the public, especially the elderly and poor, will be gutted. “Postal industry analysts I’ve spoken to believe it makes business sense: GLS is a highly profitable international parcel service with opportunities for growth, while the Royal Mail is a public service that is currently losing a million pounds a day.” The rebrand to International Distributions Services implies a commitment to the latter and, almost certainly, the splitting off of the Royal Mail. Noting its re-branding in July as International Distributions Services, the article explained, “This is a company of two parts: the Royal Mail, which has committed to deliver a letter anywhere in Britain for a fixed price since 1839 and was privatised in 2013, and the less memorable GLS (General Logistics Systems), an international parcel delivery service based in Amsterdam. Royal Mail has threatened to hive off its profitable international parcel delivery company if its demands are blocked, while new Prime Minister Liz Truss has been at the forefront of plans to use essential services legislation to ban strikes.Īn article in the New Statesman, “Nothing can stop the Royal Mail from breaking up”, set out the company’s agenda. It warned that further strikes would place workers on “a perilous path”.
On Monday, CWU officials resumed talks with Royal Mail executives, issuing a statement later that day that “both parties have agreed to reflect on the position in the next 24 hours”.īut the company refused to budge on its restructuring agenda, stating, “any talks must be about both change and pay. Royal Mail wants delivery rounds to start two hours later each day, from 9am, with last post at 7pm or later. It is demanding new delivery schedules to compete with parcel delivery services such as Amazon that employ a super-exploited gig workforce. Royal Mail insists a further below-inflation increase of 3.5 percent is contingent on “productivity” and “workplace reforms” that will set fire to existing employment contracts. They are demanding a genuine pay raise in line with galloping inflation, against a 2 percent pay award imposed by the company. Postal workers voted by nearly 99 percent for strike action. Pickets at Aylesbury Delivery Office in Buckinghamshire
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