Since Spring 2009, the Communication Workers Union (CWU) has been involved in a dispute with Royal Mail. Since June, local strikes took place across the UK. In a weblink for the general public, CWU explains that postal workers are facing threats to job security (full-time to part-time, compulsory redundancies), impossible work targets, and cuts in pay (longer hours for no pay). On 13 October, CWU made a fresh offer to the Royal Mail Managing Director, basically emphasizing that "change will be introduced by agreement". By 23 October, 120,000 postal workers went on strike nationwide and Royal Mail had to shut down its service. On 26 October, negotiations resumed with the mediation of General Secretary of the TUC Brendan Barber, and on 28 October the CWU leadership said to have had "the most useful and productive discussions since the dispute commenced", but still it remained unclear whether the union proposal was accepted by Royal Mail management.
English: http://www.cwu.org/royal-mail-dispute.html; http://www.itfglobal.org/news-online/index.cfm/newsdetail/3870 .
For more information, please contact the editor Maarten van Klaveren, Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Labour Studies (AIAS) M.vanKlaveren@uva.nl. You may find further information on the ETUI at www.etui.org, and on the AIAS at www.uva-aias.net. © ETUI aisbl, Brussels 2009. All rights reserved. The ETUI is not responsible for the content of external internet sites. The ETUI is financially supported by the European Community. The European Community is not responsible for any use made of the information contained in this news section.