CWU opposes takeover bid but doesn’t support board and accepts current service ‘no longer viable’
Communications Workers’ Union leaders are understood to have conceded they will accept an end to full six-day-a-week letter deliveries and admitted the current service is “no longer viable” in a blow to the public and greetings industry’s attempts to head off Royal Mail’s reforms.
The move came on the final day of the CWU’s postal conference held in Bournemouth last week, with the union also unanimously refusing to support Czech billionaire Daniel Křetínský’s £3.1billion takeover bid for Royal Mail’s parent company International Distribution Services, which has been has been rejected, while also not being in favour of the current RM board.
In proposing the motions, general secretary Dave Ward said: “We will not support this bid. It can’t be right that the UK keeps handing over its assets to foreign owners. And we can’t support the current board. Sorry, that ain’t gonna happen. We’ve got plans for growth, for a new model, and we’re going to launch that campaign.”
However, in a second emergency motion, the union agreed to oppose any decision by Ofcom to any reduction in delivery frequency to a three or four-day uso and any speed of delivery option which delays first class or moves the delivery of second-class products to just two days a week”, while giving conditional agreement to “Royal Mail’s proposed optimised delivery model, which delivers first class six days per week at current delivery speeds, is worthy of modelling and potential trials”,
Deputy general secretary Martin Walsh explained that he had hoped to have been able to present the conference with a set of agreed principles following top-level discussions with Royal Mail, but the current potential takeover situation had temporarily frozen progress on this.
The aim of this motion was to seek the formal approval of the conference for the position being taken by the CWU in these talks, and the conditions of the union agreeing to proposed optimised delivery include a commitment to no compulsory redundancies across the group, a programme of improvements to workplace industrial relations, improvements to quality of service and universal service (uso) compliance and renegotiation of new staff members’ terms and conditions.
The union represents 110,000 of Royal Mail’s workforce, and brought services to a standstill with industrial action which particularly damaged Christmas card deliveries in 2022, and has been one of the biggest hurdles to Royal Mail’s plans to its loss-making daily deliveries, although the company, under group chief executive Martin Seidenberg, is also battling strong opposition from across the greeting card industry as well as the government and general public to its attempts to reduce the uso whereby it it is legally bound to deliver letters across the UK six days a week for the same price.
Seconding the motion, outdoor secretary Mark Baulch said: “Royal Mail have to commit to real change in the workplace and to working with this trade union. This is an important step on the journey and together on that journey, we will take this agenda and these issues forward.”
Although not included in the CWU’s reports of the three-day conference The Times reported that Martin Walsh had told the conference: “The reality is, the uso as a six-day option is no longer financially viable.
“The challenges we face are so significant – probably the most challenging time in this union’s history, whether it’s the uso change, sale or possible takeover.”
Union sources told the newspaper they would not agree to stopping a six-day letters service altogether, as first-class mail would still be delivered on Saturday. But with first-class stamps not subject to a price cap, steep price rises could be used to make second-class stamps the norm as their price is capped.
Martin also took to the CWU’s YouTube channel to underline that he still has concerns: “The uso in its current form is unsustainable. There’s got to be change but that change has got to be right by the members.
“Ofcom is looking at three, four days, all different types of speed of delivery. Only once we’ve looked at this will we decide whether we support it or not.”
There has been widespread condemnation of the fourth above-inflation stamp price rise in two years, as well as Royal Mail’s bid to slash letter deliveries to five or even three days with a more expensive option retained to allow for next-day deliveries, which appeared to be supported by industry regulator Ofcom in its The Future Of The Postal Service review.
Royal Mail has now proposed second-class deliveries on alternate week days while keeping the six-day first-class letter post – but with no cap on prices – which it claims doesn’t need a change in the law as it would keep it within the uso while cutting up to 1,000 jobs and saving £300million a year.
Kevin Hollinrake, the government minister for postal affairs, told The Times: “There is no done deal here and, as far as we are concerned, the uso remains and we are not aware of any recommendations [by Ofcom] to change it.”
The GCA is continuing its campaign to safeguard a reliable and affordable postal service and is further strengthening links with MPs, government ministers and interested bodies as part of this.
The trade association urges everybody in the greeting card industry to do their bit, for the good of the greeting card industry and society as a whole.
There is a comprehensive blog on the GCA website with an updated letter template which publishers, retailers, trade suppliers and agents can download and adapt before sending to their mps, with an mp lookup facility within the blog.
