My brother is a postman and was one of the 77% of CWU members who voted in favour of strike action in the ballot this month.

The bosses at Royal Mail, whilst voting themselves massive bonuses (Chief Exec. Adam Crozier, ex FA, is currently the highest paid civil servant in history) are only offerning 2.5% to the lads and women that do all the hard work out on the street. After inflation this amounts to a pay cut, whilst they are being asked to work harder, lose around 40,000 jobs and deliver everything without overtime.

The CWU has accepted that Royal Mail needs to modernise (after Crozier etc run it into the ground whilst enjoying trebles all round) but they have asked to be part of the decision process. RM have refused to talk about their modernisation plan.
Both parties are meeting tomorrow but with RM refusing to change their position it seems as though a strike is likely.

Suspiciously Amazon have announced today, on the eve of talks, that they are to stop using Royal Mail to deliver certain 2nd class items - at a cost of approx £8m to Royal Mail. Sacking Crozier could make up this difference in a few months but this is unlikely when they can put another few thousand workers on the dole.

What do you think? Will the public support the postal workers if they strike?
Will Gordon Brown support them?
Will Bernard Manning appear at the Embassy club tonight?

hmmm.

question 1. never cross a picket line. this part of the public will support them
question 2. HaHaHaHaHAHAHAHA hahahahah ha.
question 3. a ghostly aparition (sp?) reveals itself to yvette fielding and says. nice tits love, put yer knickers on and make me a cup of tea. (via Derek Acorah, obviously)

as a former CWU activist i will give support to the picket line.

as for the answers to your questions.

wot he said

Solidarity from Detroit Michigan. Never cross a picket line.

I think you'll find that most of us on here are confirmed picket line non-crossers (picket line non-crossers). Add me to the list anyway.

I was listening to Adam Crozier on the radio on the way home. Sanctimonious git.

My mates a postie and I wish him well and hope he holds onto his job, but these are difficult days for the Royal Mail, How do you hold unto an industry which is looking outdated when the newer forms of communication mean that letter writing does not happen anymore, Royal Mail post junk mail and bills through my door and little else.

I can see in the near future firms like TNT cherry picking all the best bits (parcelforce) and leaving just a rump.

A variety of white vans deliver parcels to our door who could easily scale up to fill a void.

Royal Mail looses money and in that context a strike over pay is futile, The CWU should concentrate on limiting redundancies and if they have to happen (I hope not) then negoiating the best pay off.

One days strikes don't hurt the employer who can sit it out and wait for the union members to go back to work.

I was reading that temps were being employed on £5.50 an hour to clear the backlog rather than a posties rate (overtime?) of £12 an hour, that's another problem for the CWU, the temp market seems to be bigger than it has ever been before.

I see Royal Mail as similar to Post Offices and Libraries institutions that need to be reformed to meet the challenges of modern times.

I went to support on of the picket lines in Bristol, but turned up at the wrong address, a day late

FWIW, my company are still franking mail and delivering it to one of the sorting offices out at Filton, I don't know if it's being processed, I'd suspect it is being sorted at the very least, and I'd reckon temps were doing it.

Most of the functions of the Post Office of old are done online, things like posting letters and parcels are being 'modernised' at the expense of the customer; varying the charges of different sized envelopes and small packages - so I think that most folks already have enough frustration with the RM that I don't think the strike is helping their cause too much, sadly.

I agree Jon. What people have to try and remember is that the problems we have with Royal Mail are caused by the decision makers of the company, the same decision makers that the workers are striking against. I feel sorry for the Posties who have striked for four days, that's a lot of money to lose for anyone.

In fairness, Crozier is only a monkey here.

He's in charge of a service that the government are intent on fucking right up. On one hand that Royal Mail has to give away parts of its business and compete, that it must make a profit, that it must run as a viable business.
Then they are criticised for cutting services that don't make a profit, whilst interfering in their profitable functions by over-regulating. The decision makers ain't the bad guy here, gordon thatcher is, crozier is just his gimp.

worth repeating