Royal Mail: Unacceptable, Disgraceful, Shambolic!

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These are some of the words that could be said to describe the Royal Mail-Communications Workers Union fiasco. Following weeks upon weeks of delays in mail being delivered the CWU have finally decided to hold two 24-hour strikes, at the detriment to the taxpayer. The dispute over job cuts has escalated to two strikes on the 22nd Oct and 23rd Oct.

The reality of the situation is that both sides, Royal Mail and the CWU, have agreed that cuts are needed to compensate for falling revenue. Royal Mail has seen losses of 170m per annum from it's letters and packages business. It is thought that the jobs of approximately 170,000 workers in mail centres and delivery offices will be lost first.

The 'reasoning' behind the ballots is that Royal Mail managers have so far been refusing to specify the extent to which the cuts will affect the workers. On the one hand it could be argued that the CWU are taking disproportionate action against something that in essence has already been decided, but, on the other hand you have Royal Mail not taking their employees seriously enough.

Despite Royal Mail having a backlog of mail and parcels as long as the Thames these strikes will hit postal services even harder, crippling not only business that rely on the Royal Mail but also its reputation. Having suffered a similar fate in the wildcate walk-out two years ago Royal Mail haven't seemed to have learned their costly lesson. Having cost the capital's economy £300m alone last time, it would seem reasonable to expect to avoid another similar scenario.

Someone needs to tell them to grow up and rid them of their selfish ways; the economy is already bad enough as it is. Action by the CWU is perhaps callous and abusing their rights as a union to strike. Royal Mail undoubtedly have to be careful if it wishes to maintian it's stranglehold on the postal services market; if it can't provide an efficient public sector service it should expect more competition from other companies awaiting in it's shadows to jump in it's shoes. The problem essentially stems from the CWU, but the CWU is the Royal Mail's problem to sort out, not ours.

Source:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8260701.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8304722.stm