I am, of course, referring to the ongoing industrial action of the postal workers’ union. I should be clear from the outset that my initial reaction to strikes is typically negative – after all, their main purpose is to cause disruption to users of a service, be it the tube, post etc – but that I can usually understand how they came about and have sympathy for both sides of the argument. Sadly, neither is true in this instance.
To the general public, the stance of the CWU appears stupid because it apparently fails to acknowledge the reality of the challenges facing the Royal Mail and consequently the need for a fundamental modernisation in both systems and working practices. Opening up the industry to competition was a positive step for postal customers but it remains a major and difficult test for Royal Mail and its workforce. Instead of embracing this challenge, I fear that the workforce, represented by the CWU, has stuck its head in the sand and refused to accept the truth: there are serious postal alternatives in the UK and significant improvements in reliability and customer service are therefore required. Neither will be achieved through strike action, which will merely stiffen the resolve of long-suffering customers to switch to alternative postal providers. Certainly not an outcome that should be relished by postal workers given that it would most likely end in sweeping redundancies if not a collapse of the Royal Mail as a viable outfit.
Many of us also find the industrial action to be hypocritical. How dare the union only now oppose plans to modernise the service. I don’t remember many complaints or strikes from postal workers when my twice-daily postal deliveries were replaced by a single, late afternoon delivery. There seems to be a fundamental failure to consider the modernisation process in its entirety but rather an implausible belief that cushy plans can be accepted and others rejected. Such an attitude is unlikely to lead to the reform necessary to succeed in the competitive era.
The paucity of detail regarding the union’s demands is also interesting. If they are indeed as vague as some have suggested then it is even harder to justify striking given the operating environment set out above. And it is certainly insensitive for public sector unions to demand better pay, job security and working hours at a time when the private sector continues to shed jobs and cut pay. The incipient economic recovery remains fragile and I am concerned by growing resentment in the private sector at apparently unrealistic wage demands and pensions on the “other side”. Whilst this is most certainly a two-way street given the size of bonuses in some industries, there does seem to be an unrealistic expectation of increasing pay and job security in the public sector which is totally at odds with this country’s economic reality.
Of course, I am not party to the details of the negotiations between the two sides and I am sure that there is some truth in the allegations that Adam Crozier has taken a hardline stance. But for the reasons outlined, I am equally convinced that the union’s disproportionate response cannot and will not be allowed to succeed and the only possible outcomes are a significant weakening of the union and/or the failure of Royal Mail. Neither are palatable conclusions for Royal Mail’s workforce but I fear that the CWU’s uncompromising and unrealistic stance has left little alternative.
This is all such a particular shame because it is actually not hard to envisage some kind of robust future for postal services. I am still a frequent user of the Royal Mail. Not only do I like letters and therefore still write them – and not just to complain – but, more importantly, I am a member of Lovefilm and I buy trifles on Amazon from time to time. This touches importantly upon the double-edged nature of the Internet phenomenon: whilst the boom of e-mail has clearly reduced demand for postal services, significant and growing use of the Internet for shopping and rental services should in theory promise a healthy, if different, future for a modernised version of our postal services. Unfortunately, the reality is that the actions of a mindlessly militant and recalcitrant union risk destroying the Royal Mail itself and consequently threaten the jobs of the very members that it purports to represent.
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Anthony – good piece. I have to say that both sides have played this entire dispute incredibly badly. Crozier and the management have been increasingly antagonistic over the past year and have completely failed to consult the trade unions over modernisation plans. The CWU have embarked on a strike that is sure to uickly lose public sympathy in the run up to Christmas and might do extreme damage to Royal Mail’s future prospects with, as you say, the loss of some major contracts. And contracts lost are not easy to regain.
Quite why Mandelson and Brown have utterly failed to do ANYTHING to prevent this dispute and its knock on consequences is probably the big question about this dispute.
Excellent piece, which for me is summarised by the last paragraph. One thing the CWU says that rings true is that Lord Mandelsohn is acting against them in private: he wants to privatise the Post Office – which we saw as a privatisation too far last time – but wants to maneouvre the CWU into making the privatisation inevitable so the Labour Party can protest that it had no choice.