THE FUTURE OF THE POST OFFICE
Today, the Post Office Board has announced the closure and privatisation of a further 20 Crown Post Offices. This is the latest in a series of announcements from the Post Office that clearly demonstrates the Board has no viable plan to secure the future of our members’ jobs or this great British institution.
The reality is we now face the most serious situation in the history of the Post Office.
A further round of substantial job losses across the whole business – in Crowns, Supply Chain and Admin – this will lead to compulsory redundancies;
The closure of the Defined Benefit (DB) Pension Scheme which will leave thousands of staff significantly worse off in retirement;
Further branch closures, as part of a strategy leading to the wholesale privatisation of the Crown Office network;
The closure of over half of the Supply Chain operation, whilst exiting the external market.
The union has no choice other than to defend our member’s jobs and pensions by all means necessary. We will soon hold a companywide ballot for Industrial Action and are launching a fresh political campaign to call upon the Government – as the owner of the company – to intervene as a matter of urgency.
We are meeting Sajid Javid the Minister responsible for the Post Office early next week and will make it absolutely clear that we will not sit back and see another British Institution go the same way as the steel industry. We will press the minister to hold a summit meeting of all stakeholders to consider an alternative strategy for the future of the company.
On pensions, the union has taken legal advice and we are writing to the pension’s regulator asking them to investigate the actions of the company, the Trustee Board and the Government. Our legal advice suggests there is a potential for legal action if the company proceed with their plans to close the DB Scheme.
You will receive further information on the Industrial Action ballot timetable and all the issues in dispute early next week. Today we have written to our members explaining the union’s position.
It is essential we now bring together the support of the whole union to change, once and for all, the dynamics of this debate and fight for a different future.
Finally, we have attached to this LTB a copy of our Press Release and a link to an online article that has been published today in the Huffington Post.
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/dave-ward/post-office-cwu_b_10812932.html?edition=uk
Please ensure the content of this LTB is distributed to all members. Further information will be sent out in due course.
Yours sincerely
Dave Ward Ray Ellis Andy Furey
General Secretary Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary
General Secretary
CWU to launch strike ballot over Post Office privatisation
Union will ballot all Post Office members to “defend the future of great British institution”
Today (Tuesday) the Post Office board has announced the privatisation of a further 20 Crown Post Offices bringing around 175 job losses. This comes on top of a series of recent announcements including:
Significant job losses across the whole business (now totalling 2,000 since the beginning of the year) – in Crown post offices, Supply Chain and Admin. This will lead to compulsory redundancies;
The privatisation (franchise) of 41 Crown post offices announced at the beginning of the year;
The closure of the defined benefit (DB) pension scheme which will leave thousands of staff worse off in retirement (proposed to be closed from September 2016 affected 3,600 people);
A strategy that will lead to the wholesale privatisation of the Crown Office network;
The closure of over half of the Post Office cash handling operation, whilst exiting the external market (announced April 2016).
Dave Ward, general secretary of the CWU, said: “We face the most serious situation in the history of the Post Office. Taken together, recent announcements from the board demonstrate there is no viable plan to secure the future of our members’ jobs or this great British institution. The board should hang their heads in shame and we reiterate our call for them to resign with immediate effect.
“The role of the Government in this crisis must also be highlighted. We are meeting Sajid Javid the Business Secretary who is responsible for the Post Office early next week and will make it absolutely clear that we will not sit back and see another British institution go the same way as the steel industry. We will press him to hold a summit meeting of all stakeholders to consider an alternative strategy for the future of the company.
“We are left with no choice but to defend the jobs and pensions of our members and the services they provide. Plans to instigate a national industrial action ballot of our whole Post Office membership are now underway.”
CWU will announce a ballot timetable shortly which will cover 3,500 people working across the Post Office.
-ends-
Email Attachments – Click to download
LTB 404/16 – The Future of the Post Office
CWU Eastern No5 Branch 
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