CWU Wins New Deal for Hard-Working Post Office Members
2nd February 2010
CWU members working for Post Office Limited (POL) will have the opportunity to elect new reps, or stand for election themselves, if they approve a draft industrial relations (IR) framework which will "promote and enhance the role of the union at work."
Assistant secretary Andy Furey (pictured
left) explained that under the current arrangements - which date
back to 1996 - the union has nine territorial reps (TRs) and
section secretaries in post, most of whom have ad-hoc or part-time
release and, in many instances, also combine their IR
responsibilities with a health and safety (H&S) role.
"Obviously, I've got nothing but the greatest praise for the hard work and dedication of these reps, who are the backbone of our organisation at POL," insisted Andy.
But the reps' fairly limited facility time, heavy caseloads and a consequent inconsistent level of representation has meant poor accessibility for some members.
The proposed new agreement - which has been agreed in negotiations with POL and was endorsed by the union's postal executive today - vastly improves this situation, providing for a total of 33 fully recognised and full-time CWU reps - adding 20 area and four H&S lay officials to the existing, and now also wholly full-time, TR team.
This is expected to help ease the quite heavy caseload of the
TCRs, while complementing and supporting the work that they do and
allowing them to be involved with national policy issues.
If the plan is endorsed by members, then elections will take place
for these new positions over the following couple of months, with
the new set up scheduled for launch in April.
Describing the plan as a "win-win" deal, Andy said: "Under the proposed new arrangements, our members will be assured of more consistent union representation as and when they need it, from specialist reps who can dedicate all their time to dealing with these issues.
"But POL staff - and the new area reps - will still be able to call on the expertise of our more senior territorial reps as and when more serious issues arise," he added.
And the
introduction of four dedicated regional health and safety reps has
been warmly welcomed by the union's national health, safety and
environment officer Dave Joyce, who "fully
endorses the health and safety aspect to this agreement, which is
in keeping with arrangements that apply in Royal Mail.
"These dedicated representatives will, in time, will develop
professionalism, expertise and experience," he predicted,
adding that the agreement reached with POL proved that industrial
relations with the company are "relatively good" at
present.
Looking ahead to the next stage, Andy Furey said: "Now that
the postal executive has scrutinised our draft agreement and given
it the 'thumbs up', we go forward to a national briefing
and then we'll send the agreement for a branch ballot.".
Subject to approval, an individual members' ballot will then
take place to elect the new reps once nominations have been
received from the branches.
Summing up his views on the draft agreement, Andy said: "We
need to modernise and professionalise our CWU representational
structure in a way that will best serve our members and will stand
the test of time."
The new agreement (
Industrial Relations Framework Agreement Jan 2010), if
approved, will apply to members in crown offices as well as in
admin and cash centres, but not to our cash-in-transit people, who
will continue to operate under the Royal Mail Industrial Relations
Framework Agreement.
