LTB 084/24 – UNION FEES TO RISE BY 17P PER WEEK
No: 084/24
28th February 2024
TO: ALL BRANCHES
Dear Colleague
UNION FEES TO RISE BY 17P PER WEEK
Since 2015, the CWU has pledged to ensure that union subscriptions were not raised every year as a matter of course. As a result, fees have only risen once since then.
In the last five years alone, if we had kept subscription rises in line with inflation, fees would have gone up by 25.4%. As you know, during the last five years, there has been no rise at all despite facing several monumental industrial disputes, a global pandemic and an economic crisis, which has driven up costs.
We have now reached a point where fees must go up and the CWU National Executive have taken a decision to increase the rate for full-time members by 17p per week, from April 1st 2024. Part-time members and members on other subscription rates will see a smaller pro rata increase.
For CWU members in EE, it should be noted there are different rate increases to those stated above, which is a result of previous introductory rates. This will be the subject of a separate communication from the T&FS Industrial Executive.
The table of all the new subscription rates is now available on the CWU website see link below:-
https://www.cwu.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/New-rates-2024.png.
This rise will coincide with pre-agreed pay increase for our members in BT Group and Royal Mail Group, as well as other companies where pay increases have recently been agreed for CWU members.
Going forward, we are going to table proposals to our National Executive that any future increases will be lower than the rate of the average pay rises we achieve for our members across the union. This means we will continue to ensure that union membership remains good value for money.
For our members in BT, the employer implemented the subscriptions increase earlier than planned in error. They are going to adjust subscriptions in March to correct this. Following this, the appropriate rate will be applied from April onwards.
There are huge challenges facing all workers in the UK and now more than ever, it is important that the CWU stands together, defends every member we represent and fights for a better world of work.
We thank all our members for their continued support.
Yours sincerely
Dave Ward
General Secretary
Tony Kearns
Senior Deputy General Secretary