Home

News

Oxford City Council backs national postal strike at special meeting called by IWCA

11 August 2007

Oxford City Council became the only authority to declare its support for postal workers involved in the present national strike action at an extraordinary meeting of the council on Monday evening initiated by the IWCA.

Stuart Craft, leader of the four-strong IWCA group on the council said, ‘It is important that the council registers its protest at Royal Mail’s recent conduct including: a 2.5% pay offer, which represents a significant pay cut in real terms; the proposed loss of 40,000 jobs, which could result in cuts to services; and current attacks on pay and working conditions - including plans to undermine the Royal Mail pensions scheme.’

The motion presented by the IWCA and voted through, with an addendum from the Lib Dem group, called on the council to: declare it support for postal workers involved in the present national strike action; recognise that the root cause of the industrial action is Royal Mail's 2.5% pay offer, which represents a significant cut in real wages; and call on Royal Mail to enter into meaningful negotiations with the Communications Workers Union to find a just solution to the present dispute.

Green councillors backed the call for a special meeting and gave their full support to the motion.

Labour councillors attempted to introduce an amendment calling for the CWU to accept that £800 dividend payment dependent on performance targets would boost pay to an acceptable level. The argument had been put forward in an email to all councillors by the Royal Mail General Area Manager.

However, IWCA councillors and CWU representatives argued that a time and motion study had demonstrated that the performance targets were impossible to achieve and therefore the bonus was irrelevant. As a result the Labour amendment was defeated.

CWU representatives also argued that Royal Mail has consistently refused to negotiate on the pay offer, agreeing only to ‘explain’ the Post Office’s plans for ‘modernisation’.