It’s also been made clear that they are preparing for a long dispute believing that postal workers cannot sustain protracted strike action.  The last round of action was again very solid with reports from round the country indicating an even bigger response by CWU members than the first day of strike action.  Without doubt this was helped by Royal Mail's provocative action of announcing that they will take executive action by changing start times for thousands of our members on the 13th August - and in one swoop giving a large section of our membership a wage cut.

What is also clear is that 24 hour stoppages will not be enough to bring a settlement in this dispute and the dispute needs to be escalated.  The CWU national leadership have responded by calling a programme of strike action covering a 2 week period which will see different section of postal workers taking action on different days.  If successful this could block up the whole postal network.  At the same time it could lead to members being put into a difficult position as a number of Royal Mail buildings will see members out on strike at different times and then potentially being expected to cross picket lines which could lead to possible suspensions.  We could also see the management trying to force members to do the work of those workers who are out on strike.

It is vital that unity of CWU members is maintained and full backing of the union members is used if there are any attempts to suspend members who refuse to cross picket lines. We also need to organise demonstrations in the regions preferably on the two Saturdays during the 2 week campaign and in doing so make links with other public sector workers in the civil service, council workers and the health service being asked to speak at these demos.

What is clear is that Royal Mail will not meekly just give in to the union demands and this is a political battle – with Gordon Brown and New Labour giving behind the scenes support to the Royal Mail management.  We are fighting to defend a vital public service. Multi-millionaire Allan Leighton on the other hand let slip his priorities this week when he was quoted as saying that he wanted out of Royal Mail in the next year to work on other business projects where he can make “real money.”

This is a dispute that we can win and if the management refuse to change over the next 2 weeks then we must yet again up the action in a united fashion.