Keep The Post Public National Tour: North West Region

Carl Webb, Regional Secretary reports on the first day of the tour around the North West:

Day One 18th May – Liverpool

Whilst Mark Walsh, Branch Secretary Merseyside Amal was conducting radio interviews to highlight the day’s events Liverpool’s commuters were being met by members of Mark’s branch handing out leaflets highlighting the campaign to keep Royal Mail wholly in the public sector.

The response from the public as always is one of disbelieve that any government would contemplate selling off Royal Mail to a foreign competitor.  

After figuring out how to use the generator we managed to pump up the 20 foot inflatable postbox ready to take it to the waterfront for photo shoots. 

Then suddenly the heavens opened and the wind got up. This forced us to abandon these plans and we then decided to put the eye catching pillow box outside the branch office which is on one of the busiest roads in Liverpool.

This was met by motorists peeping their horns and pedestrians voicing their support. Then disaster struck the Postbox started to deflate it had somehow got ripped. Would this be the first and last day of the NW leg of the tour?

Whilst I was looking on in disbelieve Mike Yarwood stayed calm, got hold of some duck tape and quickly performed an emergency patch up, just in time.

The Liverpool Echo’s journalist and photographer arrived just as we were blowing up the inflatable again to interview Mark and take photos that have already appeared on the homepage of the papers website.

As the photographer was just about to start clicking away representatives of the Liverpool Clerical and Merseyside & SW Lancs branch turned up, their timing as always impeccable. With the weather showing no sign of improvement, we also had to abandon plans to have a stall in the centre of the City.

The guys from Liverpool Clerical and Merseyside & SW Lancs were not to be put off and took hundreds of leaflets to distribute once the weather picked up. A big thank to these branches, I know this will be duplicated across the region.

A window then appeared in the weather and it was decided to carry the pillowbox across the busy duel carriageway to site the inflatable outside the Liverpool Mail Centre. Well it seemed like a good idea at the time.

To the amusement of passing motorists and pedestrians Pat O’Hara, Mike Yarwood, Phil Callaghan, Lenny Crook (my co-driver) and I carried the postbox all to be captured on film by Mark Walsh.

After a number of photos outside the building and next to one of the oldest postboxes in the NW we then had to deflate it.

Lenny and I then had to take the liveried CWU transit van to my office in Manchester to get ready for our next leg, Rochdale and Ashton-u-Lyne. Just hope the weather is kinder to us.

Local Media Coverage  

This is how the local press, The Liverpool Echo, reported the event:

LIVERPOOL postal workers used a 20ft-high inflatable post box to deliver their message to Prime Minister Gordon Brown opposing any privatisation of Royal Mail today.

Members of the Communication Workers' Union (CWU) gathered in the city's Paradise Street to lobby public support for their campaign.

They oppose any privatisation of the mail network, claiming it would threaten services, push up costs for customers and lead to job losses and more Post Office closures.

The union is currently fighting Royal Mail plans to close Liverpool's Copperas Hill sorting centre and switch the work to another site in Warrington next year.

Union chiefs say it could cost up to 600 Liverpool sorting jobs.

CWU Liverpool branch secretary Mark Walsh said: "Postal workers are at the heart of communities the length and breadth of the country, ensuring we all receive our mail six days a week.

"The service is not profitable in rural locations, or for the majority of social mail such as cards and letters, but this is a public service and public services are worth more than balance sheets."

He added: "We have a first class postal service in the UK with cheaper costs than most in Europe.

"Privatisation will be a financial and political disaster and with the support of the Merseyside public we can overturn the decision and keep the post public."

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