Postal Workers - Doing The Right Thing!

Whilst the media in general is slagging off the Union over the current postal dispute, it is once again ensuring that the first casualty of any industrial dispute is the truth!

However, amongst the venom toward postal workers from the majority of the media, comes a superb article making some serious points over the truth of the postal services as devised by Adam Crozier and company:

Written by Victoria Coren, a columnist for the Observer newspaper, and published last Sunday (18th Nov), it begins by making the comment that whilst letters will go undelivered if the posties go on strike and that important bills and cheques will be delayed; the first question anyone should be asking is "how will we know the difference?"
 
The article then goes on,

"But nobody seems to be asking that question. Instead, people seem angry with the postal workers for striking. Everyone is grumbling about the inconvenience, damning the greed and worrying loudly about Christmas deliveries. We hate it when the shops put decorations up in October, yet, somehow, suddenly, now is exactly the right time to start thinking about posting a Nintendo DS to cousin Johnny and complaining that those selfish bastard postmen won't jam it through the letter box in time.
 
I can only assume, from the rage, that we think they have nothing to complain about. We must believe the Royal Mail is well managed, with sufficient workers and correctly allocated resources, thus resulting in the strong resemblance between a Swiss clock and the current state of the service.
 
Please. Before we were distracted by the opportunity to complain about postmen, we complained constantly about the post. The whole service has been totally cocked up. There are no longer two deliveries a day, the local post offices have all closed and "first class" now means "three days if you're lucky".

Victoria then tells us the story of her once friendly neighbourhood postman known to her affectionately as Neil:

" As Neil and I got to know each other, we struck a deal. If I had a parcel, he would bring it at the end of the round, lugging items of occasionally significant weight until the whole shift was over (because I go to bed late and fear a 7am doorbell), on condition that I opened the door and signed for the package barefoot. He didn't need to touch my feet, nothing like that. It wasn't weird. He just wanted a quick glimpse of toe, in return for a decent lie-in.

It was a good deal. We were very happy with it. I used to take a Christmas cake to the sorting office every December.

But Neil is long gone. Our post is not just delivered at a different time every day, it's delivered by a different person. Often a miserable, underpaid temp, who stuffs all the mail for six flats through the door in one torn and crumpled bundle because he or she is so frightened of being penalised by the manager for not meeting a preposterous delivery target that there is no time even to take the rubber bands off."

In concurrence with the arguments being made by the CWU regarding the current decline in service, Victoria comments:

"In beefing the delivery targets to unmanageable sizes per worker, then sacking postmen for failing to meet them, in axing the second post and generally thumping down the iron fist, the Royal Mail managed this year to make a £321m operating profit. They celebrated by imposing an immediate pay freeze on the workers.

So the profit benefited neither the postmen nor we hapless post-receivers – all of whom are, technically, the owners of the Royal Mail. It's a national company. It's ours. But we'd have been better off if our business had carried on making a loss. The profit simply inspired further cuts and a worse service. It's like telling your wife: "I got a juicy £5,000 bonus this year, so we had better cancel that holiday."

Victoria's article then concludes:

"This is what we should be angry about. Aren't you? I bloody am. We are treated like tossers. When we read that postal workers are going on strike, we should share their fury and frustration rather than turning ours against them, the gutsy naysayers who are walking out against the sharp end of bad management that affects us all.

They are doing the right thing. They are making the protest that we all should and would if we knew how, rather than just rolling our eyes and miserably putting up with it."

You can read the whole article by clicking the pic above.

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