The Royal Mail has less than four weeks to reach an agreement over postal workers’ pay and conditions, the Communication Workers Union (CWU) announced last week.
The CWU called off the latest round of proposed postal strikes last Thursday after talks with Royal Mail, which confirmed both parties would reach an agreement over the workers’ pay and modernisation dispute by 4 September.
Two weeks of continuous disruption has already been caused to mail services across the country, following strike action last month.
But in a letter to its members, CWU confirmed that no more of its members will strike from now until the first week of September, when an agreement is hoped to be reached.
Both parties signed a statement during a meeting last week, outlining what the next steps will be, including:
- that both parties commit to talks on all the issues between them, hosted and facilitated by the TUC. Both sides commit to reach an agreement by 4 September.
- that, during this period the talks are on a confidential basis with no media or internal briefings unless explicitly jointly agreed.
- that, for that period, Royal Mail will not serve notice or take any unilateral action to impose changes by executive action.
- that, for that period CWU will suspend industrial action.
Royal Mail chairman Allan Leighton and CWU general secretary Billy Hayes will review the process “as and when necessary”, according to last week’s meeting.
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