大象传媒

Damaged in the mail

• Robert Peston
• 13 Oct 07, 09:20 AM

It has been like walking on eggshells trying to establish how agreement was reached late last night to end the post workers' strike.

No one - either from CWU union or the Royal Mail - wants to go on the record.

Why?

Because the deal still has to be ratified by the 16 members of the CWU's postal executive.

And given that emotions among postal workers are running high in a dispute that's been dragging on since June, their assent cannot be taken for granted.

But if there was one thing that tipped the balance, it was that Brendan Barber, general secretary of the Trades Union Congress, somehow succeeded in translating what both sides were saying into language they could all understand.

So who has won and lost?

Well, as far as i can gather, the big pillars of what Royal Management wanted from its workforce remain in place.

The value of the pay rise this year remains at the 2 1/2 per cent offered.

The attractive final salary pension scheme will be closed to new members.

And - most important for Adam Crozier, Royal Mail's chief executive - there will be a reform of allegedly inflexible working practices. Which for Crozier means that the company can invest 拢1.2bn in new kit and "modernisation" over the coming five years, safe in the knowledge that productivity of this business will improve.

For Crozier, that was the life or death issue. With the onset of competition in the postal market, Royal Mail was haemorrhaging custom to lower-cost competitors. For Crozier, it was "become more productive or die".

But, just to be clear, this is not a slam-dunk victory for management.

My sense is that there have been important concessions.

Perhaps the most important one is that negotiation on the detail of new working arrangements will be devolved to local areas, not imposed in Stalinist style from the centre.

What this reflects is the hard reality that many postal workers have lost any trust in Crozier and in the Royal Mail's chairman, Allan Leighton.

So, of course, there must be a risk of localised disputes, as these new more flexible working practices are put in place.

But for management, what is important is that all posties are now expected to be productively employed during all of their agreed hours, before overtime kicks in.

And, I think, there has been some tweaking by management on the terms of the pension-fund changes, of benefit to those who want to retire at 60, among other things.

What does it all mean? Well, assuming it all goes through, Royal Mail can move on to the next phase in its development - which is to catch up with its rivals in becoming more efficient.

But make no mistake, there are lessons here for management as much as for the workforce and trade union.

Negotiation on pay and working conditions has been going on for at least eight months - and for most of that time, neither side seemed to have even the most basic understanding of the other side's concerns.

And there has been well over a week of strikes - which has cost the business a bomb and been a massive inconvenience and expense to its long-suffering customers.

That is hardly what you would expect of a thoroughly modern business.

Many would say it reflects as badly on the management as it does on the trade union.

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