Postal strike goes on
POSTAL staff in Middlesbrough were out on strike today as part of a fresh wave of national strikes after the collapse of talks aimed at resolving the bitter mail dispute.
Thousands of members of the Communication Workers Union (CWU) walked out at 4am, causing huge disruption to mail deliveries.
The strike went ahead after the failure of three days of intensive talks between union leaders and Royal Mail bosses, under the chairmanship of TUC general secretary Brendan Barber.
Staff at the Royal Mail centre at Cannon Park began their 24-hour walk out earlier today with delivery staff at offices in Stockton, Hartlepool, Redcar, Skelton, Guisborough, South Bank and Coulby Newham due to strike on Saturday.
Further strikes could be called by the union unless the deadlocked row over jobs, pay and modernisation is broken.
Neil Bendelow, a Teesside-based representative of the CWU, said support was “strong” on Teesside for the industrial action.
“The action has around 95% support form workers,” he said.
“Discussions were still continuing until late yesterday.
“But without an agreement we have no option but to continue with the strike action,” added Mr Bendelow.
A war of words erupted today as the Royal Mail accused the union of walking away from the talks and “playing havoc” with customer confidence.
Strikes by postal workers could escalate into longer walkouts, CWU general secretary Billy Hayes said today with “every prospect” that industrial action will now be stepped up.
Mr Hayes also revealed that the union was close to making a decision on whether to take legal action over Royal Mail’s move to hire 30,000 agency workers to deal with the backlog of mail caused by the strike as well as the Christmas rush.
The warning raises the threat of huge disruption to Christmas post.
Royal Mail managing director Mark Higson thanked Mr Barber for his efforts to broker a deal and said that the company was willing to talk for “as long as it takes” to resolve the dispute.
The company said it continued to do all it “reasonably and legally” can to clear mail delayed by the strikes.
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