LTB 589 Freedom of Information

[TrueBlueTerrier]

No. 589/09
Ref GS 11.0
Date: 07/07/09

(To All Branches)
The Branch Secretary

Dear Colleague

Freedom of Information Request : Royal Mail Commercial Agreement - March 2007 - Released July 3rd 2009

On March 7th 2007 the General Secretary wrote to the Rt Hon Alistair Darling MP, the then Secretary of State at the DTI, concerning an agreement entered into between the Government and Royal Mail. The agreement became known as the "Commercial Agreement".

The General Secretary made the request for a copy of the agreement. Despite repeated written requests to the then DTI and Royal Mail, the information was refused.

After exhausting Royal Mail internal procedures, the General Secretary wrote to the Information Commissioner on 7th November 2007 making a formal request for the information to be disclosed. The case continued throughout 2008.

On July 3rd 2009 a copy of the agreement was provided to the General Secretary (received at CWU HQ July 6th). The agreement falls short of all the information required and a number of sections have been redacted (taken out). However, this is the first time the Union has used the FOIA and we have achieved a copy of the agreement as attached.

The Union will be appealing and seeking these sections of the agreement and further information will be provided in due course.

Any enquiries on this LTB should be addressed to the General Secretary's Department quoting the Ref: GS. 11.0

Yours sincerely
BILLY HAYES DAVE WARD
General Secretary Deputy General Secretary (Postal)

NB: Please note that this LTB contains 63 pages after this page) File too large to be hosted on RMC so click link to read the FOI paper http://www.cwu.org/assets/_files/docume ... nforma.doc" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;