05/02/25 Mount Pleasant bulletin

[jimallen]

Hi, here's the Mount Pleasant bulletin of 05 February. You can also read our front-page editorial in the PDF attached, which talks about the planned cuts in USO... Comments welcome as usual!

WE CAN'T ALLOW IT!!
Even before Ofcom announced on Jan 30 that they
were consulting on a new USO, RM bosses and CWU
leaders had already planned for a trial on the new
terms. It's outrageous that the leadership should now
try to sell this drastic change to us, after having
collaborated in this way. It may be a pilot, for now, and
only in W deliveries, but it's an issue for all of us here at
the Mount - and nationally, in fact. We need to find our
collective voice to say NO!

UNBELIEVABLE!
In fact the CWU leadership claims to have made a
great bargain. They helped Kretinsky and the Board
with their plan to kill letter-post - which involves
thousands of job cuts, but then say oh, we have got a
commitment for some part-timers to be made full time!
How does such a "bargain" even work? As for saying
some of us will get more Saturdays off, that's also a
joke: Didn't they agree to Sunday- and late-working
delivering parcels?!

FULL-TIME JOBS FOR ALL!
We've heard some rumours concerning the bosses'
plan to offer part-timers on Processing full-time jobs...
(is this part of that USO bargain?). Of course, it goes
without saying that part-timers need these jobs. Ever
since management forced us into cutting our shift hours
and/or allowances last year, it's been impossible to
make ends meet!

THEY NEED THEIR HEADS EXAMINED
But what's this we hear, that if part-timers do get a fulltime
job, we'll be asked to pay back that tiny amount of
compensation management paid for cutting our
contracted hours last year? Have managers completely
lost their minds?

PASSING THE HOT POTATO...
Even before the USO pilots are underway (and we
intend to stop them!) 2nd Class letters and flats are
already piling up in Processing.
There were 30-odd Yorks crammed behind the
ILSMs last week, by the segregation area. We hear
that if it gets too much, managers plan to just ship some
Yorks out to other offices, to leave others (including
their "colleagues" elsewhere!) to deal with the problem!

THEY'RE LOSING IT ALREADY
DUMs in here think that those extra 2nd class
flats/letters they want us to deliver if USO is cut won't
make a difference, just because we do more business
than residential routes?
They know we've literally been playing "Tetris",
trying to fit packets on the vans - and that it's got harder
and harder with all those ParcelForce packets we're
supposed to deliver as well. So more 2nd class flats and
letters is Game Over! Already the USO trial is a no-go,
by DUMs' own doing!

SORRY WE CAN'T HEAR!
Wannabe-King Etcetera gets all worked-up and shouts
at us if we happen to sort some 2nd class letters on
Lates now... No doubt asking us to leave 2nd class
aside and focus on 1st class is part of management's
attempt to prepare for a cut-down USO. So he might as
well save his breath because we are not co-operating
with this plan to end what's left of the postal service.

WE TAKE CARE OF OURSELVES
Every day, managers on Processing seem to rediscover
that the workload is unworkable... And it's
because of our overloaded duties that many of us end
up with injuries and illnesses. So they can drill this into
their heads: our health is our problem to take care of.
Clearing the workload is theirs. We will take all the time
off that we need to recover!

WE NEED TO UNDO THESE CHANGES
That said, more and more of us are getting hit by the
new sick pay terms agreed by the union 3 years ago.
Under their agreement, the second time we go sick in
any 12 month period, we're only paid SSP (~£22 a day)
for the first two days, rather than our full wages as we
used to get! And if we go sick a third time in a year, we
lose 4 days full pay. This is unsustainable for us and
we are going to have to get ready to fight in order to
change it!

WE WILL RELAX; HE WON'T...
Why does Mr Witless think it's okay to ask us to stay a
few extra minutes on PSA after our shift is over?
Management cut full-time jobs on PSA and we're asked
to make up for it? Nah, we'll stick to our shift hours.
Let the pile of unprocessed items (and the panic of Mr
Witless!) grow...

AIR IT OUT
We need a through-breeze in the parcels and PSM
area, it's stifling! It feels like we're being slowly roasted
on a spit! Our only solution is to step outside for a
breath of fresh air. So that's where we'll be until
management ensures that there is cool air inside.

WHAT ABOUT THE BOARDROOM?
Who was the bright spark that decided to move the
learning centre room to the first floor, by management's
offices and the book-room? The area is busy with
people coming and going; the space is tiny and we
don't even have room for books and dictionaries... it's
obviously not a space where we can focus and learn IT
skills or English lessons. Surely there is a nice big
office somewhere in the Mount which we can take
over? Or in 185?

[chickenwittle]

I stopped reading at 2nd paragraph, it’s so predictable.

[tramssirhc]

Great grassroots reporting. Doing what the CWU can't be bothered to do.

[britwrit]

Great grassroots reporting. Doing what the CWU can't be bothered to do.

Right. I'm a little to the right of them (so is Jeremy Corbyn) but I always liked reading what they wrote when I was at the Mount.

[tramssirhc]

Great grassroots reporting. Doing what the CWU can't be bothered to do.

Right. I'm a little to the right of them (so is Jeremy Corbyn) but I always liked reading what they wrote when I was at the Mount.

And how they've kept it going for years.

[baldrick]

Great grassroots reporting. Doing what the CWU can't be bothered to do.

Right. I'm a little to the right of them (so is Jeremy Corbyn) but I always liked reading what they wrote when I was at the Mount.

And how they've kept it going for years.

When I was at the Mount the nasty clique of managers seemed to think I was behind it. It was nothing to do with me, and it's still going strong 10 years after I retired. I don't agree with everything in it, but good to get an idea of what's going on now. Makes me glad I'm out.