Post Office Cleaners Win Claim

CLEANERS and engineers who work on contracts at Royal Mail, and who were threatening walk out yesterday, have now called off their action after Royal Mail offered a significantly improved pay award.  The workers had voted 91 per cent for strike action in a secret ballot.  They had originally been offered a below inflation 1.5 per cent pay rise which, according to their union the CWU, would leave most of them below the level of the living wage.

The Communication Workers Union members are employed by facilities management company Romec - which is 50 per cent owned by Royal Mail. 

An eleventh hour proposal from their employer was good enough for the postal executive of the Communication Workers Union to call off the action.  The strike would have hit Romec – a facilities company jointly owned by Royal Mail and Balfour Beatty that supplies cleaners and engineers to post depots. The workers had been offered a rise of just 1.5 per cent over 27 months – but a revised offer of 3.1 per cent over 15 months will be put to union members for their consideration. 

Ray Ellis, CWU negotiator, said: 'These workers have stuck together and refused to be bullied into accepting an insulting pay offer. They were furious that Romec bosses had paid themselves bonuses of between 9 and 15 per cent. The new offer should take everyone over the living wage – it’s a great victory.’