First there was the Bible.

Then there was War and Peace.

Now there is the “Business Transformation 2010 and Beyond” agreement weighing in at a massive 80 pages. And what a deal it is!

The media are billing it as a victory for the union with posties getting “paid more for working less”. The Mirror says Royal Mail has been forced to offer rises worth up to £5000 per postie as “the price of peace”. The Daily Mail even frothed at the mouth that “militants finally pushed a supine Royal Mail into a disgracefully over-generous pay deal.”

This is the line of our leaders too, as Dave Ward and the negotiating team have finally rematerialised after 4 months calling the deal “a major step forward for the Union and its membership.” Even Royal Mail and Adam “the Axe” Crozier are hailing the deal, calling it “good for the business” – which is exactly what should make posties suspicious and start reading through the small print.

Pay rise…sweated out of us

Lump sums of up to £1000…if your office makes all the cuts required!

A 6.9% pay rise staged over three years, but while the cuts are up front, the carrot is dangled pretty far into the future: 2% this year, 1.4% next and then over half of it (3.5%) three years from now. A gambler wouldn’t put odds on ever seeing that money.

Deliveries will be screwed, with door to door put into ordinary workload and the limit on three per week lifted. Pay will rise by £20 to compensate – but Early shift allowance (£12) is to be cut so that’s £8 net. You can make up to 5 times that delivering on D2D today. Part-timers will be doubly screwed since they deliver the whole lot but get the payment pro-rata. Weight on delivery will skyrocket. This is a massive gift to Royal Mail. No wonder they love this deal!

There will be no rest for the wicked however. After we won the right to a weekend a few years back (or at least one-and-a-half of one by finishing early on Saturdays) Saturdays are slated to become a normal working day. So much for Royal Mail’s family-friendly policy, just say goodbye to your kids, football team, etc.

The consolation prize is one hour off the working week, down to 39 hours. In many offices the managers will just pressure everyone do 40 hours work in 39. The deal also opens the door to extending delivery times.

Not so much a groundbreaking agreement as back-breaking.

Cuts cuts baby

Members in mail centres will have better terms for transport, moving etc if their mail centre closes, but the agreement opens the door to up to half closing – outright surrender by CWU tops.

Royal Mail promises to keep 75% of jobs fulltime but like the 3.5% pay hike in three years, there is nothing really that gaurantees this.

Throw it out

Lots of cuts and workload hikes up front…with lots of jam tomorrow, if your the type that trusts Royal Mail millionaire bosses.

There are a few other benefits – on maternity and paternity pay – but these are minor and the pages of promises about consultation and union ‘involvement” are just thrown in to make CWU bureaucrats happy, they don’t really hold the company to anything.

The CWU states that the PEC ‘overwhelmingly” supported the deal, Royal Mail says the CWU leadership “unanimously” supports it. A poll on Royal Mail Chat shows posties saying they will vote no outstripping yes votes by 403 to 69. Let’s hope that reps and activists mobilise and get the same result in the ballot.