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General Secretary: Billy Hayes (www.billyhayes.co.uk)
No 785/12 Ref. 230.03 Date: 17 th October 2012
To: Branches with POSTAL Members
Dear Colleague,
NATIONAL AGREED FRAMEWORK FOR DEALING WITH DELIVERY OFFICE
MERGERS/CLOSURES
Branches will be aware of the long running saga of Delivery Office Mergers/Closures. The
Union first raised this issue with Royal Mail in 2007 following the acceptance of Comp Motion
E2 and has attempted to pursue a national agreement covering this on numerous occasions since and especially since the conclusion of the BT 2010 agreement.
In recent years a number of formal objections have been raised by Branches in some of the affected locations and as a consequence Royal Mail agreed to meet with the CWU in late
September 2010 at Rathbone Place in the presence of Peter Harwood from ACAS. Those discussions did not prove to be fruitful and the matter was subsequently raised at the NDG meeting in early October 2010. The Union made the point at the NDG that this was an issue that should have been raised in the national negotiations covering BT 2010 and that we were not going to accept Delivery Office closures/mergers being subsumed into the Mail
Centre Rationalisation Framework Agreement as there were clear differences between
Delivery Offices and Mail Centres which warranted a separate agreement. Apart from the fact that nobody from the Outdoor Dept was involved in any of the discussions regarding
Mail Centre Rationalisation. At that meeting the NDG established that there would be a separate agreement covering Delivery Offices, and further negotiations recommenced with
Royal Mail to conclude an agreement.
Following further consultation with some of the area’s affected by Delivery Office mergers/closures a formal proposal was sent to Royal Mail and a further meeting took place to discuss this which proved to be more positive than previous meetings. However things soon changed and despite the Union attempting to push this issue forward we were unable to make progress due to the inconsistency of meetings and a lack of real commitment from
Royal Mail.
It is also worth noting that in pursuing a national agreement we had made it clear to Royal
Mail and our Branches that whilst we had no in principle objection to Delivery Office mergers/closures, we needed to have a genuine, open and transparent process that allowed proposals from either party to be fully considered and open to amendment and counter proposal, that dealt with the people and operational issues.
Despite an ongoing unwillingness on the part of Royal Mail to engage in meaningful negotiations with the Union we have continued to pursue what we believe is a necessary requirement for dealing with Delivery Office Mergers/Closures. In the intervening period

there have been a number of ballot requests from Branches with some actually taking industrial action. This has led to a growing frustration on the part of Royal Mail culminating in complaints to the Outdoor Dept over what was deemed as unnecessary industrial action and adverse publicity for the business. On this point alone we have had to remind them that where there is no formal agreed process to follow this allows for disputes to occur over virtually anything.
In recent months an agreement was reached with Royal Mail only for them to renege on what they had agreed with the Union’s negotiators Mark Baulch and Peter Keenlyside. It appeared then that we were actually wasting our time and that we might be better to not have an agreement and inform Royal Mail that we would fight every closure. However talks did resume and we moved to within four or five words difference until a further meeting in
Rathbone Place moved us even further apart due to a plethora of amendments being tabled by Royal Mail. We made our ‘disappointment’ clear at this meeting and in the discussions that took place immediately following the meeting. This subsequently became a turning point and enabled meaningful discussions to take place and an agreement to be concluded which was endorsed by the Postal Executive at its statutory meeting on 16 th October 2012.
The agreement provides for early notification of intent, allows for counter proposals and full involvement of the affected units and their representatives via a JWP and also places a requirement on Royal Mail to provide all relevant information/data. The important aspect being that the people and operational issues will be dealt with before any move takes place.
This however does not mean that individuals can simply object to any move on the basis of basically not wanting to move under any circumstances. There are processes to follow which will provide units with an opportunity to put forward their case and it is important that this aspect is fully utilised. Health and Safety and space standards will be an integral part of the discussions as will the people issues.
The agreement is not designed to be a panacea for all mergers/closures and it is unlikely to remove all opposition to units being merged/closed, but it will provide an agreed framework for discussions to take place and processes to follow that should enable all issues to be dealt with through negotiation. The CWU position has always been that this type of situation is not about bricks and mortar but about people, our members, and we believe the agreement serves that purpose.
Any enquiries to Bob Gibson’s Office, quoting reference 230.03
Email Address: hnutley@cwu.org
Yours Sincerely
Bob Gibson
CWU Assistant Secretary
Final DO
MergerClosure Framework Agreement.pdf