Selena Black, Sydney
Postal workers across NSW, Victoria and Queensland went on strike for 24 hours on May 13, following the breakdown of negotiations over a new enterprise bargaining agreement (EBA) and Australia Post's unwillingness to accept wage rise and working conditions claims made by the Communications, Electrical and Plumbing Union (CEPU).
In NSW, at least 80% of Australia Post workers were out on strike, with picket lines set up at the main mail processing and delivery sites, including the City Centre Delivery Centre, the Sydney West Letters Facility and the International Mail Centre in Clyde.
At noon, 600 workers gathered for a mass meeting in Parramatta Town Hall. Jim Metcher, the NSW CEPU communications division postal and telecommunications (P&T) branch secretary, explained that the union leaders had rejected Australia Post's offer of an 8% wage rise over two years with two $400 bonuses subject to productivity conditions.
Last year, Australia Post made a profit of $462 million, an increase of 11.6%. Meanwhile, Australia Post employees are increasingly being described as part of Australia's working poor.
The union campaign is resisting Australia Post's attempts to increase the number of casual and part-time workers it employs.
One of the most alarming moves by Australia Post has been an attempt to introduce full-time jobs devoted to delivering mail only, called "Dedicated Outdoor Delivery Only" (DODO), instead of a combination of mail sorting and delivery.
A trial of the DODO has already begun, with workers delivering on motorbikes for five hours and then on foot for two hours. The union suspects that Australia Post's goal is to exhaust these posties, encouraging them to quit their jobs and then replace them with part-time and casual workers.
Australia Post is also pushing to fully franchise its shops, the "beginning of the end of post offices in this country", according to Metcher. This move will be disastrous for Australia Post shop employees, putting them under the same award as other retail workers — a 30% pay cut.
The union is also putting in a claim for all Australia Post workers to be on identical pay rates for the same work. Australia Post has started requiring newly hired workers to begin at times that mean they just miss out on penalty rates, dividing workers and eroding conditions.
In Melbourne, reports Geoff Spencer, picket lines were set up at 6am at the Ardeer Parcels Centre and the Dandenong Letter Centre. Just under 1000 postal workers attended a mass meeting at Trades Hall to hear a report on the EBA negotiations. Victorian postal workers union leader Joan Doyle outlined the current position, noting Australia Post's unwillingness to negotiate a new agreement in good faith.
The mass meeting heard solidarity messages from Victorian Electrical Trades Union secretary Dean Mighell and Victorian CEPU communications division telecommunications and services branch secretary Len Cooper.
Bill Mason reports from Brisbane that postal workers picketed the Northgate and Underwood mail centres, and marched through city streets to the GPO, after a mass meeting at the CEPU offices in south Brisbane.
Australia Post angered unionists by bringing in supervisors and their families to scab on the strike. Queensland CEPU communications division P&T branch secretary Cameron Thiele said using strikebreakers was like "waving a red rag to a bull".
From 91×ÔÅÄÂÛ̳ Weekly, May 19, 2004.
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