Royal Mail weighs lower salaries as it seeks to cut 10,000 jobs

Royal Mail has proposed slicing salaries for brand spanking new postal employees and recruiting extra non permanent employees, risking additional backlash because it threatens to slash as much as 10,000 full-time roles.

Dave Ward, common secretary on the Communication Employees Union, advised the Monetary Instances that Royal Mail had urged slicing salaries for brand spanking new workers by a few fifth, from roughly £25,000 to £20,000.

A Royal Mail spokesperson confirmed that in conferences this week it had advised the union it wanted “to have a look at completely different salaries for brand spanking new starters”.

The corporate already employs some unbiased contractors however is contemplating whether or not they should make up the next proportion of employees, the spokesperson added.

The proposals are the newest signal of the looming disaster dealing with Royal Mail because it races to chop prices within the face of competitors from youthful rivals that depend on non permanent supply employees with much less beneficiant salaries and employment phrases.

On Friday morning, not lengthy after postal employees started 19 days of strike motion over pay and situations, Royal Mail stated it deliberate to axe about 5,000 roles by March and the equal of about 10,000 positions by August subsequent 12 months. The corporate requires “pressing change” and a “modernisation of working practices”, it warned.

Ward stated the union supported change, including it had by no means urged Royal Mail “might be doing what we did 20 years in the past and assume we will maintain jobs on this trade”.

However the Royal Mail spokesperson stated the CWU had refused to interact in formal negotiations. Proposals on wage cuts and non permanent employees had not been made formally and have been a part of “broad discussions” on modifications that may very well be made, the particular person added.

Advisable

Royal Mail, which was launched as a public service in 1635 and privatised in 2013, on Friday reported a first-half adjusted working lack of £219mn, down from a £235mn revenue throughout the identical interval final 12 months as strike motion and a decline in parcel volumes hit gross sales.

The group stated it anticipated a full-year adjusted working lack of about £350mn.

The corporate’s share worth fell as a lot as 10 per cent, extending its slide for the 12 months to 55 per cent.

In March, administration threatened a separation of the manufacturers Royal Mail and GLS, its worldwide parcel-sorting enterprise that has remained worthwhile even because the UK enterprise suffers.

Ward stated a cut up would quantity to “asset stripping” that would depart employees within the UK enterprise extra susceptible.

Originally published at Gold Coast News HQ