post office
Postal workers’ union slams leaked plan to cut deliveries to alternate days
Cut to ‘universal service obligation’ exposed in leaked Ofcom report – plan made with no input from postal workers
Image: S Walker
Slamming a leaked Ofcom report on the future of Royal Mail’s ‘Universal Service Obligation’ (USO), compiled without any input from postal workers, to deliver letters on weekdays to all UK addresses, a Communication Workers Union (CWU) spokesperson said:
The early leaking of the details of the OFCOM report on the future of the Universal Service Obligation (USO) to the media sums up the lack of professionalism, integrity and credibility they have as a regulator.
This report, like their previous investigation on quality of service, has been produced without the input of a single postal worker or the CWU.
OFCOM have abandoned their responsibilities on quality of service and are now attempting to do the same on the USO.
Debating the future of the postal service in the absence of those who work for it and deliver it every day is completely inappropriate and should tell everybody what OFCOM’s real priorities and motives are.
It is therefore no surprise to see OFCOM potentially recommending letter deliveries every other day which is a serious down-dialling of the USO to a level which would threaten tens of thousands of jobs.
This is the regulator openly pursuing the failed agenda of the former Royal Mail Group senior leadership – all of whom have now left the company.
The CWU and our members are not blind to the need for change. But we want change based on the needs of customers, the security of our members’ jobs and driven by an ambitious growth strategy that sees the infrastructure, fleet and presence in every community as Royal Mail’s key assets.
The CWU will work with economists to produce an alternative and independent view on the future of postal services in the UK and embark on a major engagement exercise with our members, businesses and the public.This is a huge test of the new leadership of Royal Mail.
There has been some positive recent signs but they must now decide whether to back a completely failed vision which will destroy the company or change direction and join the CWU in expanding the role of postal workers and in turn expanding services, job security and profit.”
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Starmer ‘didn’t know’ re sub-postmasters, ‘wasn’t involved’ on Savile. What DID he do as DPP?
Analysis: CPS prosecuted at least 27 people – and as many as 38 – running post offices during Horizon scandal – it strains credibility to claim he knew nothing
Labour has claimed that none of the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) prosecutions of innocent sub-postmasters went ‘to [Keir Starmer’s] desk. Starmer himself has now told reporters that he knew nothing about any of the cases:
I wasn’t aware of any of them. I think there was a small number within a 20-year window, that’s all I know. I don’t even now – I think the CPS are helping with inquiries – how many of those may or may not have involved Horizon.
There were at least twenty-seven and as many as thirty eight cases.
One such case that definitely happened under Starmer’s tenure as CPS head was the prosecution of Seema Misra, who was jailed for fifteen months in 2010 – on her son’s tenth birthday – for fraud that she never committed. She was pregnant when she was prosecuted and jailed – and her conviction was only quashed in 2021. The prosecution did not disclose to the court that the Post Office knew the Horizon system was faulty and had at least forty examples of the system causing shortfalls at Post Office branches.
When the scandal of serial rapist Jimmy Savile broke and Starmer was attacked for not prosecuting him, Keir Starmer did not personally deny he had been involved in the decision not to prosecute Savile, instead allowing mouthpieces – including Tory MPs – to say he was not aware of it, insisting that we believe that he ran the CPS and was never asked for his view on whether to prosecute the offender who was, at the time, Britain’s highest-profile entertainer.
Starmer boasted of his role in prosecuting former government minister Chris Huhne and promised the US he would ‘do everything’ to secure the extradition of autistic hacker Gary McKinnon – yet supposedly was not consulted by his subordinates about Savile.
The CPS claimed it had destroyed all records relating to the decision not to prosecute Savile. The CPS also claimed that it had destroyed all records relating to prosecution of Seema Misra.
We are asked to believe that Starmer was not involved in the Savile decision, was not involved in or consulted on any CPS Post Office cases – was not even aware of their existence – despite them taking place while he ran the CPS and despite revelations, a year before the Misra case, in the press about the known, widespread issues with the Horizon system causing false ‘shortfalls’ in Post Office branches.
As Labour leader, Starmer has covered up a whistleblower’s allegations of ‘sadistic’ and ‘criminal’ exploitation of vulnerable domestic violence victims by a Labour staffer who was the lover of the MP she was working for. That MP, Khalid Mahmood, did not dispute a victim’s sworn evidence in whistleblower Elaina Cohen’s successful tribunal for wrongful dismissal – and confirmed under oath that Starmer and Labour general secretary David Evans were fully and repeatedly aware of the allegations.
Starmer also sheltered at least two alleged sex pests in his Shadow Cabinet and re-admitted racist and sex harasser MP Neil Coyle back into the parliamentary party, as well as Mike Gapes, the right-wing former MP who defended fellow right-winger Ian McKenzie after McKenzie tweeted about the rape and beheading of Thornberry herself, and former MPs who defended him. He is a creature of the Establishment and sides with it every time.
What the hell was he doing while he was boss of the CPS if he didn’t know about the highest profile cases and wasn’t consulted on the widest miscarriage of justice in British legal history? This site does not believe it is credible.
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