Currently , UK is facing a threat of Royal Mail massive rolling strikes. Once I came up to that news, I’ve been reading through different papers dealing with this issue. French people are famous for their “striking patterns”, that’s why this issue caught my curiosity. At the moment, the Communication Workers Union is threatening the UK with probably leading a strike in the next weeks, blaming Royal Mail for intend to cut jobs further to a year to year decrease in their activity. Employees are planning to go on strike in the run-up to Christmas, to disrupt people and businesses as much as they can.
The Financial Times is displaying a quite short article, which explains in a basic way terms of the dispute. The CWU have voted for a 24-hour all-out stoppage followed by rolling strikes. The CWU is expected to offer The Royal Mail a mediation but chances to reach an agreement appear slim. Then the three-day rolling strikes strategy, aiming to save 2 days out of 3 of salary is explained. Further to this induction statement, the journalist starts dealing with the consequences of such a scheme which would be terrible to post-relying businesses.
This news have already received many reactions, and The Times summarizes what they are. We can obviously see how lucky are businesses which rely on different delivery services. Customers might start to put off online shopping, which worries online entrepreneurs who are seeking other ways to deliver. This article remains quite negative, but points out that Royal Mail executives are responsible for this situation. The Royal Mail is weighed down by a 3.4£ billion pension deficit and successive boards have failed to privatise the service, refused to accept flexible working, led a poor management and a draconian regulatory regime. This article does not deal with strike itself, but with why Royal Mail has came to such a terrific situation. It is quite overwhelming because it throws up many figures and analysis on why Royal Mail is currently going down.
I have found another article, presenting the news in a very different way. The Daily Mail is focusing on consequences of this upcoming strike, consequences on businesses mainly. It presents how businesses are trying and avoid a Christmas disaster, with first of all, the great internet retailers such as Amazon or Tesco Direct, that are looking for other ways to deliver. Then, it is coming into a more casual analysis on why The Royal Mail is facing such a crisis. Annual revenue have collapsed to around £1billion below expectations in the past year. It basically going through negative consequences by the end of the document, but it insists on employees point of view, quoting largely the CWU deputy general secretary Dave Ward, who finishes saying he would be aware to reach an agreement.
I have faced three very different ways to deal with this issue. The financial times article is quite straightforward but remains too basic to me. It is not going through reasons of such a threat for UK businesses and families. The most relevant article to such a critical situation is the Times one, which is going through a wide analysis of issues that are striking The Royal Mail at the moment, there is a bias in it because the journalist is blaming the Royal Mail boards for not having managed to avoid The Royal Mail to sink.
To me, it appears that it will be quite difficult to come out such a critical situation, because Royal Mail have been mismanaged for years now, and the CWU queries have not been met. It is up to Royal Mail board to lead a more flexible social policy from now on, if they want to give them a chance to avoid a major issue in the run-up to Christmas.
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Again you've worked hard on your research. What does the language of these reports tell you about their objectivity and bias? In particular the Daily Mail story? Good. 6/10
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