# Postal strikes in Spain



## Alcalaina (Aug 6, 2010)

Correos workers were on strike last Monday and more are planned for 15 and 22 May.

They've lost 15,000 jobs over the past five years and are protesting against planned further cuts in staffing levels.


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## Pazcat (Mar 24, 2010)

In our area we have lost the postal service and now have to go to the post office to pick up our mail or they send it back.
This was a decision taken exclusively by Correos albeit made legal by a law passed by the King.
At this point I find it hard to sympathise with them but then again I'm more angry at the useless community who refuse to install community boxes.

That said if it's a case of the workers against the hierarchy then good luck to them.
I wonder what Correos's profits are?


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## mrypg9 (Apr 26, 2008)

The profits of at least some parts of the business of postal services are shrinking all over Europe and elsewhere as customers turn away from old-fashioned snail mail to electronic communication. No amount of strikes will stop that. In fact, it could well accelerate the process if more customers turn to other means of communication such as private couriers. Delivering post to rural areas is rarely if ever going to make a profit. It's like rural bus services. Whilst few people may actually use these services or use them rarely the fact is that without them however many people would effectively be isolated from everyday life.

What I think needs to be discussed is a sustainable and agreed level of subsidy to keep these services operating. It seems to me to be essential in today's society to be able to move away from the place one lives in whether metaphorically via postal services or literally via public transport.

So hopefully the Correos workers' union leaders are doing something more productive than merely striking....engaging in a campaign to alert the public of the possible problems loss of service would bring and constructive negotiations with employers.....are these underway, I wonder?


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## bandit1250 (Aug 5, 2014)

on strike, how will we know???


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## Justina (Jan 25, 2013)

*Jobs*



Alcalaina said:


> Correos workers were on strike last Monday and more are planned for 15 and 22 May.
> 
> They've lost 15,000 jobs over the past five years and are protesting against planned further cuts in staffing levels.


The above could well explain in part the queues in banks and the post office
I saw striking cleaners for the main hospital in Cadiz last week saying no to the privatisation of their jobs.


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## mrypg9 (Apr 26, 2008)

Justina said:


> The above could well explain in part the queues in banks and the post office
> I saw striking cleaners for the main hospital in Cadiz last week saying no to the privatisation of their jobs.


The strike weapon is not always the most effective. It is in fact often counter-productive. It impoverishes unions that can afford to pay strikers - not many of those left now - and of course saves employers money and antagonises most of the public.

Don't get me wrong, I would fight for the retention of the strike weapon....but as a very last resort. My union is always willing to strike when there really is no other way forward and we are 99% successful when it is employed. 

With privatisation of public services, I think that money could be spent more effectively on running hard-hitting campaigns alerting the public to what privatisation means in practice for workers and users of services, especially with the kinds of services being outsourced in Cadiz.

In my own workplace, during the Thatcher years, I saw loyal staff who had cleaned our premises extremely well for years being sacked then reemployed by private companies at much reduced pay and less favourable conditions of service. That particularly company was in fact a management buyout, composed of former council employees, but the law of 'compulsory lowest tender' meant a race to the bottom.
Pay was cut and hours reduced and our premises became less clean in spite of the heroic efforts made by the workers.
I thought it was shameful.


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## baldilocks (Mar 7, 2010)

Employees in many of the service industries are in a lose - lose situation by going on strike. I used to work for BR and it was a time when Fords were having a lot of strikes and the NUR wanted to call out the train guards. I put it to those with whom I was involved "Fords go on strike, they go back to work, there is the lost production to make up, so they work overtime, they've got their new rate of pay and made up for what they lost while on strike." "If you go on strike for a week you will lose ££, you will never get it back, because the passengers who couldn't travel during that week aren't going to make extra journeys, so you can't work overtime to make up for your losses!"


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## mrypg9 (Apr 26, 2008)

baldilocks said:


> Employees in many of the service industries are in a lose - lose situation by going on strike. I used to work for BR and it was a time when Fords were having a lot of strikes and the NUR wanted to call out the train guards. I put it to those with whom I was involved "Fords go on strike, they go back to work, there is the lost production to make up, so they work overtime, they've got their new rate of pay and made up for what they lost while on strike." "If you go on strike for a week you will lose ££, you will never get it back, because the passengers who couldn't travel during that week aren't going to make extra journeys, so you can't work overtime to make up for your losses!"


My Union strikes over issues like 'refusing to teach' which is when a Board of Governors overrides a Head's decision to exclude a violent and disruptive pupil. We do so with the overwhelming support of parents who object to their children's education being disrupted. We do not shut down the school, it's a case of not teaching classes containing the pupil in question. We nearly always succeed in getting the violent pupil referred to a unit specialised in dealing with such unfortunate youngsters, whose plight is more often than not due to parents who wouldn't be trusted with looking after a guineau-pig.

Unlike another teaching union, we do not believe that mainstream education is suitable for every pupil.


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## 90199 (Mar 21, 2010)

Postal Strike, maybe that is why we never received the voting papers


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## Alcalaina (Aug 6, 2010)

Pazcat said:


> That said if it's a case of the workers against the hierarchy then good luck to them.
> I wonder what Correos's profits are?


It's currently 100% state-owned and making a loss. In order to meet its pensions obligation it has to "modernise" i.e. shed staff. Like the GPO in the UK it has suffered from the growth in email and the competition from private distribution companies like MRW and SEUR.

It's one of the most inefficient nationalised industries I've ever come across. Our post office doesn't even sell stamps! And if you want to send a parcel to the UK the price trebles once the weight goes over 200g. Shame really - the workers have to suffer because of poor management.


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## Lynn R (Feb 21, 2014)

Hepa said:


> Postal Strike, maybe that is why we never received the voting papers


Which voting papers? We received ours for the Spanish municipal elections today, delivered by Correos, and got a postal delivery from Correos yesterday too with some international mail.

Aside from one problem several years ago when we got no mail for almost 3 weeks and my OH made a complaint to the Correos Head Office in Madrid, which was swiftly resolved, we have never had a problem with the mail service. The lady who has been delivering our mail for 2/3 years now is absolutely lovely, and if she sees us in the street whilst out on her round and she has any mail for us, she stops and fishes it out of her bag and hands it over there and then. We were once sitting in the local water company office waiting to pay a bill (for someone else) when she came in to deliver their mail. She said hello, went into the back office with their mail, came out and fished out our mail and handed it to us with a big smile. All the Spanish customers waiting to be served looked quite nonplussed, I could just imagine them muttering "bloody foreigners, they get better treatment than we do".


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## mrypg9 (Apr 26, 2008)

Lynn R said:


> Which voting papers? We received ours for the Spanish municipal elections today, delivered by Correos, and got a postal delivery from Correos yesterday too with some international mail.
> 
> Aside from one problem several years ago when we got no mail for almost 3 weeks and my OH made a complaint to the Correos Head Office in Madrid, which was swiftly resolved, we have never had a problem with the mail service. The lady who has been delivering our mail for 2/3 years now is absolutely lovely, and if she sees us in the street whilst out on her round and she has any mail for us, she stops and fishes it out of her bag and hands it over there and then. We were once sitting in the local water company office waiting to pay a bill (for someone else) when she came in to deliver their mail. She said hello, went into the back office with their mail, came out and fished out our mail and handed it to us with a big smile. All the Spanish customers waiting to be served looked quite nonplussed, I could just imagine them muttering "bloody foreigners, they get better treatment than we do".


When we lived in our tiny hamlet just outside Prague our post was delivered by two large ladies in a van to our postbox by our gate. We too were often handed mail if seen out walking but this was not always convenient as I used to get a lot of bulky envelopes from TUC HQ containing lots of papers.
Now our post is delivered by one lady in a van to the end of our road where it is distributed seemingly randomly into the boxes for all the houses in our streets. If you are lucky your mail gets delivered into the right box....but often it is put in someone else's box and you get it if the person is socially minded or not away for weeks or months on end.
Most of our immigrant friends have boxes at the Post Office.


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## 90199 (Mar 21, 2010)

Lynn R said:


> Which voting papers? We received ours for the Spanish municipal elections today, delivered by Correos, and got a postal delivery from Correos yesterday too with some international mail.
> 
> 
> ".


I believe there is a General Election in the U.K., we can vote in the Dewsbury ward, but only if the postal vote papers arrive, to date they have not, and now it is far too late.


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## baldilocks (Mar 7, 2010)

Got mine, voted and returned.


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## Lynn R (Feb 21, 2014)

mrypg9 said:


> When we lived in our tiny hamlet just outside Prague our post was delivered by two large ladies in a van to our postbox by our gate. We too were often handed mail if seen out walking but this was not always convenient as I used to get a lot of bulky envelopes from TUC HQ containing lots of papers.
> Now our post is delivered by one lady in a van to the end of our road where it is distributed seemingly randomly into the boxes for all the houses in our streets. If you are lucky your mail gets delivered into the right box....but often it is put in someone else's box and you get it if the person is socially minded or not away for weeks or months on end.
> Most of our immigrant friends have boxes at the Post Office.


A van? Luxury! Our post lady has to walk up from the main sorting office which is almost half an hour's walk away at the other end of town (uphill all the way), has a large round to cover of steep streets, and at the end of her round has to walk all the way back to the sorting office. If she was on strike on Monday in protest at job losses, she has my full support, although I take your point that strikes are often not the best way to achieve your objective and the striking members sometimes lose more than they gain.


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## 90199 (Mar 21, 2010)

Lynn R said:


> A van? Luxury! Our post lady has to walk up from the main sorting office which is almost half an hour's walk away at the other end of town (uphill all the way), has a large round to cover of steep streets, and at the end of her round has to walk all the way back to the sorting office. If she was on strike on Monday in protest at job losses, she has my full support, although I take your point that strikes are often not the best way to achieve your objective and the striking members sometimes lose more than they gain.


Ours has a scooter,


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## Madliz (Feb 4, 2011)

I can believe that the quantity of letters sent is much reduced these days because of electronic communication, but the growth of internet shopping surely means the volume of parcels has increased substantially? I order goods and sell online, and generally send and receive a couple of items every week, so I use Correos way more than I did a decade ago.


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## snikpoh (Nov 19, 2007)

Madliz said:


> I can believe that the quantity of letters sent is much reduced these days because of electronic communication, but the growth of internet shopping surely means the volume of parcels has increased substantially? I order goods and sell online, and generally send and receive a couple of items every week, so I use Correos way more than I did a decade ago.


... but how much of that business goes via correos and how much via DHL / UPS / etc. etc.?


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## baldilocks (Mar 7, 2010)

snikpoh said:


> ... but how much of that business goes via correos and how much via DHL / UPS / etc. etc.?


I had a package yesterday that originated in USA crossed with DHL to Germany and then by post from there, delivered by our regular cartera


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## Alcalaina (Aug 6, 2010)

Hepa said:


> I believe there is a General Election in the U.K., we can vote in the Dewsbury ward, but only if the postal vote papers arrive, to date they have not, and now it is far too late.


We didn't get ours either, though we registered before Christmas and had a confirmation email. I don't think it can have been a problem at this end because they've only had one day's strike so far.


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## mrypg9 (Apr 26, 2008)

Lynn R said:


> A van? Luxury! Our post lady has to walk up from the main sorting office which is almost half an hour's walk away at the other end of town (uphill all the way), has a large round to cover of steep streets, and at the end of her round has to walk all the way back to the sorting office. If she was on strike on Monday in protest at job losses, she has my full support, although I take your point that strikes are often not the best way to achieve your objective and the striking members sometimes lose more than they gain.


A van was essential as our village was one of several our two ladies - one driving, one hopping out to deliver at each stop- had to cover in their round. Impossible to walk.

Your post lady is, sadly, on a hiding to nothing unless some agreement is reached at national or regional government level on the amount of subsidy needed to preserve this important public service.

It's surprising that there is so little public awareness of the strike and its motivation.


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## Alcalaina (Aug 6, 2010)

mrypg9 said:


> It's surprising that there is so little public awareness of the strike and its motivation.


Maybe this one will get more attention - no football is far more serious!

LFP to take legal action after Liga games are suspended by Spanish Football Federation - Goal.com


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