Due to the announced strike at Bpost, no newspapers, letters and parcels will be delivered in Wallonia on Monday. Brussels will also be affected. The French-speaking unions at the postal company confirmed this on Saturday.
CSC-Transcom and CGSP Poste expect that their actions, mainly prompted by the unrest over the ongoing negotiations regarding the new newspaper distribution, will last weeks and will lead to an escalation on Wednesday. Bpost regrets the situation and says it wants to give priority to social consultation.
So no mail would be delivered on Monday, expects Stéphane Daussaint of the Christian union CSC-Transcom. According to him, it is more than likely that more activities will be affected during the week.
Secretary-general Thierry Tasset makes the same assessment at the socialist CGSP Poste. “The actions will gradually increase, until everything comes to a standstill on Wednesday,” he warns. There would therefore be no mail delivery on Monday, transports would be disrupted on Tuesday, and the sorting centers would also be affected on Wednesday. Tasset expects that post office staff will also join the actions.
An action plan of three weeks together was drawn up. “I have never seen the staff so motivated,” says Tasset. “Normally we have to encourage the employees, but here we are the ones who follow them.”
Bpost itself regrets the announced disruption and at the same time emphasizes that “social dialogue is now a priority”.
The Flemish trade unions said last week that they did not want to participate in the actions for the time being and that they wanted to give negotiations about newspaper distribution every opportunity. The management and the unions will sit at the table again on Wednesday, but expectations are not high among the French-speaking unions. CSC-Transcom says that Bpost’s management “has not yet moved” since the unions dropped their strike notice three weeks ago.
In addition to newspaper distribution, unions are also concerned about the impact of an upcoming reorganization of work on productivity and expected efficiency.