I want to commend the News for wonderful reporting and information sharing over the postal dispute. I was impressed to read the letters to the editor on June 24 – not only did you print letters but you printed opinions from both sides of the union fence, those for and those against. It is refreshing to see a paper not afraid to step out of the safe zone.
Now that CUPW employees are back at work, Canada Post says that they understand that is has been a very difficult and stressful time for us and our families. They should know, they did everything possible to make it difficult and stressful.
We have seen them try to introduce a massive program of rollbacks including the elimination of top-up pay for injured workers, an attack on retiree benefits, and a two-tiered pay system for new hires. The two main issues Canada Post would not move on were very serious and important issues that got very little attention in the media. One was health and safety, such as having the Modern Post two-bundle system. That system means we will have to carry letters in our hand, magazines and larger items on our arms and flyers nestled somewhere in between. This new system greatly increases our chance of injury while CPC wants to replace our sick-time benefit package with an inferior version. It should be noted that our injury rate is second only to miners.
After 12 days of rotating strikes by CUPW, Canada Post upped the stakes with 13 days of a full-scale national lockout. It was this lockout that resulted in the mail being held hostage.
If we lose this “battle,” even non-union workers will be affected if profitable companies are able to make cutbacks to increase profits at the cost of its workers.
Lesa Norry
Saanich
