Post Office staff are set to stage a national 24-hour strike over a pay offer they say amounts to a real terms cut.
Pay was frozen for staff in 2021, and they were offered a 2 per cent pay rise at the start of April, alongside a £250 one-off lump sum payment.
But with inflation hitting 7 per cent in March, the Communication Workers Union (CWU) says this amounts to a real terms pay cut.
CWU assistant secretary Andy Furey has called the offer “an insult”. The action on May 3 was voted for by 97.3 per cent of the union’s Post Office members.
“This is the first national Post Office strike for a number of years and the responsibility for this situation lies 100 per cent with the senior management and their stubborn, arrogant and downright disrespectful attitude towards their workforce,” he continued.
“They have told us that they’re freezing pay in keeping with official government and public-sector pay policy. But that’s an outrageous and dishonest excuse as the government’s austerity measures do not apply to the Post Office.”