Subject: UK Post workers' strikes set to spread

Thousands of postal workers have staged a 24-hour strike in a bitter row over pay, jobs and services, with action set to spread into next week.

Members of the Communication Workers Union walked out in areas including London, Northampton, Peterborough, Birmingham and Coventry.

Similar action will be taken on Saturday by Royal Mail employees in Bristol, Edinburgh and Peterborough before strikes spread to East Anglia on Monday and Stoke-on-Trent on Tuesday.

The union has announced plans to ballot all its postal members for a national strike in September, threatening the worst disruption to mail deliveries for two years.

The CWU said it had repeated its offer of a no-strike deal to Royal Mail in return for negotiations to agree a "sustainable future" for the company.

Deputy general secretary Dave Ward said: "Royal Mail management is trying to crush the British postal service. They have been criticised by Government for failing to tackle industrial relations problems, yet they still refuse to address the concerns of postal workers.

"Postal workers and customers are experiencing cuts to services, cuts to hours, cuts to jobs and threats over future jobs and services. This is just down-sizing, there's nothing modern about it.

"We want to see a modern Royal Mail at the cutting edge of British deliveries. There are opportunities in internet delivery fulfilment, modern machinery and innovation in products and services. However, without engagement and negotiation over how this affects the workforce, there is no light at the end of the tunnel for postal workers.

"We are repeating our offer of a no-strike deal to Royal Mail to avert current and future action. In return, we want them to uphold their commitment on the 2007 agreement to negotiate over modernisation."

Royal Mail has accused the union of breaking the agreement which ended the 2007 strike and of refusing to co-operate with modernisation.