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Matthew Vella
A bitter feud is resurfacing between Maltapost and its workers as the company yesterday directed employees not to report for work as of tomorrow until further notice. The move has been described by Union Haddiema Maghqudin, the Maltapost employees’ official union, as “taking industrial relations 100 years backwards.”
The union’s secretary-general Gejtu Vella has described the action as “unacceptable” after the union yesterday gave the postal service’s employees a series of directives in protest at the level of staff complement at Maltapost needed to carry out operations.
Last May, following a stuttering restructuring process to have the Maltapost workforce cut down from 816 to 550, the company called back fourteen workers into service from the 160 it had managed to transfer to the public service. Encountering problems of staff complement, Maltapost also drafted in surplus workers from the Industrial Projects Services Limited and the Public Broadcasting Services. Maltapost workers told MaltaToday that all workers save two who came in from the IPSL, a surrogate entity created to take in surplus workers from the defunct Malta Shipbuilding Ltd, were released from their duties on medical grounds and an inability to carry out their duties properly. Gejtu Vella told MaltaToday the current staff complement is unable to carry out normal operations due to the heavy workload.
As a result of industrial action at Maltapost, which includes the non-collection of mail from street posting boxes, non-acceptance and delivery of bulk mail and non-delivery of unaddressed mail, Maltapost said postal services had been severely disrupted and there was “insufficient work to perform processing and delivery functions as well as administrative duties, due to constraints on the use of telephones and computers.” The lock-out has not affected retail branch workers and management.
Maltapost workers told MaltaToday there is a clear sense of demoralisation at the state of affairs in the downsized postal company, an exercise which heralded the arrival of New Zealand Post as a 35 per cent stakeholder through the purchase of 980,000 shares, and a two-year management contract under the command of CEO Robert Lake. Management will now be passed on into the hands of former METCO chief executive Stephen Sultana.
The UHM has given instructions for workers to report to work tomorrow at 6.30 am. However they will be facing locked doors since hub supervisors were ordered to hand over their keys to the management.
“We expect that operations are conducted normally, with the established complement reached through an agreement between the company and the union,” Gejtu Vella said. Shop steward Charles Spiteri told MaltaToday that the new workers drafted in from other companies feel clearly demoralised at having to do a job which they never did in the past.
“First they drained the company, then they took back workers from IPSL and PBS, and now these workers are leaving again, leaving the complement to decrease as the workload increases. This is not acceptable and the situation is deteriorating. There is no direction,” Gejtu Vella said.
Maltapost yesterday had nothing to add with its announcement to close the doors to its employees. Spokesperson Tony Barbaro Sant said he would not comment on Vella’s comments that the Maltapost action would be sending industrial relations “100 years backwards.”
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