Comrades & friends,
CUPW is facing the greatest threat ever posed to its future.
Lettermail no longer gives us the job security it used to. We are increasingly exposed to competition. While Canada Post is trying to adapt its business model to the digital era, letter mail volumes continue to fall, and the increased revenue from parcel volumes is not reliable. More and more non-union courier companies – and also eCommerce companies doing their own delivery – are entering the parcel delivery industry to compete against us.
If the working conditions at non-union delivery companies are not addressed and the standards increased, then wages and working conditions at CPC will be under downward pressure, and CUPW – with so much of our membership employed at Canada Post – will lose members and bargaining power.
While legislation and public pressure can help to protect our market share and jobs, the only sure way is to organize last mile delivery into unions.
Other unions have taken on this challenge, but we cannot let them be the masters of our destiny. We need to organize for ourselves in ways that are strategic to the goals and purpose of CUPW.
Since CUPW started organizing the cleaners in its mail processing facilities in the 1980s