• TNT, the fast-expanding freight group, faces the threat of its first national strike in the UK later this month.
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This follows a decision by 5,000 members of the Transport and General Workers Union employed by TNT to reject the company's annual pay offer by a two-to-one majority, and vote for industrial action.
Union negotiators are due to meet management on Monday (16 November) and if no change is made to the offer of an £8-to-£11 per week pay increase, a strike is likely. Any action would severely disrupt TNT's national distribution operations, particularly its contract with Rupert Murdoch's News International newspapers.
The TGWU, which represents almost all TNT manual and clerical employees, says the company has rejected its demands for a 10% pay rise and a shorter working week. It refused to comment on any threatened industrial action until after a meeting of national delegates on Monday.
Alan Jones, managing director of TNT Express UK denies industrial action is imminent: "We are making a fair and realistic offer of between 2.8 and £10 a week extra. Our employees are the highest-paid in the express parcels industry. This offer will put drivers and warehousemen 240 ahead of their counterparts in other companies."
Last year, Jack Ashwell, national secretary of the TGWU commercial road transport group, called TNT's terms and conditions of employment the "highest prevailing in the industry" — but this week he says that the company's offer does "not match the aspirations" of employees, and that a strike is possible.