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Page 739 · proportion of membership under that formula, and accept the hostility of the existing recognised associations to this decision, with all the consequences involved.
(ii) I can restate Post Office policy on recognition of new associations, but grant recognition to any new associations which have already fulfilled the numerical requirements set out in the Listowel formula before the change is made.
(iii) I can restate Post Office policy on recognition of new associations and apply the new criteria currently to all associations not now recognised, whether or not they have already fulfilled the numerical requirements of the Listowel formula.
Consideration of First Course
5. The first course would go a long way towards satisfying the Parlia- mentary Opposition. It would, however, arouse bitter resentment on the part of the Union of Post Office Workers, the Post Office Engineering Union, the Post Office Controlling Officers' Association and possibly, to a lesser extent other asso- ciations on the Staff Side of the two Post Office Whitley Councils (Engineering and non-Engineering). The repercussions of staff co-operation on productivity cannot be forecast with certainty, but in my opinion we should have to face the withdrawal of staff co-operation in improving productivity in the Post Office through the Joint Production Committees which have been functioning for some two years on the engineering side, and the Joint Production Council and local Committees which have been established within the last few months on the mani- pulative side. It is already clear beyond doubt that the Unions have entered upon the productivity campaign with a genuine and strenuous determination to achieve results, and the conversion of this goodwill into hostility would have incalculable results on the prospects of the Post Office making its proper contribution to national recovery. It would also react in the sphere of wage claims, where so much depends at the moment upon Union restraint. For these reasons I do not favour this course.
Consideration of Second Course
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6. Under the second course I should propose to leave myself the maximum freedom for the future, and I set out in Appendix E the terms in which I should propose to formulate my new policy. (These terms have been agreed in discussion at the official level with the Treasury, Ministry of Labour and Ministry of Health.) This course ought, I think, to give a considerable degree of satisfaction to the Union of Post Office Workers, which is the most influential of the three existing unions concerned and potentially the most effective in the productivity sphere, since the Union could justifiably regard it as likely to give them some safeguard against recognition of the National Association of Postal and Telegraph Officers. Also I should obviate by this means any accusation of sharp practice towards the associations which had already fulfilled the numerical requirements of the Listowel formula, and by doing this I should take away much of the force of the criticism of the Opposition. I should no doubt still have to face the accusa- tion that I was taking away a safeguard which had hitherto existed for the protection of minorities. The answer which I should make is that there is nothing in the terms of my new policy which justified such an accusation.
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7. The serious objection to this course is that it would involve recognising the Engineering Officers' (Telecommunications) Association, a breakaway from the Post Office Engineering Union, and would thus incur the forfeiture of any hope of co-operation or goodwill on the part of that Union. Indeed, coming as it would on top of the rejection of the Union's recent wage claim, it could not fail to produce the greatest bitter- ness and would furnish another ground for unfavourable contrast with the treat- ment meted out to the larger and more powerful Union of Post Office Workers. It would also play into the hands of those elements in the Post Office Engineering Union which would like to see the Union take a more aggressive and hostile line. Further, it would involve the inconsistency that, on the one hand, we should be justifying the line we are taking on the ground of the importance of co-operation with the Post Office Staff as a whole, while, on the other hand, by recognising thePage omgl 09fficers' (Telecommunications), Pagsoziof, 1007 should be discarding the prospect of such co-operation on the engineering side.
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Consideration of 791dYourse
the Third
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