Spanish postal service semi-privatisated

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In June 1998, the Spanish Parliament passed a new law to reorganise the postal service in line with the 1997 EU Directive on postal services. Some trade unions and the left-wing opposition parties have rejected the legislation, but other unions have shown a more favourable attitude after negotiating certain amendments.

The December 1997 EU Directive on postal services (97/67/EC) requires all Member States to guarantee a universal postal service that covers at least the collection, classification, transport and distribution of postal items of up to two kilos and parcels of up to 10 kilos, as well as registered mail and insured-value mail. These requirements cover both domestic services and cross-border services. However, if considered necessary for the efficient operation of the service, Member States may reserve domestic, urgent or ordinary correspondence weighing less than 350 grammes for a commercial operator. The same is true for cross-border mail and direct advertising.

In other words, in Spain, after specifying the service that must be guaranteed for all, the state can take the political decision to assign the service to several operators or to reserve the above sections for the public operator.

Government proposal for the universal postal service

The Ministry of Development in Spain has decided to reserve ordinary inter-city and international postal services of items less than 350 grammes for the public operator. The rest - that is local mail, urgent mail and items weighing over 350 grammes - will be in free competition and may be delivered by private companies that will pay the government for a licence. Some of these companies are already competing with the public operator, which will make it difficult to return to the monopoly system.

A new Postal Law (Ley de Correos) along these lines was passed by Parliament at first reading on 30 April 1998, thanks to the government majority. The Government argues that this guarantees the universal postal service and the economic solvency of the public operator through a formula of partial privatisation of the service.

Initial union reactions

All the trade unions represented in the public postal service (Correos) opposed this law. They want to reserve for the public operator all items up to 350 grammes (ordinary and urgent, local, inter-city and international), though they accept that any services for heavier items may be privatised. The main argument is that both local and urgent mail are essential services and are also the most profitable ones - that is, those that can best guarantee the economic solvency of the public operator and the quality of the service.

The unions called a series of demonstrations and stoppages in early May with a notable degree of success (ES9804252N). Besides the above demands, they claimed that quality and efficiency must be supported by, in their view, a less confused and more secure proposal for funding than the one proposed by the Ministry, which requires funds to be:

• collected from the private operators;

• obtained by the public operator (self-funding);

• budgeted by Parliament; and

• donated by private individuals and companies.

The public service would be managed through a company run by the Ministry and not accountable to Parliament. The unions, however, believe that funding should be fixed totally by the state budget (coming mainly from services that are profitable and efficiently managed) and that the mail service should continue to be controlled by Parliament.

Another fundamental area of concern to the unions is guaranteeing the employment of the 65,000 people currently employed by the postal service. The conversion of the postal service into an autonomous company and its dependence on funding from so many sources mean that employment may be jeopardised. By contrast, reserving the most profitable services for the public operator and linking its funding to the state budget are seen as a guarantee of financial health and therefore employment.

Legal amendments and the breaking of union unity

In mid-May 1998, the majority trade union in the sector, CC.OO, and the majority union in the region of Galicia, CIGA, negotiated with the Ministry certain amendments to the law that, according to them, improve it substantially, especially bearing in mind that the Government had a sufficient majority to pass the law without the support of other parties.

The main amendments are the following. The universal public service is extended to include direct advertising, books and catalogues. The service is guaranteed to all areas of the country. The possibility that private operators could act in the area reserved for the public company is eliminated. The funding of the public operator is structured with a five-year renewable programme contract, so that the public company has greater financial security and stability to allow it to plan for the future; the accounts are also subject to the control of Parliament. Finally, an investment plan of ESP 55 billion is guaranteed to improve the efficiency and competitiveness of the public company.

According to the unions involved, with the new amendments, the law offers "an absolute guarantee of the viability of the service and maintaining employment". This is why they did not join in renewed demonstrations against the law.

The Unitary Trade Union Platform (Plataforma Unitaria Sindical), now led by UGT- with the support of some smaller trade unions such as CSIF, Sindicato Libre, ELA and CGT- continued to reject the proposal and called new strikes for the end of May. However, they received less support because of the lack of union unity.

The law was passed, as amended, at the end of June, while the protests of the Unitary Platform continued. In Parliament, the left-wing opposition parties - PSOE and IU- opposed the law, though each submitted different proposals.

Commentary

The amendments introduced into the law following the negotiations between the Ministry and CC.OO and CIGA improve the original text, above all by clarifying details of the funding of the public operator. However, it should not be ignored that yet a further step has been taken in the current Government's privatisation policy, because the EU Directive would have allowed more services to be reserved for the public operator.

The amendments provide for a more consolidated public operator, but they do not eliminate the threat of redundancies. It should above all be borne in mind that the public operator will have to compete with companies that will base a large part of their productivity on precarious employment.

Finally, it should be noted that the lack of trade union unity may weaken the position of the workers within the public postal service, and this may itself involve a threat to the stability of the workforce. (Fausto Miguélez, QUIT)