Thousands of postal workers are taking part in a one-day strike on Tuesday in protest at TNT’s plans to reduce its workforce by 11,0000 and sack 3,100 delivery staff.

The strike began in sorting centres on Monday night. On Tuesday, post boxes will not be emptied and ordinary post will not be delivered. Emergency post, such as medicine and death notices will still be distributed.
Thousands of postal workers are expected to be in The Hague on Tuesday afternoon for a rally outside TNT’s headquarters.
Liberalisation
Today’s strike is the first by postal workers since 1983. The unions want the company to reduce the number of compulsory redundancies and spread the reorganisation over a longer period.
TNT has been hit by competition from email and budget mail companies which employ delivery staff as freelancers and pay per item they deliver.
Under an agreement signed when the sector was liberalised, the budget firms, such as Sandd and Selekt Mail, are supposed to employ most of their workers directly within a few years. But they are now going to court to fight the plan.
The government has now appointed a mediator to look in to that conflict.