Union Office, British Telecom, Becket House, New Dover Road,

Canterbury, Kent, CT1 3BB

Tel: 01227 760311 Fax: 01227 815929 e-mail: cwumeridian@btconnect.com

Chairperson’s Report

As I write this report we have lost another two long standing Officers in the branch. Both Pete Browning and Terry Letchford have now taken release and will be hard to replace. They both have a wealth of knowledge and experience, something you just can pick up on a union course. Thankfully we do have people that are keen to take an active part and I look forward to working with them over the next 12 months. The date for the nominations to be in has now passed and therefore I write this as the outgoing Chairperson and welcome Anne Nickolson into the Chair. I will be taking over as Branch Secretary and hope to do justice to the role which Pete did well for many years. I’m happy to say that they are both staying on the committee as portability members and we can therefore continue to benefit from their attendance at meetings.

As I’ve said many times the union is not just the elected positions. It is every fee paying member and I fear that too often this is forgotten. The more members we have the better bargaining position. This in turn will hopefully create more activists and future branch officers. It is important that we look to succession plan as none of the current branch officers are getting any younger! There are many ways you can help or get involved so please come forward if you are interested. We have already had interest from members following a text message sent out to everyone in January. If you did not receive this please update your details.

My time as Meridian Chairperson has been challenging to say the least! I am, however, looking forward to the new challenge ahead and hope to see more activism amongst our members over the next few months with more engagement in the branch.

There have been a lot of major issues this year. We have seen the closure of Business Sales in Becket House. A new universal attendance agreement brought in to Consumer which will be rolled out in the next few months. Increased performance cases in Openreach that have gone from ridiculous proportions to almost unmanageable levels! There has not been a week that we have not been doing a case of some kind and things are getting worse by the day. Openreach site strategy has also been another huge headache for all concerned with limited “centres of excellence” being earmarked initially before knowing what work would be there! This has also created a huge workload.

There will, I am sure, be lots of propositions submitted to this year’s annual conference on some of these issues and as a branch we intend to have our voice heard in those debates. If there are particular issues that you think need addressing nationally then email the branch as soon as possible.

Please get involved, encourage your colleagues to join and make sure you keep us updated with any changes, either personal or work related. Never presume we get told in advance!

I look forward to seeing of you at this year’s AGM.

Dave Booker,

(Outgoing) Chairperson.