POSTMEN and women in Lancashire were today being balloted for more one-day strikes.

Six hundred members of the East Lancashire branch of the Communication Workers Union are among 138,000 Post Office staff nationwide considering more industrial action.

The Post Office is made up of the Royal Mail, Post Office Counters and Parcelforce and, at present, only Royal Mail staff are in dispute.

Postmen are unhappy that they are working a six-day, 41-and-a-half hour week for £183 and fewer holidays than other Post Office grades.

"The Royal Mail made profits of £400 million last year and we are asking to have a share of those profits," said branch secretary Steve Large.

"We've had only eight strikes over four months but the Royal Mail has used them as an excuse to cover up staff shortages, poor morale and poor management." Mr Large added that the Government's threat to end the Royal Mail monoploy if there were more strikes would mean an end to universal pricing and delivery.

"We are confident that our members will give their authority to industrial action and the Royal Mail, which has been calling for a ballot, will have to take notice," he added.

A spokeswoman for the Royal Mail said postmen and women had been offered an average of a 15 per cent pay rise, shorter hours, more holidays and job security until the year 2000 in return for "more flexible" working practices, including working in teams.

She added that strike action threatened the future of postal workers' jobs, in view of the Government's threat to lift the monopoly and the interest of other companies, such as the Dutch Postal Authority, in taking a share of the British postal business.

"That is a terrifying prospect for us," she said.

The results of the postal ballot are due to be announced on October 31.

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