WORKERS at a York postal depot have been told they could face redundancies under plans by the postal service Consignia.

They also heard homes and businesses could get later deliveries under the streamlining proposals.

Employees at the 150-strong depot at Birch Park, in Huntington, were given an outline of options for the future, which could include job losses.

The Huntington base serves roughly one third of York's addresses and, as the proposals are being made across the country, it is likely that similar options will be outlined to all the city's depots and offices.

Consignia and union representatives told the Evening Press today that no decisions would be made without full consultation.

Consignia recently announced proposals to cut up to 30,000 jobs nationwide because of increased competition and huge losses.

A trial known as tailored delivery specification, is proposed for 14 sites across the country, including Thirsk.

An employee who attended the meeting, but asked not to be named, said: "Everyone is completely shocked. Our line manager told us that from October we would start work at 7.30am instead of 5am. We will work on a four-hour delivery span, beginning at 9.30am.

"He then said 30 per cent of the workforce will be made redundant.

"I can't believe it - no agreement has yet been made with our union.

"Unless businesses want to pay extra, they will have mail delivered three or four hours later - minimum."

Dave Dowling, spokesman for the Communication Workers' Union in the York postcode area, said he wanted to play down the fears arising from reports of yesterday's meeting, and said later start times for workers could guarantee more reliable deliveries.

He said: "We're in the middle of talks and I think it's presumptuous to assume what is going to happen.

"I wasn't at the meeting, but it sounds as if someone has perhaps made it sound like this is gospel, leaving no room to manoeuvre. In fact, it was more about a list of options.

"Birch Park could have handled this better. It seems they have jumped the gun. We're aiming to increase the efficiency of the postal service. There may be job losses, but we will deal with them in a constructive way. There has never been a compulsory redundancy in the postal service, and we hope that record will continue."

He said later delivery times could actually improve the reliability of the service, while providing more "family-friendly hours" for staff.

A spokeswoman for Consignia also said no firm plans would be made without full consultation with the unions. She said reports of definite decisions having been made were "very puzzling".

"This was a standard quarterly management meeting," she said.

"A general discussion took place about the possible implementation in the YO post code of tailored delivery specification. But no decisions will be made until full discussions have taken place with the CWU and staff about possible timescales and the roll-out of the programme. It's too early to predict anything at the moment."

Updated: 11:50 Wednesday, May 22, 2002