NETHERLANDS - TNT Post, the Dutch postal service company, has announced possible changes to its pension scheme amid a cull of around 7,000 of its total 58,000 jobs.

The move coincided with a union call for a postal sector pension fund to be established.

In a comment to today's announcement - which could increase to 11,000 job losses by 2010 - a TNT spokesperson told Reuters that changes to the pension fund were imminent.

This to achieve cost savings of in total €300m that were announced on December 4 last year.

The spokesperson was quoted as saying that employees in future would have to contribute to the pension scheme. This is currently not the case, wrote Reuters.

TNT has also announced that workers will not receive any salary raises in the next two years, in order to prevent that even more employees will loose their job.

Dutch trade union CNV Publieke Zaak has vehemently opposed the announcement of the move, which comes shortly before the post market liberalisation in the Netherlands in January next year in which TNT will lose its monopoly on delivering post and packages up to 50 grams.

This liberalisation has prompted Inge Bakker, head of CNV Publieke Zaak, today to call for an industry-wide pension scheme for postal workers.

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