Whenever there's a strike unions and management dispute the percentage of the workforce that took part in the action. Here's what a postal worker wrote after the last CWU one-day strike, demonstrating how management arrive at their number of non-strikers, which is not the same as the number of scabs.

"So, the second CWU day of action came and went. The CWU claim 95% of people refused to work and looking around the figures from different Royal Mail units from Regional Distribution Centres to the smallest Delivery Offices it’s difficult to argue with that. Needless to say, Royal Mail does argue with the figures and have instructed Line Managers to provide information on employees who are on sick leave, annual holiday leave or who are on their weekly day off. One sixth of all staff in delivery offices will have had their day off on Friday and anything up to 15% will have been on holiday. The percentage of sick will be anyone’s guess, but a combination of the draconian Attendance Procedure (agreed with the CWU, it should be added) and Line Managers out to score Brownie points from their Area Managers ensure very few people are off longer than is the very minimum of time. Royal Mail deducts this total from the numbers of staff who go on strike and issue their own figures in the hope of fooling the public that thousands of postal workers are actually working. It’s similar to the system the Government use when issuing the unemployment figures to the compliant media. Everyone knows there are many thousands of under -18s, older members of the population, parents of very young children, carers of elderly relatives etc who cannot claim benefit, but who are removed from the total of unemployed.Of course there exists an active group of scabs who Royal Mail knows will be prepared to cross the picket line and break the strike. A hard core of blacklegs with no sense of self-respect, dignity or solidarity. A set of individuals who can always be relied upon to carry out any order without question. These are knows as ‘managers’ although they are little more than office boys, and bullying office boys at that. This is why Leighton and Crozier have given them all several thousand pounds each while telling postmen and postwomen they can have no more than 2.5% just as long as they hit a set of undisclosed targets, carry out work which will lead to one in six postal workers joining (or not joining, depending upon the Government’s strange method of mathematics ) the unemployment figures, agree to later starting times and covering work performed by colleagues on holiday or off sick for no extra money and much more. These managers are mostly members of the Communication Managers Association which is part of Amicus. "

Read more at -
www.iww.org.uk/about/updates/070719-post/index