The strikes planned for January and February at the privatised control towers of Spanish airports on the scheduled dates will continue, reports the union CCOO. Monday 30 January is the first of the strike days.
The meeting of the legal representation of workers and service providers in the liberalised control towers with the employers, FerroNats and Saerco, was “not a success”. This was according to what the union said. Consequently, 162 workers are called to strike.
Where and when will the strikes take place?
The first strike day will take place on Monday 30 January and will continue every Monday throughout February. This means that strikes will take place on Monday 30 January and 6, 13, 20 and 27 February at the following airport towers;
- A Coruña
- Alicante-Elche
- Castellón
- Cuatro Vientos
- El Hierro
- Fuerteventura
- Ibiza
- Jerez
- Lanzarote
- La Palma
- Lleida
- Murcia,
- Sabadell
- Seville
- Valencia
- Vigo
Proposal off the table
During the negotiations on Thursday, Saerco proposed a CPI increase for the years 2021 (0%), 2022 (1%), 2023 (2%) and 2024 (2.5%). However, this did not meet workers’ expectations “as it fell far short of their proposal”.
Furthermore, Saerco says the proposed wage increase of 5.5% ‘seriously jeopardises the viability of the company’.
The union justifies that when the government granted licences via electronic tender, Saerco secured the so-called Lot 2 (Jerez, Seville, Cuatro Vientos – in Madrid -, Vigo and A Coruña), ‘with an economic proposal several tens of millions of euros lower than that of its competitors’. Moreover, Saerco knew that FerroNats’ labour costs were higher than according to the sectoral agreement.
According to CCOO, Saerco complied with the aforementioned agreement from the transition in the change of operator (between February and May 2021) until December of the same year. Then the sectoral agreement unilaterally ceased to apply, “which meant an economic loss of more than 16% of their salary for the staff”.
