The unions are going ahead with the Iberia ground handling strike planned for 5, 6, 7 and 8 January, in the middle of the Epiphany weekend, after the mediation meeting held on Thursday at the Interconfederal Mediation and Arbitration Service (SIMA) ended without agreement.
Although the strike has been called twice, on the one hand by the CCOO and UGT unions and, subsequently, by USO, a single mediation meeting was held this Thursday with all the convening unions, which lasted four hours.
After the lack of agreement at the SIMA meeting, Iberia has “deeply” regretted the refusal of the trade unions to call off the strike and reiterated its willingness to dialogue.
However, he has warned that, in order to move forward in any kind of negotiation, “maintains its essential condition that the strikes are called off, which will cause unnecessary and unjustified damage to the thousands of travelers who return on these dates from their Epiphany vacations”.
The airline has also insisted that the V Agreement of the handling industry “absolutely guarantees all jobsas well as all salary and non-wage conditions for life in a subrogation process”.
UGT and CCOO announced last Friday that they were resuming the strike, initially planned also for December 29 to 31 and which had been suspended in order to continue negotiating with the company, with the presence of the Ministry of Transportation.
However, no agreement was reached in that forum either, so that reactivated their protestthis comes after Iberia lost the handling service at eight of the country’s main airports (Barcelona, Palma de Mallorca, Malaga, Alicante, Gran Canaria, Tenerife Sur, Ibiza and Bilbao), although it kept Madrid, in the tender announced by Aena in September.
This forces subrogate workers at each of the airports where Iberia will cease operations in the winning companies in each location (Globalia’s Groundforce, Aviapartners and Menzies).
The unions do not want this subrogation because it means leaving Iberia’s umbrella, although they are covered by the sector’s agreement, and they ask the company to do ‘autohandling’ for all the companies of the IAG group -to which it belongs together with British Airways, Vueling, Aer Lingus and Level-.
However, the airline discards it because it has higher costs than contracting the handling service with third parties and assures that would lead it to lose positions with its competitors.
After the decision taken by CCOO and UGT to resume the mobilization, last December 23, USO announced its call for a strike in defense of a viability plan for the handling business that includes, among other things, the ‘autohandling’ of IAG in the places where Iberia has lost the license.
USO has pointed out after the act in the SIMA that the “absolutely intransigent” position of Iberiawhich went so far as to state that “either the strike was previously called off or it would not sit down to negotiate, obliges us to maintain our position, since we find this position unpresentable”.
USO has recalled that, from the day he learned the result of the contest of ‘handling’, came saying that Iberia could ask for the ‘autohandling’, but the company has remained on the path of reversing the decision of Aena via appeal and today it has been known that the National Court has also overturned the injunctions.
“We never discussed the legal route on the part of the company if it considered that there were grounds for doing so, which did not prevent us from requesting a Plan B (autohandling of the group and/or UTE) in case this option was not effective, as time has shown,” USO has detailed.
Strike in the Management Services at Barajas Platform
A strike called by UGT in the Platform Management Service (SDP) of the Adolfo Suárez-Madrid Barajas airport, which has 35 workers, has been added to the handling mobilizations in Iberia since 00:00 am from December 31 to January 7.
This service plays a “critical” role in the airport’s operations, as it is in charge of managing the movement of surface flights from two of Barajas’ towers over a wide area that covers 70% of the airport’s taxiways.
The problem arises after the award of the service to Skyway in 2022 with a proposal 15% lower than that of the previous company and 30% lower than the starting pricea.
This downgrading has resulted in the inability to maintain the previous working conditions, taking advantage of the absence of subrogation and collective bargaining agreement in an essential service of public interest.
UGT asserts that, since 2011, the SDP has experienced a progressive deterioration in working conditions and quality of service under various companies, with the problem intensifying with the current management of Skyway in an economic context of cumulative inflation of 24% since 2011.
“We do not count on subrogation, we have to win it in the courts bid by bid what we leaves us at the feet of the interests of the bidding companies“, adds the union.
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