Iberia to summon unions to new meetings next week

This morning Iberia management met with the strike committee and with the contract negotiation committees of the unions representing its ground staff and cabin crews in a bid to advance with negotiations and to avert the series of day-long strikes called for the week before Christmas. Since no agreement was reached, new meetings have been scheduled for next week. The SEPLA pilots union refused to meet with the company.

Spain’s SIMA labour conflict arbitration body has summoned Iberia and the striking unions to a meeting on Monday to explore the possibility of mediation.

Iberia regards the strikes as both a disproportionate and unjustified response to its new Transformation Plan, since the airline has already agreed to negotiate the labour aspects of the restructuring plan, aimed at restoring profitability and ensuring the future viability of the 85-year-old Spanish airline.

Strike will aggravate Iberia’s difficult situation

Unions have called six strike days, five of them consecutive, for one of the busiest weeks of the year, which will worsen the company’s current loss-making situation and seriously inconvenience thousands of customers, while bringing no possible benefit to employees.

The company’s position is that a strike to protest the restructuring plan is out of order since it has already agreed to negotiate the labour aspects of its plan that was unveiled in November. It says the strike will seriously worsen the company’s situation in a year when operating losses had already reached 262 million euros by end of September.

Since the strikes are scheduled for the 14th and the 17th-21st of December, one of the busiest periods of the year, it will be difficult for the airline to find alternative flights for the passengers affected, but board chairman Rafael Sánchez-Lozano, has pledged “to do everything in our power to lessen the impact of these strikes on our customers and find alternatives for them, and all our non-striking employees will make every effort to minimise the inconveniences.”