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Ryanair cabin crew in Spain plan weekly stoppages from August until January 2023
Just as the latest round of work stoppages are coming to an end and travellers were looking forward to getting back to some kind of normality, the two unions representing Ryanair cabin crew in Spain have announced a new barrage of strikes: staff now plan to strike every week between August 8 and January 7, 2023, downing tools from Monday to Thursday.
The cabin crew have already called two bouts of industrial action this month, between July 12 and 15 and from July 18 to 21, and another round this week. The strikes have naturally led to a wave of cancellations and delays at the airline’s Spanish bases, with Barcelona, Alicante, Palma de Mallorca and Malaga airports all experiencing some disruption, but the stoppages haven’t led to nearly as much travel chaos as was initially feared.
The general secretary of the USO union at Ryanair, Lidia Arasanz, stated that they were "forced" to reconvene new days of strike action due to the “impassivity” of the company for not listening to its workers and preferring to leave thousands of passengers on the ground “before sitting down to negotiate an agreement under Spanish law.”
Tras consultar a los trabajadores y ante la negativa de @Ryanair_ES a negociar con #USO y @sitcpla, registrada nueva convocatoria de huelga con paros del 8 de agosto al 7 de enero de 2023. #USOEnLuchahttps://t.co/EUBycfpLSz pic.twitter.com/UDeVXMDiTh
— Confederación USO (@USOConfe) July 27, 2022
The unions have also repeatedly criticised Ryanair for its ‘minimum service’ policy which forces staff to turn up to work or face dismissal.
“It is not only worth sitting down at the negotiating table again, but it goes further. We are talking about the fact that we have 11 workers fired and more than 100 on file for exercising a fundamental right and we have already said that we are not going to leave any worker behind,” added Ms Arasanz.
On the second to last day of the original industrial action, Wednesday July 27, a total of nine flights were cancelled while 42 suffered delays.
As well as reinstating the salary rates that were being paid pre-pandemic, the unions are demanding 22 days of annual leave for cabin crew as well as 14 public holidays.
Ryanair has released a statement saying that that expect “minimal (if any) disruption in Spain this winter”.
“Ryanair has recently reached an agreement with the main Spanish union, CCOO, on wages, rosters (4 days on followed by 3 days off) and allowances for its Spanish cabin crew,” said the airline, in a statement via its public relation company Edelman. “Recent USO/SITCPLA strikes have had little support and minimal effect. Ryanair has operated over 45,000 flights to/from Spain in the last 3 months with less than 1% of crew affected and expects minimal (if any) disruption to operations scheduled for this winter.”
You might also like: Ryanair reaches 5-year pay deal with Spanish pilots
Image: Confederacion USO
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