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Norwegian ends free tickets as strike begins

Norwegian Air Shuttle has stripped its cabin staff of one of the main perks of the job -- free airline tickets -- in retaliation for a strike announced on Wednesday.

Norwegian ends free tickets as strike begins
René Gustavsen, the Norwegian cabin steward who on Wednesday began a one-man strategic strike. Photo: Stian Lysberg Solum / NTB scanpix
Cabin Services Norway, which took over the company's Norwegian cabin staff in March, sent out a text message to all staff on Friday, according to Tønsberg Blad newspaper. 
 
The message informed them that the system of "ID-tickets",  on which cabin staff previously only had to pay tax, had been terminated with immediate effect.
 
"This is a consequence of the employees going on strike," Norwegian's head of information Lasse Sandakerveien-Nielsen told the paper. "We have to take action and it is not uncommon to do this when there is a conflict. This is something that Parat and The Cabin Crew Association knew would come if there was conflict." 
 
The punishment makes good a message the airline sent out by text message on Tuesday night, warning employees they would lose free tickets, be forced to relocate to Oslo, and, in the case of Danish employees, be transferred to an employment agency, thereby losing much of their job security. 
 
Parat, the Norwegian union coordinating the strike action, on Thursday afternoon accused the airline of "brutalisation" of its staff, in a release. 
 
"We don’t want to see brutalisation such as we are witnessing here in either the Norwegian or the European labour market," Turid Svendsen, the union's chief negotiator, said in a press statement on Thursday afternoon.
 
"We believe that this type of intimidation by the company is in violation of agreements signed between the company and the union, because this is regarded as an action aimed at avoiding a strike and affecting the outcome of a conflict of interest." 
 
Parat said it was coordinating with the European Transport Workers' Federation, which brings together unions from across 41  European countries and the ITF, which has five million members inn 150 countries, to try and prevent Norwegian bringing in temporary staff from other countries to replace striking workers. 
 
"The airline has announced measures to maintain flights in the case of a strike, and Parat regards this action as blacklegging," it wrote in its statement. 
 
It also warned that the airline was in danger of causing a major strike which could affect flights across Europe. 
 
"The Norwegian airline with the same name is in danger of being thrown into a comprehensive strike by its cabin crew in Norway and Denmark within a short period of time," Parat warned. 
 
"The airline…is accused of treating its employees with little respect, while attempting to crush the union that currently organises most of its employees in Scandinavia." 
 
At present just one member of Norwegian's staff, René Gustavsen, is on strike, but a further 1,300 staff are expected to join him within the next 18 days. 
 
 

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TRAVEL NEWS

German train strike wave to end following new labour agreement

Germany's Deutsche Bahn rail operator and the GDL train drivers' union have reached a deal in a wage dispute that has caused months of crippling strikes in the country, the union said.

German train strike wave to end following new labour agreement

“The German Train Drivers’ Union (GDL) and Deutsche Bahn have reached a wage agreement,” GDL said in a statement.

Further details will be announced in a press conference on Tuesday, the union said. A spokesman for Deutsche Bahn also confirmed that an agreement had been reached.

Train drivers have walked out six times since November, causing disruption for huge numbers of passengers.

The strikes have often lasted for several days and have also caused disruption to freight traffic, with the most recent walkout in mid-March.

In late January, rail traffic was paralysed for five days on the national network in one of the longest strikes in Deutsche Bahn’s history.

READ ALSO: Why are German train drivers launching more strike action?

Europe’s largest economy has faced industrial action for months as workers and management across multiple sectors wrestle over terms amid high inflation and weak business activity.

The strikes have exacerbated an already gloomy economic picture, with the German economy shrinking 0.3 percent across the whole of last year.

What we know about the new offer so far

Through the new agreement, there will be optional reduction of a work week to 36 hours at the start of 2027, 35.5 hours from 2028 and then 35 hours from 2029. For the last three stages, employees must notify their employer themselves if they wish to take advantage of the reduction steps.

However, they can also opt to work the same or more hours – up to 40 hours per week are possible in under the new “optional model”.

“One thing is clear: if you work more, you get more money,” said Deutsche Bahn spokesperson Martin Seiler. Accordingly, employees will receive 2.7 percent more pay for each additional or unchanged working hour.

According to Deutsche Bahn, other parts of the agreement included a pay increase of 420 per month in two stages, a tax and duty-free inflation adjustment bonus of 2,850 and a term of 26 months.

Growing pressure

Last year’s walkouts cost Deutsche Bahn some 200 million, according to estimates by the operator, which overall recorded a net loss for 2023 of 2.35 billion.

Germany has historically been among the countries in Europe where workers went on strike the least.

But since the end of 2022, the country has seen growing labour unrest, while real wages have fallen by four percent since the start of the war in Ukraine.

German airline Lufthansa is also locked in wage disputes with ground staff and cabin crew.

Several strikes have severely disrupted the group’s business in recent weeks and will weigh on first-quarter results, according to the group’s management.

Airport security staff have also staged several walkouts since January.

Some politicians have called for Germany to put in place rules to restrict critical infrastructure like rail transport from industrial action.

But Chancellor Olaf Scholz has rejected the calls, arguing that “the right to strike is written in the constitution… and that is a democratic right for which unions and workers have fought”.

The strikes have piled growing pressure on the coalition government between Scholz’s Social Democrats, the Greens and the pro-business FDP, which has scored dismally in recent opinion polls.

The far-right AfD has been enjoying a boost in popularity amid the unrest with elections in three key former East German states due to take place later this year.

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