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Scandinavian Airlines cancels 110 flights

Scandinavian Airlines (SAS) cancelled 110 flights on Wednesday and Thursday in a bid to to prevent passengers from getting stuck in transit due to an impending strike, the airline announced today.

Published: 20 May 2015 22:14 CEST

Scandinavian Airlines cancels 110 flights

An SAS plane on the ground. Photo: SAS

Most of the cancelled flights are Swedish domestic flights, but passengers travelling to major destinations in Norway and Denmark are also affected.

“Our travellers will suffer in the case of a conflict and I can only regret that we are now facing a situation threatening to affect many passengers in a negative way,” Rickard Gustafson, the company's chief executive said in a statement.

Some 430 Swedish pilots are due to go on strike by midnight if an agreement with the airline cannot be reached, affecting thousands of travellers on long and short haul flights.

SAS is due to begin mediation with pilots in Norway next week, after SAS failed to reach an agreement with about 300 pilots in the Norsk Cockpitforbund.

SAS has already reached agreement with the half of its Norwegian pilots who are members of another union and three days have been set aside for the negotiations.

That means that the Norwegian pilots could go on strike on Thursday next week if an agreement is not reached.

SAS is struggling in the face of growing competition from low cost airlines, pushing it into a loss for the first three months of the year.

The Swedish Airline Pilots Organisation claimed in a press release that changes to wages, pensions and working hours amounted to an effective 40 percent cut in remuneration, and are therefore demanding a moderate wage increase from the airline.

SAS reject that the pilots are being offered a deal that would mean further cutbacks.

”The on-going negotiations are not about reducing wages or pensions,” We want to forge modern Scandinavian collective bargaining agreements,” Malin Selander, the company's press officer told Sweden's Expressen newspaper.

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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