The pilots of the Spanish airline announce a new strike which will last from Friday to Sunday evening.
Easyjet pilots in Spain began a strike on Friday in August to demand the restoration of working conditions prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, two weeks after cabin crew ended a similar strike that ended ended with an agreement. In the middle of the high tourist season, this new Easyjet strike comes on top of the ongoing strike by the flight crew of another low-cost airline, Irish Ryanair, where two Spanish unions have called a strike until early January 2023. .
At Easyjet, the strike will take place from Friday to Sunday this week as well as the following week, then from Saturday August 27 to Monday August 29, at the airports of Barcelona, Malaga and the Mediterranean (Balearic) islands of Palma de Mallorca and Menorca. Friday, the first day of the strike, eight flights of the British company were canceled, the majority at Barcelona airport. Regarding Ryanair, 20 flights have been canceled in Spain since Monday, according to the USO union.
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The showdown between management and employees continues
The strike isthe only alternative option in the face of Easyjet’s refusal to restore the conditions pilots had before the Covid-19 pandemic and to negotiate the second collective agreement“, explained the Sepla union. The Spanish Ministry of Transport has established a minimum service obligation between 57 and 61% in order to “reconcile the interests of citizens and their mobility needs with the right to strike of workers“, he announced.
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The Sepla union defended in its press release that “during the worst months of the pandemic“, the pilots of Easyjet had accepted a drop in wages”to guarantee not only jobs, but also the very survival of the company in Spain“. But, according to the union, Easyjet has now regained a volume of flights “similarto that before the pandemic. For its part, the flight crew of the British company had ended on July 28 a strike started at the beginning of this month, after obtaining a salary increase of 22% spread over three years, according to the USO union.
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