The UGT and CCOO unions have called eight days of strike at Iberia, in the middle of Christmas, in protest because the company, they say, does not accept the provision of "self-handling" (ground service provided by the company itself) in those airports in which it lost the tender called by Aena.
Union sources said this Wednesday that the stoppages would occur on December 29, 30 and 31 and January 1, 4, 5, 6 and 7, coinciding with the critical dates of the end of the year and the Epiphany.
Iberia has expressed in a note its "enormous disappointment" at the "irresponsible" call for a strike, "in the midst of negotiating a viable solution for handling."
According to separate statements from UGT and CCOO, after several meetings with Iberia and IAG (the group to which the Spanish company belongs together with British Airways, Vueling, Aer Lingus and Level), the holding company still does not accept the creation of a "self-handling" that provides service to all the group's airlines at airports where it did not obtain a license.
Iberia says that workers will not lose rights
On September 26, Aena announced the result of the tender, which left Iberia out of the service to third parties in some of the main airports in the country (Barcelona, Palma de Mallorca, Malaga, Alicante, Gran Canaria, Tenerife South, Ibiza and Bilbao), although it maintained Madrid.
Iberia recalls in its note that it undertook legal actions to request the annulment of the tender and, in parallel, has been working "intensely" with the unions to find a solution.
The airline adds that, by virtue of the V Agreement of the ground assistance sector, the subrogation of workers to the companies winning the tender would be carried out with the guarantee that all of them will fully retain their rights, their labor, salary and extra-salary concepts, including the airline tickets that they have been enjoying as Iberia employees.
It also points out that it is difficult to carry out "self-handling" at the airports where it lost the license, since it would mean "a serious damage to the competitiveness of the company and all the airlines of IAG, with its consequent economic impact, and with the unavoidable condemnation in the medium term of this business."
Iberia has explained in this process to the unions that "self-handling" and partial subrogation is not a viable solution because it would mean that the people with the longest seniority and, therefore, those with the highest salaries would remain in the group.
That means that the operators awarded the tender would have personnel with lower salary costs, so they could offer much more competitive prices than those that can be achieved through "self-handling" and would create a competitiveness gap between the main Spanish airlines and the international operators winning the tender.
Iberia explains that it has never done "self-handling" at the airports where it operates, but has always chosen to contract the services of third parties.
