The Government of the Canary Islands, the Cabildo of Lanzarote and Spanish Airports and Air Navigation (Aena) decided yesterday to convene Iberia and the Strike Committee, in the presence of the Labor Inspectorate, to a meeting next Wednesday, August 31 to try once again to bring positions closer between the parties in conflict and enable an agreement that ends the handling service stoppages at the airport. The acting president of the First Island Corporation, Manuel Fajardo, will today ask the workers to suspend the strike at least until the day of the meeting.
The novelty of this new negotiating table will be the presence of Aena represented by the regional director of Canary Airports, Fernando Echegaray, and the director of the Lanzarote aerodrome, Dionisio Canomanuel. The Minister of Tourism of the regional Executive, Manuel Fajardo Feo, said that the public administrations will make all the necessary efforts before requesting a mandatory arbitration for both parties. The decision was known after a meeting that lasted an hour and a half between the acting president of the Cabildo, the Minister of Tourism, the two representatives of Aena mentioned above and the socialist senator for Lanzarote, Marcos Hernández.
The Cabildo stressed that the conflict between Iberia and its workers has overflowed the private sphere due to the serious damages caused to the island's economy. For this reason, Fajardo Palarea pointed out, both the Government and the Cabildo and now the public entity that manages the country's airports have agreed to bring the fronts in discord together once again in order to reach a meeting point. "We will ask the workers to suspend the strike until Wednesday, appealing again to responsibility," said the president of the Corporation.
So far, the strikers plan to resume the stoppages next Sunday precisely awaiting the steps promised by the top of the Cabildo.
Although the general director of Labor, Pedro Tomás Pino, had announced that the Executive was withdrawing from the mediation after the first face-to-face meeting between Iberia and the strikers without satisfactory results, the Minister of Tourism rectified and stated with his presence and manifest will that the Government will remain present at the negotiating table.
Possible sanctions to Iberia
Aena confirmed that it is collecting all the necessary information to conclude whether or not Iberia deserves a sanction, but in any case the director of Canary Airports admitted that the essential handling services in Lanzarote during the strike period have not been fulfilled. Fernando Echegaray did not advance what the possible sanctions applied to Iberia would be.
Difficult situation
Iberia workers are not demanding salary improvements and that makes the possibility of an agreement difficult. Why?. It is not that the workers are asking for a 10 percent increase and that the company offers 5, which would facilitate, for example, an intermediate agreement at 7.5 percent. The workers claim, based on a resolution of the Labor Inspectorate, that 50 temporary workers become permanent and the Iberia managers who came to Lanzarote from Madrid said vehemently that under no circumstances would they accept negotiating that point, they have even indicated that the position of the employees is intransigent. Given this reality, it is almost impossible for there to be an agreement no matter how many meetings are scheduled.
Nothing from the arbitration
If the agreement already has signs of utopia, it is not understood that the mandatory ruling continues to be postponed, while the island's economy continues to suffer the ravages of the strike. It will be that there is some fear that the Strike Committee is effectively right, especially since the Labor Inspectorate, one of the participants in the negotiating table as a mediator, has granted it through a resolution also requesting sanctions for the company. Even in that you have to think because the partridge is already being made too dizzy.
The airport director spoke
Dionisio Canomanuel broke his silence and assured that there is no persecution of workers by him. Asked about the events at the air base that led to the arrests of five workers and the seizure of their access cards to the jobs, Canomanuel argued that the employees violated the strict security measures of the airport and that when that happens the controls are absolutely strict. According to Canomanuel, he does not intend to persecute anyone, however, the workers think quite differently.