The cabin crew of airline Ryanair, which works at the airports of Zaventem and Charleroi, will stop working on Friday 22 April, Saturday 23 April and Sunday 24 April. This is announced by the Christian trade unions CNE and ACV Puls.
The action follows negotiations on a new collective labor agreement (CLA) on cabin crew wages and premiums. A final mediation attempt between the staff representatives and the management “did not lead to the hoped-for solutions”, say the unions.
The unions are complaining that Ryanair, which has about 650 employees in Belgium, “refuses to invest in a personnel policy”. For example, there is no HR service in Belgium, it is said, and wages are not paid correctly. “Some staff members who are no longer allowed to fly due to pregnancy, for example, have been without wages or benefits for months,” says ACV trade unionist Hans Elsen.
Minimum wage
In 2018, under pressure from the trade unions, the Irish company accepted the application of Belgian labor law and a personnel director with knowledge of local legislation was appointed. It is now no longer active. The collective labor agreement for on-board staff, which was concluded in the spring of 2019, expired at the end of March. That agreement provided for a fixed monthly income, regardless of the number of flights performed.
According to the union, 75 percent of cabin crew members receive the sectoral minimum wage. “They work on public holidays, weekends, early and late hours for a paltry 2,000 euros gross, while Ryanair in Charleroi has a profit margin of 30 percent,” it sounds. The pilots are not participating in the strike, but negotiations are ongoing for them too. At the beginning of April, CNE union man Didier Lebbe warned that social peace is not certain with them either.
The last strike at Ryanair in Belgium dates back to September 2018, when staff stopped working for four days, causing 172 flights to be canceled or delayed. The company recently reached an agreement with consumer organization ‘Test Aankoop’ about compensation for the approximately 33,000 passengers who were affected at the time.
Brussels Airport does not yet know how many flights may be affected by the strike. “It is up to Ryanair to inform their passengers. For example, they can cancel flights as a precaution or inform their passengers in advance that there may be delays,” says Ihsane Chioua Lekhli of Brussels Airport.
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