Ryanair claims competitors organising cabin crew strikes
Ryanair has complained to the European Commission, claiming its competitors were partly to blame as industrial action forced the budget airline to cancel 8% of its flights on Friday.
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The Irish carrier published its offer to pilots and cabin crew on Wednesday to try and reach a speedy conclusion of collective labour agreements with its staff and their unions, which has led to the cancellation of 190 of its flights on Friday amid planned strikes by cabin crew based in Spain, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, Portugal and Italy.
The airline submitted a competition complaint to the European Commission, calling for an investigation of the anti-competitive behaviour of competitor airline crew, unions and lobby groups “working against” Ryanair and impeding the negotiations with pilots and cabin crew.
Ryanair claims that in Spain, Norwegian cabin crew in Alicante organise the cabin crew strikes, they also claim similar activities from other airlines in Portugal, the Netherlands and Sweden.
Friday’s strike follows a complicated summer for the company that has had internal disruption and was forced to cancel around 400 flights in August. There were similar strikes in July.
Travellers are starting to lose consumer confidence in the company and choosing alternative airlines in fear that their flight might be cancelled due to a cabin crew strike.
Speaking in Brussels on Wednesday, Ryanair’s Michael O’Leary said: “We have made real progress with the unions and our people in many EU countries since we agreed to recognise unions in Dec 2017. However, in certain countries, most notably in Portugal, Spain, Germany, Netherlands, and Sweden similar progress is being impeded by the interference of competitor airline pilots and cabin crew who are conspiring to call repeated and unnecessary strikes.
“We are not aware of any other multi-national company in Europe where its union negotiations are interfered with by competitor employees. Volkswagen’s union negotiations do not take place with Peugeot car workers. Tesco is not required to meet with ASDA employees. Yet in Ryanair currently, we are being asked to negotiate with pilots and/or cabin crew of Aer Lingus, Norwegian, TAP, Eurowings, KLM and Braathens. This is anti-competitive behaviour which damages consumers.”