Tuesday, September 07, 2021
No agreement in sight
GDL ends second longest strike round
Rail customers can take a deep breath: after the strike of the train drivers’ union GDL, train traffic has been returning to normal since the early morning – at least for the time being: a rapprochement seems to be a long way off and GDL boss Weselsky is still belligerent.
Deutsche Bahn has returned to the regular timetable since early Tuesday morning – the strike of the German Locomotive Drivers’ Union (GDL) has ended for the time being. A railway spokesman said that the railway was assuming that the trains would mostly run according to the normal schedule again over the course of Tuesday. Both sides want to draw a conclusion in the course of the day.
According to the Deutsche Bahn, train traffic started “largely normally”. According to a spokeswoman, Deutsche Bahn is “very confident” that the 860 long-distance trains planned for the day as well as 21,000 regional and S-Bahn trains will run as planned again. “Irregularities can still occur in individual cases,” warned the state-owned company. Passengers are therefore asked in the morning to find out about the connection they have booked in advance on the Internet or via the DB Navigator app. All long-distance tickets that have already been booked and that were affected by the GDL strike will remain valid, according to Deutsche Bahn. They can still be used flexibly up to and including September 17th.
The third and so far longest strike round in the ongoing tariff dispute at the railways led to far-reaching restrictions in freight and passenger traffic and hit train travelers and industrial customers hard. However, the union has already shown that it can go even longer: 127 hours in passenger traffic and 138 strike hours in goods traffic lasted the longest round of industrial action by the GDL in a collective bargaining dispute. That was in May 2015. It was not until two months later that a collective agreement was concluded in an arbitration process. The strike that has now ended, however, lasted 110 hours in passenger and 118 hours in freight. This makes it the second longest in the history of Deutsche Bahn AG.
It’s not just about money
However, a rapprochement between the two sides is not in sight. “After the strike is before the strike,” said the chairman of the GDL train drivers’ union, Claus Weselsky, in front of members at Berlin Central Station on Monday afternoon. It is up to the management of the railway whether there will be another labor dispute.
In addition to classic tariff issues then and now there is a dispute about the law on collective bargaining and the GDL’s sphere of influence in the group. The law came into force in 2015. It stipulates that in a company with several unions only the collective agreement of the employee representative body with a larger number of members will be applied. In most of the approximately 300 rail operations, from the Group’s point of view, this is the rail and transport union competing with the GDL.
GDL boss Claus Weselsky is therefore forced to expand his sphere of influence to other trades and to become the majority union. In addition to the train staff, he therefore also wants to negotiate for workshop employees as well as for employees in the infrastructure and administration – areas that have traditionally been represented by the EVG so far.
Shortly before the end of the strike, Weselsky reiterated his demand for an offer that would enable the union to conclude a collective agreement for all members in the various rail companies.
In addition to these questions, the wage dispute is also about money. The GDL is calling for a total of 3.2 percent higher wages and salaries for a term of 28 months and a corona bonus of 600 euros. The railway had recently offered a term of 36 months and agreed to the corona premium. There is also a dispute about the future form of old-age provision.
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