08/01/2018
Pressure increased before third round of negotiations
IG Metall covers industry nationwide with warning strikes
DPA
Car industry: IG Metall announces warning strikes in the metal and electrical industry before the third round of negotiations
Before the start of the third round of negotiations in the collective bargaining dispute between the metal and electrical industry, IG Metall is covering the industry nationwide with warning strikes. On Monday was among others again affected the car maker Porsche in Stuttgart, where, according to the union, more than 3,000 workers laid off work for about an hour in the morning and went to a rally outside the factory gate. Immediately after midnight, employees of companies in Aschaffenburg in Franconia and Iserlohn in Westphalia had already stopped work for a short time.
Apart from in Baden-Wuerttemberg, Bavaria and North Rhine-Westphalia, there were also small and large warning strikes in Hesse, Berlin, Brandenburg and Lower Saxony. In addition, the union called on workers in Saxony and Thuringia to short-term work stoppages.
In the coming days, the IG Metall wants to increase the pressure and expand the actions, before then on Thursday Baden-Württemberg makes the prelude to the third round of negotiations. Occasional warning strikes, also at Porsche, had already been there last week.
“If nothing happens on Thursday at the negotiating table, then the employers will quickly feel how angry their workforces are,” Porsche works council chief Uwe Hück was quoted as saying. It was not the employers who made the high profits, but the employees.
Six percent more for around 4 million employees
The IG Metall demands Six per cent more money and for all 3.9 million employees the option of reducing their working time to 28 hours a week, Shift workers, parents of young children and family caregivers should receive partial pay compensation if they reduce their working hours – which employers categorically reject.
Employers call the claim unlawful because it would create unequal treatment for employees who are already working part-time without compensation. They rely on a labor law report that supports this view. The offer made by IG Metall’s employers provides for wage increases of two percent plus a one-off payment. In addition, they demand a more flexible working hours upwards.
The boss of the IG Metall in the southwest, Roman Zitzelsberger, had called the procedure of the employers at the weekend as fog candle. The employers’ organization Südwestmetall, on the other hand, called it “hard-working and helpless” as the union tries to minimize the possible illegality of its own claim
la / dpa-AFX
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