Half of Brussels Airlines’ flights will be cancelled due to strike action on Monday
Unions at Brussels Airlines have confirmed that a strike announced for Monday 20 December will go ahead as planned. The strike will mean that around half of Brussels Airlines’ flights will be cancelled. The unions say that the threat by Brussels Airlines’ management to take legal action if the strike was not called off by 11am today has simply hardened their resolve.
“Management has shot itself in the foot”, the unions say. With the threatened legal action Brussels Airlines would attempt to recoup the estimated 2.5 million euro it will lose as a result of the strike in a compensation claim against the unions.
The unions aren’t impressed “We’re standing firm. Two strike notices have been issued. The strike notices that were issued are completely legal”, Paul Buekenhout of the Christian Trade Union ACV Puls told VRT News.
Tim Roelandt of the liberal trade union ACLVB confirms that the strike will go ahead. He added that there had been enough “soft action” taken and warnings issued in recent months and that a strike will now be held. Mr Roelandt believes that it is regrettable that the focus has now turned to the rights and wrongs of staff taking strike action “rather than the real problems faced by the employees being addressed”.
In recent months staff at Brussels Airlines have taken action several times to call for structural measures to be taken to address the high workload at the airline. Management at Brussels Airlines say that they expect around half of flights will operate on Monday.
The airline’s spokeswoman Kim Daenen told VRT News that around 9,000 of the 12,500 people expected to fly with Brussels Airlines on Monday will be able to fly as planned. She added that alternative travel arrangements have been made for some of the 3,500 Brussels Airline passengers that have had their flights cancelled. These include rebooking them onto flights with other airlines that like Brussels Airlines form part of the Lufthansa Group.