BERLIN (AFP) — Workers at German national airline Lufthansa began an indefinite strike Monday at the height of the holiday season to press for higher pay, in the latest walkout to hit Europe’s biggest economy.
About 5,000 maintenance, freight and catering staff stopped work from midnight (2200 GMT Sunday) after members of the Verdi service sector union voted overwhelmingly last week for a strike.
Lufthansa said passengers had not felt the impact of the industrial action, which hit airports including Frankfurt, Cologne and Duesseldorf in western Germany and the southern city of Munich, because it had prepared in advance.
“We could see on day one of the strike that our precautionary measures took effect perfectly,” a company spokesman said, such as hiring out maintenance workers from other airlines to fill the gaps.
Verdi said it was doing what it could to avoid inconveniencing travellers while it ratcheted up the pressure on Lufthansa.
“The goal of the strike is not to hinder passengers but to increase the cost to the company,” Verdi’s chief negotiator Erhard Ott said, noting that ordering catering from other firms or docking planes in other hangars was “very pricey”.
He added that Lufthansa had already seen a decline in reservations in recent weeks as wary passengers booked with other carriers.
Verdi said Lufthansa customers would soon start feeling the pinch if the company did not meet the union’s demands.
“Lufthansa can head off the looming impairments of service for holiday passengers at the last minute with a significantly improved offer,” the union’s board said in a statement.
Verdi wants a 9.8 percent pay hike over a year for around 50,000 workers, while Lufthansa has offered 6.7 percent over 21 months.
The newspaper Die Welt quoted Verdi as saying the strike would cost Lufthansa five million euros (7.9 million dollars) a day.
The industrial action comes as German labour steps up its demands for higher pay to keep pace with rising consumer prices, which grew 3.3 percent in June on a 12-month basis, the biggest increase since December 1993.
A study by the WSI economic research institute, traditionally close to the trade unions, showed that 900,000 employees staged warning strikes during the first six months of the year, hitting the metalworking, textiles and postal sectors among others.
“Wage talks have become much tougher” in a country known for relatively harmonious relations between management and labour, WSI expert Heiner Dribbusch said. “Employees are more ready to mobilise now.”
The Federal Labour Agency, which keeps track of industrial action, said there have been more strike days in Germany since 2006 than in the decade before.
Lufthansa transports 150,000 people daily on average, and July is one of its busiest months.
The walkouts could have a ripple effect because Lufthansa ground personnel also services aircraft from around 50 other companies at major German airports.
Airline boss Wolfgang Mayrhuber has said the carrier “cannot do any more” than its latest offer owing to “extremely limited economic room to manoeuvre.”
But unions point to Lufthansa’s operating profit last year of 1.38 billion euros, a figure it expects to reach again in 2008, as proof it can afford to meet workers’ demands.
Amid growing competition among carriers, and tough conditions because of soaring prices for jet fuel, Lufthansa has held its own and maintained its 2008 targets.
But the airline is also embroiled in separate talks with the Cockpit trade union, which represents pilots at its CityLine and Eurowings subsidiaries.
Warning strikes last week forced the cancellation of around 1,000 flights by those carriers.