The National Union of Civil Aviation Workers (SINTAC) and Portway did not reach an agreement this Friday on the definition of minimum services for the planned strike from August 26 to 28 at four airports.
The union structure met with the General Directorate of Employment and Labor Relations (DGERT) and with Portway.
This meeting was more of the same. There was no consensus, as has been the hallmark of the meetings with Portway. We did not reach concrete conclusions or an agreement on the definition of minimum services”, said the leader of SINTAC, Pedro Figueiredo, in statements to Lusa.
The leader lamented the conditions that the strike will cause to all users and guaranteed that the union is still available to reach an understanding.
On August 10, SINTAC filed a strike notice, covering Portway workers at Lisbon, Porto, Faro and Funchal airports, for August 26, 27 and 28.
Portway workers move forward with three-day notice of strike at end of month
At stake is HR policy [recursos humanos] assumed in recent years by Portway, a company owned by the VINCI Group, of confrontation and devaluation of workers for consecutive breaches of the Company Agreement, disciplinary confrontation, failure to update salary, misrepresentation of performance evaluations that prevent salary progression and bad faith in the negotiations”, indicated, at the time, the union, in a statement.
The notice provides general strike of the workers of the ground handling companyat the airports of Lisbon, Porto, Faro and Funchal, starting at 00:00 hours on August 26 and ending at 24:00 hours on August 28.
SINTAC also accuses the company of promoting a “climate of psychological terror, where threats proliferate and disciplinary processes are initiated, generating social instability unprecedented in the company’s history.”
Thus, the workers demand compliance with the 2016 Company Agreement and a performance evaluation that does not serve to prevent progression.
Pedro Figueiredo also told Lusa that a new meeting with the company was not planned and he expected a strong adherence to the planned strike.
SINTAC is the largest private aviation union, which is not linked to a central union. When we went on strike in 2019, we had 90% adherence […]. Our expectation is that it will be a large-scale membership. In 2019 we still did not have a perception of what the next administration would be. Now we have. Adherence will be strong and we regret the impacts,” he noted.
Before the end of the meeting with the union and the DGERT, Portway delivered a note to its workers, to which Lusa had access, in which it said “to be surprised” by the strike notice, issued “in the middle of the Christmas season.” , and when the tourist and aeronautical activity begins its long-awaited and necessary recovery”.
Portway also mentioned that the reasons given by the union “do not correspond to the reality of the company” and that it will continue to favor dialogue.
In the document, the company assured that it has always fulfilled its economic commitments and highlighted that the updates that have been given since 2019 have represented an 11% increase in the compensation of workers.
In response, the union considered that the company “has a habit of biasing and giving the impression that the data disclosed is not correct”, highlighting that, “if there was good faith and seriousness” on the part of Portwayit would be possible to arrive at another result.
Source: Observadora
