British tourists heading for Spain are to be hit by a double whammy as more strike action has been announced affecting major airports and airlines. The union UGT has already announced repeated walkouts in Ryanair’s baggage handling department, starting on August 15.
But now, the prospect of delays and flight cancellations has been made worse after 1,500 workers with another company, Menzies, confirmed their own strike action, also starting this month. Menzies serves airlines such as Emirates, British Airways, American Airlines, EasyJet, Turkish Airlines, Norwegian and Wizz Air. The UGT union has called a strike by ground staff of the Menzies group that will affect five Spanish airports, including Barcelona-El Prat, Alicante, Palma, Malaga and Tenerife South, on August 16, 17, 23, 24, 30 and 31.
The workers’ representatives are protesting against what they see as “serious and repeated breaches of labour agreements and the conditions established by agreement” by Menzies, they said in a statement.
Among these “violations”, UGT cites “salary breaches, violation of subrogation rights, disorganisation in working hours and schedules and constant errors in the management of personnel and payroll.”
They also maintain that there is a lack of staff to deal with the workload and “arbitrary imposition of holidays.” The union claims that Menzies is in breach of the sectoral handling agreement, the company’s own agreement, and the sectoral agreement ratified before the Interconfederal Mediation and Arbitration Service (SIMA) in December 2024, which allowed a previous strike to be called off.
The union UGT has already called for repeated walkouts in Ryanair’s handling department at a time when Spain is bursting with visitors at the height of the season and during school holidays.
That strike, involving more than 3,000 workers who load and unload luggage, will be on August 15, 16, and 17 and then every Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. In even worse news, unless an agreement is reached, the Ryanair strikes could continue until next January.
By law, the workers have to provide a “minimum service” yet to be determined, but the action will still have a major impact on travellers. The protests are “against the sanctions imposed on workers and the abuse of hours.”
Ryanair’s bases are located in Valencia, Alicante, Madrid, Barcelona, Seville, Malaga, Ibiza, Palma, Girona, Tenerife South, Lanzarote and Santiago.
The strike at Azul Handling (Ryanair’s handling subsidiary) will take place on August 15, 16 and 17 and will continue every Wednesday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday until at least December 31, ” confirmed the UGT in a statement. Actions could then be extended into January,
The strike will take place between 5am and 9am, noon and 3pm and 9pm to 11.59pm. The FeSMC-UGT airline sector is requesting mediation before the Interconfederal Mediation and Arbitration Service (SIMA).
The union says the reasons for the call are as follows:
Lack of stable job creation and consolidation of working hours for permanent part-time staff.
Imposition and coercion in the performance of complementary hours, both ordinary and voluntary, apply in some cases, with disproportionate sanctions.
Repeated failure to comply with the opinions of the Joint Committee of the Sectoral Agreement on guarantees and bonuses.
Illegal restrictions on reinstatement after medical discharge and on the adaptation of working hours to exercise the right to family conciliation.
“UGT regrets having to go to these extremes and all the damages that may occur, for which the direct responsibility will be solely and exclusively the company and its reckless action with the workforce,” it says.
Jose Manuel Perez Grande, Federal Secretary of the FeSMC-UGT Air Union, claimed Azul Handling maintains “a strategy of precariousness and pressure on the workforce that violates basic labour rights and systematically ignores union demands.”
The FeSMC-UGT Air Sector demands that the company withdraw the sanctions, comply with the opinions of the Joint Commission, and immediately open a real negotiation process, which will improve the working conditions of the more than 3,000 workers affected throughout the national territory.
