It seems doubtful whether the rather smaller interventions as proposed by the Union would change much in the strike power of a GDL. The parties to this industrial dispute have demonstrated many times that arbitration does not automatically bring the parties together. At the end of 2020, the then Prime Minister of Brandenburg, Mathias Platzek, tried to mediate as an arbitrator early on in the collective bargaining dispute between Deutsche Bahn and the train drivers’ union. Weeks later, the railway and GDL leader Weselsky declared the attempt a failure. He still called for a strike, several times.
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In any case, “emergency services” and “strike preparation” would have little effect on the duration and frequency of a labor dispute. Major interventions in the law would be necessary here, such as banning strikes on certain days or in certain regions. Rail expert from the Green parliamentary group in the Bundestag, Matthias Gastel, considers such restrictions to be “not very practical,” he says. “A signal box is either occupied or not occupied on strike days,” says Gastel. He generally rejects restrictions on the right to strike. Political scientist and strike expert Wolfgang Schroeder from the University of Kassel suspects that such serious interventions would also have little legal success in court. For years he has observed how business associations and parts of politics want to restrict the right to strike. “Because of the requirement of collective bargaining autonomy, I see little scope this time too,” says Schroeder.