Warning strikes in the ticker: Tuesday and Wednesday again warning strikes in retail

Warning strikes in retail in East Westphalia again on Tuesday and Wednesday

Tuesday, May 30, 7:30 a.m.: After a nationwide warning strike in mid-May, the Verdi union once again called on workers in retail, wholesale and foreign trade to walk out. Next Tuesday and Wednesday they want to go on strike in Ostwestfalen-Lippe for better pay and working conditions. Employees in branches of Primark, H&M, Kaufland, Ikea, Smyth Toys and Marktkauf, Schüco, Phoenix, Leitz, Noweda and Edeka Foodservice are called upon to do so.

The results of the previous rounds of negotiations were not satisfactory, the union said in a statement on Saturday. The willingness to go on strike is therefore very high, as Ursula Jacob-Reisinger said as trade union secretary for trade in OWL.

In the 2023 collective bargaining round in retail in North Rhine-Westphalia, Verdi is demanding 2.50 euros more salary and wages per hour. Training allowances are to be increased by 250 euros. Negotiations will continue on June 12 in Recklinghausen.

In wholesale and foreign trade in North Rhine-Westphalia, Verdi wants an increase in fees of 13 percent, but at least 400 euros. Training allowances are also to be increased by 250 euros. Negotiations will continue here on June 13, 2023.

Retail workers are walking down again

Saturday, May 27, 5:14 p.m.: One day after the warning strikes in retail in Rhineland-Palatinate and Saarland, employees went back to work on Saturday. The Verdi union had previously called for warning strikes again. Around 300 people took part in the warning strike in both countries, as Verdi coordinator Monika Di Silvestre said. Of these, around 200 employees were at the strike rally in Kaiserslautern in the morning. The branches of Galeria, Ikea, H&M, Kaufland, Hornbach and Primark are affected by the warning strikes.

According to Verdi, 150 to 200 employees stopped work on Friday. “Colleagues are striking again today so that employers can finally move and realize that their situation is serious,” said Di Silvestre. The employees are urgently dependent on a sustainable wage increase in order to be able to pay the daily living expenses.

The background is the current collective bargaining for the retail and mail order trade in Rhineland-Palatinate. According to Di Silvestre, around 150,000 employees in Rhineland-Palatinate are affected. Verdi is demanding 2.50 euros more per hour worked, a term for the collective agreements of twelve months and the introduction of generally binding collective agreements in retail and mail order. In addition, trainee remuneration should increase by EUR 250 per year of training.

The trade association proposed a two-stage offer over two years. In the first year there should be a tariff increase of three percent, in the second year by two percent.

The first round of collective bargaining took place at the beginning of May. Further talks are to take place next Tuesday, May 30th.

Threatening warning strike in schools: Representatives of the Senate speak to the GEW

3:12 p.m.: The Berlin Senate wants to talk to the Education and Science Union (GEW) about the announced three-day warning strike. Finance Senator Stefan Evers and Education Senator Katharina Günther-Wünsch (both CDU) invited the Berlin GEW chairmen Tom Erdmann and Martina Regulin to a meeting on Wednesday, as the education administration announced on Friday. The aim should be to find out to what extent the strike could still be averted or at least shortened, which happened exactly during the period of the Abitur exams. “Together, we must aim to reduce the workload of educators and at the same time achieve better learning and teaching conditions,” says the statement.

The Berlin GEW had called on the employees at the schools to a warning strike for June 6th to 8th. The trade unionists announced that they wanted to increase the pressure because the new Finance Senator Evers, like his predecessor Daniel Wesener (Greens), had not responded to the call for collective bargaining. The GEW wants to regulate the ratio of pupils to teachers and thus the class size at general and vocational schools in a “collective agreement on health protection”.

The tax authorities had pointed out that Berlin was a member of the collective bargaining community of the federal states and therefore could not meet the request for a “special collective agreement”. The red-green-red Senate had already argued the same way.

There are around 34,000 teachers in Berlin. Many of them are employees and – unlike civil servants – are allowed to go on strike. Several thousand teachers have taken part in the previous warning strikes – some lessons have been cancelled.

Tariff agreement reached in Bavarian local transport

Friday, May 26, 10:56 am: After several warning strikes in Bavarian local transport, the union and employers have agreed on a new collective agreement. As the Bavarian municipal employers’ association announced on Friday, the payment of a tax-free inflation adjustment of 3,000 euros was agreed on Thursday evening.

The sum is to be distributed in June initially with a one-time payment of 1240 euros, until February 2024 there will be 220 euros per month. From March 2024, wages will then be increased by at least 340 euros. A later increase in shift allowances and a better classification of the drivers had also been agreed.

Employer negotiator Magdalena Weigel said that the deal had succeeded in averting further strikes at the expense of passengers. The attractiveness of the profession will be strengthened by the new collective agreement. Employers hope that this will make it easier for them to attract the skilled workers they are looking for.

The Verdi union emphasized that there was also a commitment to negotiate to improve working conditions. “In some places, this result goes well beyond the level of public service and thus compensates to some extent for the long term until the end of 2024, which unfortunately could not be negotiated away,” emphasized Verdi negotiator Sinan Öztürk.

In Bavaria, local transport is not part of the public service in collective bargaining, for which an agreement had already been reached.

DB presents new tariff offer – EVG: No strikes over Pentecost

8:10 p.m.: At Deutsche Bahn there are no warning strikes over Pentecost. In the collective bargaining dispute with the railway and transport union EVG, the state-owned group presented a new offer on Thursday. The union then ruled out calling for work stoppages in the next few days. “Those who negotiate don’t go on strike,” said EVG negotiator Kristian Loroch in Fulda. The railway asked the union to comment on the new offer by Tuesday. The EVG, in turn, announced that it would like to continue the collective bargaining in the coming week.

The new DB offer for a good 180,000 employees provides twelve percent more money for the lower, ten percent more for the middle and eight percent more for the upper income groups. The increases are to take place in two stages, the first in December 2023. In addition, DB offers the payment of 2850 euros inflation compensation premium – 1450 euros expected in July, another 1400 euros in November. The term on offer is 24 months – twice as long as required by the EVG.

“There is more money and there is more money earlier, that is the main good news,” said DB HR Director Martin Seiler in Fulda about the new offer. “We stretched again significantly. We now hope that a result can be found on this basis.”

The EVG wants to achieve at least 650 euros more per month and twelve percent for the upper income in the negotiations.

The fact that there will be no strike over Pentecost should not only please all train passengers, but also the group itself. The holiday weekend is one of the busiest travel times of the year. Because passengers are entitled to compensation in the event of a warning strike, a walkout would have been very expensive – and regardless of the costs, frustration with the train would presumably have increased.

DB and EVG have been negotiating a new collective agreement since the end of February. At the beginning, the talks progressed only very slowly, so the EVG called twice for a warning strike and tried to quickly increase the pressure on the railways. A third warning strike, lasting 50 hours, was called off at short notice because both sides agreed to a settlement before the labor court in Frankfurt am Main.

The fourth round of negotiations began on Tuesday in Fulda. Loroch described the talks of the past few days as “constructive compared to the previous rounds, because we were able to get into the topics”. Negotiations continued in smaller rounds and working groups, interim results were exchanged, and on Tuesday and Wednesday the talks lasted into the evening hours. “The last few days have shown very clearly that it makes sense that we continue to negotiate and that we continue to talk,” said Loroch.

At the end of the round of negotiations, Deutsche Bahn sharpened its new offer in several areas that the union had previously highlighted as particularly important: the term was reduced from 27 to 24 months and twelve instead of the previous ten percent more money was promised . In addition, the first table increase was brought forward to the current year (instead of March 2024). The union recently insisted on a fixed amount increase instead of a percentage increase.

First warning strike in wholesale and foreign trade: pharmaceuticals and the automotive industry affected

Thursday, May 25, 09:26: The Verdi trade union, with its around 60,000 employees, has a first in the collective bargaining round for Hamburg’s wholesale and foreign trade warning strike called. On Thursday, the employees of Autoteile Matthies, the steel dealers Carl Spaeter and Heinrich Schütt and the pharmaceutical dealers Sanacorp and Phoenix are to stop working, as Verdi announced. The union is reacting to what Verdi believes has so far been an insufficient offer from the employer side.

Verdi calls for an increase in wages and salaries of 13 percent, but at least by 400 euros per month, as well as an increase in training allowances by 250 euros for a collective bargaining term of twelve months. In the first round of negotiations on May 10, the employer side proposed an increase in wages and training allowances by 4 percent from December 2023, 2.1 percent from December 2024 and two inflation compensation premiums of 700 euros this year and next.

More information on the warning strikes on the next pages.