Ryanair has called the decision of Spanish cabin staff affiliated to "smaller unions" to strike for six days in June and July as "a distraction" and said that it does not expect widespread disruption to services this summer.
Ryanair staff aligned with the Unión Sindical Obrera (USO) and Sindicato Independiente de Tripulantes de Cabina de Pasajeros de Líneas Aéreas (SITCPLA) unions will not work on 24-26 and 30 June and 1-2 July in protest at working conditions and pay.
The 24-hour stoppages will take place at Ryanair's 10 bases in Spain and follow walks outs by workers at the budget airline in other European countries, including Belgium and Italy. Ryanair currently flies to 18 Spanish destinations from Irish airports.
"We have to resume mobilisation so that the reality of our situation is known and Ryanair is forced to abide by basic labour laws," said Lidia Aransanz, general secretary of USO's Ryanair section.
In response, Ryanair described the USO and SITCPLA as "smaller unions", adding that it did not believe the strike call would be supported by Spanish crews.
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"Ryanair has negotiated collective agreements covering 90% of our people across Europe. In recent months we have been negotiating improvements to those agreements as we work through the Covid recovery phase," the company said in a statement.
"Those negotiations are going well and we do not expect widespread disruption this summer," the airline said.
Ryanair added that it had reached a collective agreement on behalf of Spanish-based cabin crew with Comisiones Obreras (CCOO), Spain's largest trade union, "reinforcing Ryanair’s commitment to the welfare of its cabin crew."
"Recent announcements by the much smaller USO and SITCPLA unions are a distraction from their own failures to deliver agreements after three years of negotiations and we believe that their strike calls will not be supported by our Spanish crews.”
The striking unions said that Ryanair had left the negotiating table after they made a threat of strike action last month, and that the agreement between Ryanair and CCOO was not an improvement on the deal they had achieved.
They added that CCOO did not represent a majority of Ryanair cabin crew staff in Spain and that the company sought a deal with the union to discredit USO and SITCPLA. Ryanair booked a net loss of €355m last year and recently opened a €10m heavy maintenance facility at Shannon.
Photo: Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary. (Pic: Getty Images)
