Lufthansa is entering into a collective agreement with Verdi for its holiday airline Discover. This is far from bringing peace, as union competition is on the rise.
At Lufthansa’s holiday airline Discover, the signs point to conflict despite a newly concluded collective agreement. The unions Vereinigung Cockpit (VC) and Ufo could soon call on the flight crew to strike again because the current negotiations were concluded not by them but by their rival Verdi. In the power struggle between the unions, passengers could possibly be the ones to suffer this summer.
First collective agreements for the airline founded three years ago
The company and Verdi report on the first collective bargaining agreements at the airline, which was founded three years ago. Agreements on salary and working conditions have been reached for both the approximately 500 pilots and the approximately 1,400 cabin crew members.
Salary increases, allowances and special payments have been agreed for both professional groups until the end of 2027. Company pension schemes, duty rosters and sick pay subsidies have also been taken into account. “We have not made a dumping collective agreement,” says Verdi negotiator Marvin Reschinsky.
Is everything going well at the relatively small holiday airline with 27 aircraft?
Not at all, say rival unions Ufo and VC, who feel they have been deceived by the Lufthansa Group after months of negotiations of their own that were actually concluded. They particularly doubt that Verdi is organizing a significant number of Discover employees. Ufo officials speak internally of “a handful,” while together with VC they easily represent “around 1,000 colleagues.” “Verdi is appointed by the employer as a collective bargaining partner,” says Ufo collective bargaining expert Harry Jaeger.
A spokeswoman for the airline said that they had no knowledge of the employees’ union membership.
For Verdi, the agreement is a success
Verdi man Reschinsky brushes off the accusations. “We are not revealing our level of organization – like every other union.” Verdi sees the agreement as a success because up to now, the union has only been properly represented in the Lufthansa Group on ground staff and in the Eurowings cabins. The only union that has a collective agreement for pilots is the cargo subsidiary Aerologic.
The DGB union could benefit from Lufthansa’s strategy of putting its existing airlines under cost pressure through new flight operations. Initially, there will be no wage conditions at all and later lower wage conditions. This logic does not only apply to Aerologic in the cargo sector: Discover Airlines and City Airlines are two young companies ready to fly long- and medium-haul routes more cheaply than the Lufthansa core company, which has the highest wages under the collective agreement.
For customers, the differences are barely noticeable. Group CEO Carsten Spohr has therefore long since ordered additional aircraft for the young subsidiaries.
“VC and Ufo can campaign for better agreements at Discover,” Reschinsky says. Ultimately, it is clear to all those involved that this can only be achieved through industrial action. Only in the case of competing collective agreements would it be necessary to determine, according to the Collective Bargaining Act, which union is the strongest in the company and is then allowed to conclude collective agreements.
VC wants another ballot among its members at Discover
The VC has already announced another ballot among its members at Discover. Last winter, the pilots had already struck in three waves and the flight attendants once, cancelling some flights. In February, pilots from the Lufthansa Boeing fleet even went on a solidarity strike. Within the Lufthansa Group, the VC has established a joint collective bargaining committee for the German companies.
In any case, the new VC President Andreas Pinheiro is ready for a fight and says: “If Discover continues to categorically rule out a tariff agreement with VC, industrial action will again be possible in the summer and beyond.”
Verdi, on the other hand, hopes that the flying staff at the low-cost subsidiaries may not feel properly represented by the unions VC and Ufo established within the group. “We are available for a collective agreement at City Airlines,” says Reschinsky. The next round in the tough union battle at Lufthansa has thus begun.
Source: Stern
