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29 March 2024

Lufthansa cabin staff won't strike for now

Published
By AFP

Cabin staff of the German airline Lufthansa have again decided not to strike so as to give management a last chance to come up with an acceptable offer in wage talks, labour union UFO said on Thursday.

The union's chief negotiator Dirk Vogelsang said Lufthansa had, as promised, tabled a new offer on Wednesday evening.

"But, as expected, it consisted merely of a package of cuts and demands and was therefore not negotiable," Vogelsang said in a statement.

Nevertheless, to the union's great surprise, management had told employees in an open letter that there had been "misunderstandings" and asked the union to agree to a last-ditch attempt to reach a solution.

"It will be a last final, clearly timetabled attempt," the union said.

And if no solution is reached in the next five days, "we will call for concrete industrial action next Tuesday," it said.

In a strike ballot earlier this month, 97.5 percent of Lufthansa cabin staff voted in favour of walk-outs in order to turn up the pressure on management in the gridlocked talks.

The union is seeking a 5.0-percent pay increase for cabin staff for 15 months starting from January this year after three years of zero increases.

It is also opposed to the use of temporary cabin staff in Lufthansa aircraft.