The vote by the Airbus staff has resulted in the refusal to pause the strike until the preliminary agreement reached between the company's management and the unions, after mediation by Industry, is submitted to a referendum. The results have been very close and the difference between one decision and another has been 67 votes.
The Albacete plant already decided last Friday to stop the strike momentarily and, yesterday, Monday, the Cádiz plant made the same decision with 94.3% of votes in favor, as well as that of Illescas (59.7%) or Tablada (59.8%). However, in Getafe, where 9,000 of the approximately 14,000 Airbus Spain workers work, it was decided not to pause the indefinite strike with 46.2% of the votes, compared to 45.4% who opted for the opposite option. Finally, during the morning of today, the San Pablo plant in Seville supported continuing with the strike with 76% of the votes in favor, according to union sources.
The strikes will continue today and, predictably, throughout the week, although the UGT is considering the option of holding specific votes to lift the strike momentarily, that is, lifting the strikes for only eight hours, as long as the staff agrees.
Last Friday, Jordi Hereu, Minister of Industry and Tourism, assured that, after the mediation meeting held with the management of Airbus and the unions, a pre-agreement had been reached with the majority union organizations, which represented more than 80% of the negotiating table. These were UGT, ATP, SIPA and CCOO, but during that same day, UGT distanced itself from these statements and stated that they had simply collected the proposal document to examine it. In fact, union sources express that the pre-agreement was reached with the other attending unions and showed their opposition to the absence of CGT and ÚTIL (two of the three unions calling for the current indefinite strike) in that presentation of the Ministry's proposal to mediate.
In this way, the strikes will continue until the referendum is held to validate or reject a new agreement. According to UGT sources, the staff still does not have a document with all the details about the agreement and CGT states that there are still "aspects of the claims that remain to be developed."
Despite the staff's decision not to pause the strike, CGT affirms that "of that 51% that has voted not to pause, it is difficult to know who is really going to commit to the strike, and of those who are going to strike also who is committed to going to pickets and assemblies." In addition, he defends that supporting the conflict with that slight difference in support can be frowned upon.
For the moment, the call for a march on the morning of September 12 to go from Colón to the Ministry of Industry remains in force. In this scenario, the unions will hold informational meetings with their membership and staff at all plants to explain the details of the final Airbus proposal. CCOO has confirmed to Europa Press that these sessions will take place this Wednesday and Thursday, while SIPA will bring together the workers "during these days." Thus, Airbus faces another vital week for the resolution of the conflict.
The principle of agreement reached by CCOO, SIPA and ATP (not the organizers of the strike but representatives of the majority of the negotiating table) has a duration of four years, and includes the commitment to pay the real CPI and the recovery of purchasing power of 7.95% distributed proportionally each year, although the union defends that the loss of purchasing power is 9% and demands to recover it in less time. The increases will be applied as follows: in January 2026 it will be the real CPI plus 2%, in January 2027 the real CPI plus 2%, in April 2028 the real CPI plus 2%, and in April 2029 the real CPI plus 1.95%. The company also withdrew the appeal in the Supreme Court regarding the Bradford concept and committed to maintaining the remote work policy and respect for individual agreements, including 40% remote work, as well as making the vacation period more flexible, among other aspects.
