If you take a look around, you might get the idea that there are strikes all over the country. The postmen stop working, the kindergarten teachers, the airport employees, the nurses. People notice this especially because many public areas are affected – and soon they could feel it even more clearly. It won’t be long before trains can stand still again for a few hours – or much longer.
There are two collective bargaining rounds at Deutsche Bahn this year. From this Tuesday onwards, the group will be negotiating with the large railway union EVG, and in the fall the round will follow with the much smaller train drivers’ union GDL, whose boss Klaus Weselsky is still well known to people in this country from previous massive waves of strikes.
The EVG, which goes first, is considered the more tame, one could also say more constructive, of the two unions. Nevertheless, rail customers should not expect everything to be as quiet as in previous years this spring. This is due to the extremely high demand that the EVG has decided: Twelve percent more money is demanded for its employees, but strictly speaking its demand is significantly higher. On average, rail insiders get a whopping 18 percent more. Such demands are likely to cost the state-owned company several billion euros if they are implemented – and will probably also burden passengers and taxpayers accordingly.
One thing is clear: the negotiations will be more difficult than ever. On eleven pages, the EVG lists 57 individual demands on the railways. The union insists that every employee affected by the agreement should receive at least 650 euros more per month. For low-income workers on the railways – cleaning staff or security staff, for example – this would correspond to a salary increase of up to 30 percent. The Deutsche Bahn is said to be in a “challenging” situation and that the group is surprised by the extent of the demands. The group must pay attention to its own competitiveness and also to ensure that jobs are secure in the long term.
The EVG justifies the high demands on the one hand with the extremely high inflation, which was 7.9 percent last year and is forecast to remain high this year. On the other hand, she points out that she held back at the last conclusion in 2020, when people stayed away from the trains because of the corona pandemic, out of responsibility towards the group.
The EVG expects a quick offer from the railways
At that time, the EVG agreed job guarantees and a wage increase of 1.5 percent, later a corona bonus of 1100 euros was added – money that rising inflation quickly eaten up again. Even then, EVG negotiator Kristian Loroch announced a “tough dispute from March 1, 2023” – it is now imminent when it comes to the new collective agreement. In addition to the wallets of its members, Loroch should also have the more combative GDL trade union in mind, with which the EVG is in competition.
The EVG emphasizes that it wants to reach a conclusion quickly. There is no time for “tariff folklore” – the usual long rounds of negotiations. The situation among the low earners in the group is too precarious for that. Some, for whom money has always been tight, now have to decide at the end of the month whether to fill up the car or go to the supermarket; there is no longer enough for both.
The EVG therefore expects a quick offer from the railways and otherwise thinks about warning strikes. They are likely to come closer, because according to information from railway circles, the group does not want to react directly to the EVG initiative with its own offer. Since the peace obligation ends on February 28, warning strikes are possible from the beginning of March.
And they should have it all. Because even smaller warning strikes usually have a major impact on traffic on the railways. In recent years, they have repeatedly met millions of travelers and commuters. For example, in December 2018, the railways had to stop long-distance traffic nationwide for hours due to warning strikes by the EVG union. The great strike effect of the EVG is also due to the fact that its members often work at central positions in the railway system. If, for example, a signal box is on strike by a few employees, this has a massive impact on the entire rail traffic in a region. The union can therefore have a major impact with comparatively little strike effort – and hit many passengers.
After the start on Tuesday in Fulda, a second round of negotiations is scheduled for March 14th and 15th. By then at the latest it should be clear whether there will be rapid strikes. If the negotiations are concluded in early summer, the negotiators at Deutsche Bahn and the passengers will probably have little time to catch their breath. The collective agreement with the militant train drivers’ union GDL expires in October. A probably slightly higher demand on the railways should then make for even more difficult discussions and bring the railway customers the next strike at Christmas time.