Some 150 workers from Babcock, the Alicante helicopter company (formerly Inaer) held a 20-minute strike in protest for a salary increase that they have not received since 2015. The plan is to repeat the protest daily until 25 November.
The strike is supported by the unions CCOO, UGT, the Free Union of Airline Workers (SLTA) and the Union of the Spanish Association of Aircraft Maintenance Technicians (Asetma). They are also being carried out at venues in Albacete and Salamanca. Employees in charge of repairing rescue, emergency and firefighting aircraft, as well as staff from offices and structures of a company that is finalising the process of selling its business in Spain to the Ancala Partners fund, have been present at the protests.
Thus, David Vicente , president of the works council of the subsidiary Babcock MCS Fleet, and member of Asetma, assure that they will continue carrying out the twenty-minute stoppages and that, before the first meeting with the company, they are “expectant” but also assure that, awaiting the result of the meeting, ” we have been waiting for seven years for a proposal to assess and we do not have it “. In this case, they will request it to improve the conditions of their salaries and jobs. They also affirm that if the talks do not bear fruit, they are considering raising the level of the protests and raising the possibility of a strike.
The process of selling Babcock to the British fund would be closed – it has not been executed – and would end in December. It was at the end of August when Ancala Partners announced the acquisition of part of the air services business of Babcock International. The amount of the transaction was set at 136 million euro and includes Babcock’s activities in Spain, Portugal, Italy, Norway, Sweden and Finland. Ancala has over 65 investors from across 4 continents, including pension funds, insurance companies, and asset managers.
Babcock International Group plc is a British aerospace, defence and nuclear engineering services company based in London.
