Latest round of Air Europa strikes will affect the connection between Malaga and Madrid

Due to the latest round of industrial action by Air Europa pilots, the airline has cancelled 14 flights from its scheduled services for tomorrow, Monday, May 22.

One of the routes affected will be the regular connection between the airports of Malaga and Madrid. Passengers have been offered the possibility of changing the date or destination of their flights or they can obtain a voucher for the amount of the ticket.

Sepla, the Spanish Union of Airline Pilots, has convened a new series of strikes by Air Europa pilots. Specifically, there will be eight new dates, including May 22, 23, 25, 26, 29 and 30, along with June 1 and 2. These follow the four dates earlier this month that resulted in 68 flights being cancelled nationally.

During these eight new days of action, the cancelled flights amount to 114 and affect the national routes that link Madrid with Bilbao, La Coruña, Palma de Mallorca, Vigo, and Malaga.

Internationally, it hits the routes connecting Madrid with Fiumicino airport in Rome, Milan’s Malpensa, Paris-Orly, plus Porto and Lisbon in Portugal. The route between Barcelona and Palma is also affected.

In the first five days of the strike, as well as that of June 1, the airline will stop operating 14 flights in each of them, while on May 30, there will be 18 operations cut. Finally, on June 2, a total of 12 flights will not operate.

Air Europa is offering its customers three alternatives. The first of which is the possibility of changing the date to fly on the same route within 30 days of their original flight.

The other two options are to either reroute to another Air Europa-operated destination within three days before or after your original flight date or to save the ticket amount to use as a credit on a future purchase for any airport operated by the airline.

According to Sepla, the call for a strike responds: “to the tension and labour conflict generated by the directors of Air Europa, playing with the rights of workers, disguising as proposals what represents a real loss of labour rights acquired in the IV collective agreement”.

“Giving in to pressure from the company would have meant worse working and salary conditions in the short and medium term”, the union insisted.

The pilots “feel discriminated against by the company, since it is the only labour group affected by this action by the airline in the different negotiations that it has held for salary reviews.” 

While the conflict with the pilots continues, the negotiation between Air Europa and the unions of its cabin crew (TCP) has come to fruition, when a preliminary agreement was reached on May 18.

It includes an accumulated salary increase of 11.93 per cent over three years (2023-2025) that will now be submitted to the workers for ratification, as reported by malagahoy.es.