On 10 and 11 March, the ver.di services union organized warning strikes in 12 clinics belonging to the Helios group. The aim of the strikes was to show the strength of feeling of workers in the lead up to the third round of bargaining with the company, which has 17,000 employees across Germany and is part of the Fresenius health conglomerate. Ver.di had become frustrated by the employer’s failure to come up with a pay offer and is demanding a range of measures in a package worth around 7%. This includes increases in pay, including payments to trainees, along with higher rates for on-call and night work.
English: http://www.epsu.org/cob/411
German: http://presse.verdi.de/pressemitteilungen/showNews?id= ...
This article was published in the Collective Bargaining Newsletter. It aims to facilitate information exchange between trade unions and to support the work of ETUC's collective bargaining committee. For more information, please contact the editor Maarten van Klaveren, Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Labour Studies (AIAS) M.vanKlaveren@uva.nl. You may find further information on the ETUI at www.etui.org, and on the AIAS at www.uva-aias.net. © ETUI aisbl, Brussels 2011.