Unions take LOT to Court

Polish airlines LOT wants to dismiss 450 people starting in October. The management also plans on handing the majority of the 3500 employees at the airline notice changing the work conditions. Unions have decided to try and fight the job cuts and the introduction of worse working conditions.

Unions have filed a suit. They claim that these plans are not in accordance with the collective agreement in LOT. However the Board cancelled the agreement in June, effective at the end of September. But there is no new collective agreement and the unions think that the old one should be binding until a new one is in place.

On Sept. 28 there will be a picket in front of LOT headquarters. The protest will be not only against the planned group dismissals, but also do demand that two trade union leaders, Grzegorz Kossowski and Elwira Niemiec, be reinstated. They were illegally fired in July.

The International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) and its European arm, the European Transport Workers’ Federation (ETF), started a solidarity campaign with LOT workers. Its webpage is here:

www.itfglobal.org/campaigns/LOTdispute.cfm