A sudden strike of the employees of luggage handling company Swissport at the Brussels international airport Zaventem caused numerous flight delays. The first meeting between trade unions and management of the luggage handling company did not strike, which will last until tomorrow morning.
“Affected are 10,000 people and about 200 flights”, said the official representative from Brussels international airport Zaventem. According to her, “this is not chaos, despite some delays, but such a stoppage of work is now particularly inappropriate”, given the high passenger load at the end of the holiday season.
The Swissport at the Brussels airport serves about 60% of luggage operations.
According to the official representative, the airport administration is doing everything possible to ease the situation of passengers. At the same time, they do not know what is happening at Swissport, which employees are holding discussions with their management. The airport expects that the parties will be able to agree that the work will be restored as soon as possible.
“Structural shortages are the biggest problem”, said spokesperson of Swissport, Sandra Langenus, adding that management have too little respect for staff. On the Swissport side, we are talking about a wildcat strike. When the unions were contacted this (Tuesday) morning about the strike, they were not even aware”, says a spokesperson of Swissport. “They were also caught up in speed”, added she. A version contradicted by the union bench. The unions say they were ready, starting at 7am, to get around the table, which the two sides were not able to do before 10am.
