Walloon public transport strike-bound

Public transport in Wallonia (Belgium) was disrupted by a series of strikes for several months towards the end of 1998. The strikes are an indicator of the growing discontent amongst transport workers following competition requirements imposed by the Walloon Regional Transport Company.

Towards the end of 1998, public transport in Wallonia has been disrupted by a series of strikes over several months. Organised on a local basis to start with, the strikes have paralysed the whole network for one day a week. They indicate the growing discontent amongst transport workers following the competition requirements imposed by the Walloon Regional Transport Company (Société Régionale Wallonne du Transport, TEC) which coordinates the five Walloon public transport companies.

The current dispute concerns the renewal of the collective agreement for 1999-2000. The agreement provides for the allocation of a bonus paid partly as a lump sum and partly in the form of wages. Increased flexibility is also being considered through the recruitment of part-time drivers, greater mobility of employees between depôts and having maintenance staff drive buses. The administrator of TEC has proposed two new provisions:

• linking the bonus to an increase in productivity - that is, to a reduction in absence which has reached 12% in certain regional companies; and

• penalising "wildcat" strikes (strikes declared without notice) through deductions from the pay of those individuals involved.

These measures, applicable to bonuses laid down in the current collective agreement, were unacceptable to the socialist and christian trade unions to which most of the 4,300 employees are affiliated. During the course of November 1998, talks have broken down as "there is complete distrust" between the two parties, said Mr Servotte, the sectoral joint subcommittee chair called in as conciliator.

This seemingly straightforward dispute is in fact fuelled by an underlying unrest generated by changes in the public transport sector over the last 10 years, including:

• the standardisation of employee statuses and the loss of advantages, due to the regrouping of local urban companies and rural railway companies under the new public administration of the Walloon region;

• the deterioration in the drivers' working conditions arising from social factors such as isolated drivers on buses, run-down infrastructure and the threat of violence from passengers in certain urban areas. Although these facts are rarely mentioned in Belgium, unions claim that they are contributing to absence;

• the freeze on statutory recruitment and its replacement by contract labour, as well as old rolling stock and lack of investment; and

• the scheduled opening up of this sector to European competition, which would mean an end to the company's operating monopoly. In response, the executive of the Walloon transport authority plans to increase competitiveness and to reduce spending.

"The public service is approaching its final furlong" said the Minister in charge of this sector. According to an editorial in the financial newspaper L'Echo, the sector has entered a "pre-Thatcherite era". This would mean that collective bargaining as it evolved in the social traditions of the public service is no longer appropriate. This is the message that the regional administration is trying to convey to the trade unions and what they are apparently refusing to hear.