Wave of strike action by OSE workers

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In November 1998, workers at the Hellenic Railways Organisation (OSE) began a series of strikes to voice their disapproval of a bill presented by the Ministry of Transport on "regulation of OSE-related matters".

For the second time in only a few months, in November 1998 workers at the Hellenic Railways Organisation (OSE) expressed their opposition to government policy by launching a series of ongoing strikes. In particular, the Panhellenic Federation of Railway Workers (POS), is voicing objection to a bill on "regulation of OSE-related matters" published by the Ministry of Transport and Communications in early November and submitted to Parliament on 19 November. According to POS, passage of the bill in combination with new OSE staff regulations (GR9806178N) will:

• break up OSE into an undetermined number of companies;

• reduce the railway network from 2,500 to 1,000 kilometres;

• give any third party the right to operate networks (urban, suburban, interurban) along with other profitable activities;

• open the way to strategic alliances, which means that when works are completed their ownership will pass into other hands,

• destroy 3,000 jobs by the year 2002 and another 2,000 by 2005; and

• overturn OSE staff's basic labour rights.

In this framework, the POS executive took a unanimous decision to announce an integrated programme of industrial action (stoppages, meetings and 24-hour strikes), in order to:

• protect OSE's public and social character;

• modernise the whole rail network and develop rail transport;

• keep all lines open;

• secure all jobs; and

• develop OSE under a single administration, rather than break it up into different companies.

On 23 November, POS called a 24-hour strike as part of the pan-European day of action, coordinated by the Federation of Transport Workers' Unions in the European Union (FST), in protest against EU plans to liberalise the rail sector (PT9811111N). Such action, the POS contends, expresses in practice the will of the railway workers to prevent the railways from being fragmented and to prevent their labour, economic and social insurance rights from being taken away. In the union's view, strike action will also curb the speed-up of liberalisation and privatisation of many parts of the rail transport sector.