Tenerife airports strike: hundreds of workers prepare to stop work
In the Canary Islands, airport ground handling staff have announced a strike due to the failure of the company Menzies to comply with labor agreements, which may lead to flight delays.
A serious conflict is brewing at the airports in the Canary Islands. Ground handling staff (those who prepare planes for departure and greet passengers) are going on strike. The UGT union has announced that employees of Menzies at the North and South Tenerife airports will not be working on August 16, 17, 23, 24, 30 and 31. In total, the strike will affect more than 500 people.
At Tenerife North Airport, about 30 Menzies employees will strike, mainly serving Canaryfly airline. But things are calm here, and flights are not planned to be canceled.
However, the situation is more serious at the South Airport. There, 480 employees will join the strike: 350 from Menzies Ground Services and 130 from Menzies Aviation.
Isabel Benmodo from the UGT union explains that the strike is a response to the company's failure to fulfill its promises and breach agreements reached in November 2024. Back then, they also wanted to strike because of this, but they managed to come to an agreement. Now, however, employees complain about salary delays (sometimes up to a year and a half!), which causes people serious financial problems, including being unable to pay their mortgages on time. They are also forced to work a lot of overtime, are overloaded with work, constantly have temporary workers changing, and arbitrarily change vacation schedules.
"This is simply destroying the economy of any employee," says Benmodo. She adds that permanent employees have to constantly train new ones, which increases the number of sick leaves, especially due to psychological problems.
On August 7, they tried to negotiate with the company through government mediation to avoid the strike. But the meeting ended without result. "We were not offered anything we expected," the union leader said.
The Ministry of Transport has set a minimum level of service during the strike for both Menzies and Azul Handling (this company helps Ryanair at Spanish airports). In the Canary Islands, the minimum level of service will be between 66% and 81% on flights to mainland Spain. And on domestic flights between the islands and on flights to the mainland where there is no convenient alternative, it will exceed 99%, as, for example, at Tenerife North Airport.