Iberia was forced to cancel 25 per cent of their flights on Monday, most of them coming in Europe where the airline operates a majority of their flights. International flights are less likely to be threatened as they only operate daily or twice daily services, whereas domestic city hoping flights, especially those within Spain, are more like to be cancelled as they have more flights. But, yesterday international flights to New York, London and Paris were cancelled. Pilots are worried that Iberia's new stake in a low cost airline will lead to job losses and maybe even forced transfers to the new airline for lower pay. The airline, Iberia, says that will not happen. However, pilots believe they must stand for their jobs. Over 25,000 people work for Iberia currently servicing only 105 destinations with 230 aircraft. A very sizable staff and fleet for such a small airline.
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Pilots' union SEPLA wants guarantees that Iberia's planned low-cost airline, provisionally called Catair, will not lead to job losses, or pilots being transferred to the new airline on lower pay and conditions.
Iberia and its four project partners are launching the low-cost carrier to fight a growing number of budget rivals who have eaten into profits on domestic and European routes.
The airline said it would send SEPLA a written offer guaranteeing the job of every pilot, but a meeting between the two sides late on Monday broke down without agreement.
"They haven't exchanged any document with us. They haven't give us anything," SEPLA President Bernardo Obrador said after the meeting, which state radio said lasted just six minutes.
"Until we have a clear declaration that Iberia will guarantee our jobs... we're not moving an inch."
State radio quoted Iberia sources as saying a proposal existed, but SEPLA had refused to look at it.
At the start of the peak summer travel season and as a heat wave hit Spain, irate travellers at Madrid's Barajas Airport tried to reschedule journeys as the airline cancelled some 240 flights during the day.
Flights cancelled on Monday mainly served destinations within Spain, but also included flights to Paris, New York and London.
Spain's Socialist Government also criticized the strike, the latest in a series over recent years.
"The demands that we've heard from the pilots are difficult to understand," Finance Minister Pedro Solbes told reporters in Brussels. "The creation of a company independent of Iberia should not worry them so much."
Iberia has said the strike would cost it some EUR35 million (USD$44.7 million) if all its pilots -- almost 2,000 of them -- took part in the week-long action.
On Sunday it described a demand by pilots that their salaries be guaranteed until the age of 65 -- using the airline's planes as collateral -- as an "aberration."
The airline, which has offered to return money for cancelled flights, said it was still operating all services to the Canary and Balearic islands, Africa, the Middle East, most of its long-haul destinations and about half its destinations within Spain and the rest of Europe.
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