Porto, Sept. 12, 2024 (Lusa) - Employees of Porto city bus operator Sociedade de Transportes Coletivos do Porto (STCP) are next week to stage two more strikes, one for 50 hours from Monday and another, partial one for 60 days from Wednesday, the trade union representing workers in the sector in the Porto region announced on Thursday.
These two new strikes at STCP, called by the Sindicato dos Transportes Rodoviários Urbanos do Norte (STRUN), come after two others in July and August.
The company, in its own note, recalled that the STRUN, which represents around 14% of STCP employees, was the only one of five unions in the company not to have signed a pay deal this year.
In its statement, the union specified that the first strike, an all-out stoppage, is to run from midnight on Sunday to 2 a.m. on Wednesday, that is, 50 hours.
The second, lasting 60 days, covers the first five hours of each worker's shift, and begins at 2 a.m. on Wednesday and ends at 2 a.m. on 17 November the union explained.
The union salutes the workers who have shown their discontent with inadequate their pay and conditions in the past and calls on them to unite once more in these upcoming strikes.
"It is regrettable that every day dozens of routes are left undone due to a lack of sufficient drivers, as can be seen in the timetables," it said.
The company, STCP, said in a statement that due to regular operations may be disrupted during the first, 50-hour strike, although a skeleton service is guaranteed.
The minimum services defined by the Arbitration Court include, during the daytime on weekdays, six vehicles on the 205 bus route, five vehicles on the 200 and 204 routes and three vehicles on the 201, 207, 208 and 305 routes.
Minimum services for nighttime include two vehicles on each of routes 200, 204, 205, 305, 502, 600, 602, 700, 701, 702, 801, 901/906 and 903 and one vehicle on route 907.
In the early hours of the morning, the lines on the early morning network (1M, 2M, 3M, 4M, 5M, 7M, 8M, 9M, 10M, 11M, 12M, 13M) are seen operating normally.
STCP also noted of the second, 60-day strike starting on Wednesday, covering the first five hours of each worker's shift, that it is "is in addition to the strike that has been in force since 8 November 2023 and which concerns the last two hours of service."
It stressed that, since Porto buses were integrated into services in other municipalities in the wider region in January 2021, "STCP's board of directors has met with the various trade unions representing its workers in order to establish commitments that have made it possible to substantially raise/improve the working conditions of all STCP workers."
SVF/ARO // ARO.
Lusa
