Waste, Portugal, Italy

The SINTAP trade union has reached an agreement with Águas de Portugal water company that applies to the union’s members and delivers a 3% increase, with a minimum of €53, an increase in the food allowance to €7.60, as well as establishing an entry salary in the company of €905. Workers with more than 10 years’ service get further improvements. Meanwhile, the STAL trade union has been active in the waste sector where it has been involved in protest and industrial action to secure better pay and conditions for workers in the FCC and Resinorte companies. At FCC the demand is for a 15% pay

The STAL trade union is mobilising members in three separate disputes involving workers in parks and gardens, waste and municipalities. A four-day strike began on 3 August at the publicly-owned PSML company that maintains major buildings, parks and gardens in Sintra. The dispute is over a range of issues including deregulation of work schedules, integration into the pay system and allowances for employees who work in remote areas. Employees of the EMARP public company that provides cleaning and waste services in Portimão began their four-day strike on 4 August with demands over pay, salary

Members of the STAL trade union working in the waste sector have been taking action over pay, collective bargaining rights and precarious employment. The workers at FCC Environment were set to strike on 7-11 April while those employed by ERSUC were due to take action on 10-11 April. Action over pay was also planned for 6-9 April by STAL members employed by the PSML company that maintains the Parque de Sintra site. Members of the SINTAP union were due to take industrial action at the Infraestruturas road and rail maintenance company on 6 April over pay, collective bargaining and staffing while

The STAL trade union is pleased at the high turnout of workers for the strike action on 13 December in the AdP water company and the two-day action on 9-10 December in the Tratolixo company that provides services to the municipalities of Cascais, Mafra, Oeiras and Sintra. At AdP the union is calling for a €120-a-month increase for all workers and a minimum wage of €900 a month in the face of the employer’s offer of an increase of only 1.2%. At Tratolixo the main demand is for a €100-a-month increase. In both cases the union is pushing for proper negotiations and implementation of a collective

The STAL municipal service union organised a two-day strike across the FCC Environment waste group on 15-16 August. The union says that the company is refusing to negotiate on pay, claiming that its financial situation prevents it from offering a pay increase to workers. The union says that urgent action is needed to tackle low pay and the impact of inflation and wants to see a minimum monthly increase of €90, along with negotiations on better working conditions and health and safety and a consistent approach across the whole company.

Members of the STAL municipal services union took strike action on 1 August in protest at the failure of the Braval waste company to increase pay in the face of soaring inflation. The publicly-owned company provides waste services across a range of municipalities in northern Portugal. The union says that there has been no pay increase for two years and it is calling for a minimum increase of €90 for all workers. It also wants the company to abide by the collective agreement particularly in relation to career progression and wage development.

Fp Cgil and other unions in the waste and environmental sector have negotiated a three-year agreement covering the period 2022-24 which will bring together the previously separate public and private sectors and cover around 100,000 workers. Workers will see an average monthly pay increase of around €121 which the unions argue will keep wages in line with inflation. The unions particularly underline the importance of achieving a single agreement for the sector. The new agreement will also include increases in various allowances, benefits and productivity payments. There are provisions to

Following their massively supported national strike on 8 November, union federations in the waste sector are taking another day of action on 13 December. The unions have been calling for the renewal of the sector agreement which expired 29 months ago and to ensure it covers the whole of the sector. Employers are, however, are looking to undermine collective bargaining and trade union rights. They haven’t made any offer to increase pay or to compensate workers for the period since the expiry of the last agreement. Unions are calling for investment in the sector and the sectors’ workers and will

The Fp-Cgil, Fit-Cisl, Uiltrasporti and Fiadel trade union federations report very high levels of support for the national strike action in the waste sector on 8 November. They estimate overall that 90% of workers joined the strike with 100% coverage in some areas. The trade unions are determined to retain and renew the sector agreement and to incorporate a range of improvements. They want to ensure the agreement covers the whole sector including recycling plants and they are calling for action on safety, training, job classification and to ensure real increases in pay and other benefits.

The federations that organise workers in waste and environmental services – Fp-Cgil, Fit-Cisl, Uiltrasporti and Fiadel – have called for a national strike on 8 November. The unions are mobilising hard to maximise turnout and ensure the key messages of the dispute are fully understood. They are facing up to employers who are pushing to unilaterally worsen employment conditions for all workers with a view to cut labour costs and eliminate the unions. The unions are determined to resist precarious working conditions and calls to decentralise bargaining and so fragment the main sector agreement. A

The four main unions in the waste sector - Fp Cgil, Fit Cisl, Uiltrasporti and Fiadel – will be consulting with their activists on 16 September in the lead up to the next sector negotiations due on 20 September. The unions will discuss mobilisation across the sector if the employers fail to respond to the unions’ key demands for the renewal of the collective agreement that expired 26 months ago. The unions are looking for a number of key improvements including extension of the sector agreement to cover recycling plants, strengthening of the industrial relations system, better health and safety

The SINTAP public service trade union has negotiated a new collective agreement with the Inova company that provides waste, water and other municipal services in Cantanhede in the Coimbra district. The union highlights in particular the progressive reduction of working hours in 2022 and 2023 to 35 a week; changes to the timing of night work; additional holiday entitlement – an extra day for each 10 years of service and general increase in annual leave to 25 by 2023. There will also be increases to meal and other allowances as well as higher pay. In contrast, the STAL local government union

The STAL municipal union has joined with the FIEQUMETAL industrial union in a series of public “tribunals” to denounce the EGF/Mota&Engil waste and construction company. The unions’ aim is to expose the poverty wages paid by the company and its failure to enter into a proper process of collective bargaining. The joint action started in Coimbra in central Portugal on 12 July, moving on to Guimarães in the north of the country on 20 July with further events planned for 26 July and 2 August. The two unions argue that the company is denying them the right to collective bargaining while maintaining