Romanian Railway Union Unhappy With Plans To Fire 12,000 People, Threaten Major Strike

The restructuring program sent to the railway union Friday by the Ministry of Transportation provides for a staff reduction of 12,139 people throughout the system, union leader Gheorghe Popa told MEDIAFAX Friday.

The staff reduction will be done by closing certain branches and restricting activity, Popa said. The changes brought about by the program include a lower number of subdivisions (railway stations, departments, districts, traffic regulators), closing down several cargo stations, cancelling the maintenance of some cars, fewer jobs in the central administration of some of the companies and branches in the sector.

Representatives will meet Monday with general managers and deputy state secretary Constantin Axinia in order to discuss the issues related to railway restructuring. If no agreement is reached, union members are considering protests and even going on strike.

Gheorghe Popa stated that the members are not asking for higher wages, but demand that all railway employees’ jobs and bonuses be kept.

The union leader said that the workers’ demand of this program to cut expenses is a non-discriminatory handling of railway and road infrastructure, reducing expenses in general, not only those related to labor and transferring services provided by third parties, such as security and sanitation, to the Romanian Railway Company.

Popa added that CFR Marfa, the rail freight service, could become unable to pay debts, unless it receives around RON300 million in aid from the Government. At the same time, CFR Infrastructura needs RON500 million for repairs and maintenance.

Acting transport minister Radu Berceanu stated at the end of January that a restructuring and lay-off plan would be implemented at SNCFR, after it was found that a significant percentage of incomes was directed towards employees’ salaries.

According to the minister, the companies which make up the National Railway Company (SNCFR), which are CFR Marfa, CFR Calatori and CFR Infrastructura, will be subject to analysis, as there are numerous organizational problems.

On November 6, last year, the railway unionists called off the general strike they had planned for the following day, after union leaders signed a protocol with the Transport Ministry. According to the document, unionists would have cancelled the general strike if two of the four items of the protocol would be solved by November 21.

Then-transport minister Ludovic Orban told Gheorghe Popa he will sign the orders regulating the authorization and the periodical check-up of railway staff. Following talks with Orban at that time, a protocol was signed as both parties agreed to draw up a program rendering the structure of the company more efficient, to be discussed with the unionists’ leaders and to be enforced in the first quarter of 2009.