The political agreement for the transfer of Rodalies to the Generalitat has passed the first hurdle. The strike call by Renfe and Adif staff, which was supposed to start on Friday and was supposed to last for five days, was suspended yesterday afternoon after the cancellation of the stoppages that was sealed between the unions and the representatives of the Ministry of Transport.
In the agreement signed by the two parties, to which La Vanguardia has had access, the ministry’s commitment “to the maintenance of the social and labor conditions of the workforce” is left in writing, as well as “the guarantee of the integrity of the Renfe group and Adif, who maintain the templates and the operation”. In this way, the Government gives guarantees to the workers of the two public railway companies that they will continue within their structures and with their conditions regarding the transfer of Rodalies. For this reason, in addition, a legal framework will be agreed that guarantees both the rights and the mobility of the workers of the two public companies, one of the issues that generate the most anxiety in the workforce due to the large number of professionals who live temporarily in Catalonia who come from other parts of Spain, where they want to maintain the right to be able to return.
The legal representation of Semaf workers, CC.OO., the UGT, the CGT, the SF-Intersyndical and the SCF will also be at the specific negotiation tables that are created to deal with the transfer. The commitment signed by all the parties is to work together regarding the process of transferring the powers to the new joint venture, which could be half-integrated between Renfe and Ferrocarrils de la Generalitat (FGC) as a formula to continue maintaining the Renfe staff within the same structure, as stated in the agreement signed yesterday. For the time being, the work teams will be formed before December 15. If this is not the case, or if the subsequent development does not satisfy the unions, the works council warns that it reserves the right to call new strikes.
The agreement also affects Renfe Mercancías, which intends to give a 50% stake to a subsidiary of the shipping company MSC in a new mixed company like the Generalitat in the case of Rodalies, but with the aggravating factor that, in the case of Mercancías , it is a private company.
Calling the strike was the most pressing issue facing the new Minister of Transport and Sustainable Mobility, Óscar Puente, when he took office on Tuesday. This caused him to become directly involved in the negotiations to try to avoid the stoppages and reach an agreement that the predecessor, Raquel Sánchez, had already tried without success days before. At the final agreement, the president of Renfe, Raül Blanco, and the president of Adif, Maria Luisa Domínguez, were also present.
One of the reasons that convinced the unions to call off the strikes was the coincidence with the general strike planned today by a union allied to Vox and non-existent in Renfe and Adif. The convenors did not want in any way that the extreme right could take advantage of the images of the stoppage in the transport of the whole country.
The agreement that was reached just six hours before the strike began did not allow the operation to be reorganized and there may be specific incidents during today’s day, especially in the early hours of the morning. In any case, the day of generalized chaos that could have trapped thousands of travelers is not expected. The Generalitat took longer than expected to rule on the minimum services and, when it made them public, on Wednesday afternoon, there was too little room left to formally and officially notify all train drivers in sufficient advance. This could have caused a significant part of the staff called to minimum services on the tracks not to know and exercise their right to strike, which would have caused the number of trains to be much lower than 66% in peak hours and a 33% the rest of the day, lower percentages than those set by the Ministry of Transport for the rest of Spain.
