The Comisiones Obreras union (CC.OO.) has estimated the number of breakdowns in the Madrid Metro registered in the months of January and February at 581 and has branded the situation of maintenance on the underground by the regional government as “critical”.
This has been highlighted in a statement in which it has emphasized the “unfortunate” situation in which they can carry out their work due to the lack of both staff and material spare parts such as screws, tools or parts.
Precisely in the case of the screws they have criticized that they have to be putting the old ones on “many occasions” without knowing the “hardness and quality” they have. “There is a lack of material for the refrigeration of the compressors, springs for the hooks, brake discs, axle bodies, semi-flanges for the HURT reducers…”, they list from the union.
This lack of maintenance due to lack of spare parts, and the material being so old, is producing a “significant number of breakdowns and incidents in the trains”, according to CC.OO statistics. because “of course the Management of the Company is not providing them”. They estimate that there would be an average of ten daily breakdowns and incidents in the network.
In the field of lack of personnel, they have recalled that the Metro is governed by the Public Employment Replacement Rate that has to be implemented in the Community Budgets, for which a rate of 120% corresponds to the suburban. “In the year 2022, we could have hired 332 people, and only 205 positions have been covered, postponing the hiring of the remaining 127 people to this year 2023,” they criticize from the union.
Likewise, taking into account this year, they assure that they could incorporate 325 people but that their hiring is not authorized and “they probably do not want to hire all the people that are allowed.”
