STRIKES have been confirmed for 180,000 hospitality staff throughout July on a number of hotspot islands.
Hotels, restaurants and clubs in the Balearic Islands will be hit by the walkouts, sparking chaos for thousands of British tourists.
3
3
3
Mallorca, Ibiza and Menorca which are usually bursting with holidaymakers will be affected by the strikes which could go on for weeks.
The alert was raised earlier today after union bosses walked out of a meeting about pay and working conditions, calling hospitality bosses’ offer of an 11 per cent pay increase insufficient.
Talks about reducing the working week to 35 hours were also promptly shut down when employers said they “categorically” rejected this proposal.
UGT union spokesman Jose Garcia Relucio described the offer as “more crumbs” and claimed hotel bosses were expecting workers to survive on tips.
He said after walking out of today’s meeting: “We’d come here to negotiate to improve the conditions of service industry workers, not to worsen them.”
Unless a last-minute agreement is reached between employers and unions a large chunk of the Balearic island’s workforce will down their tools on July 10.
The strikes could persist throughout the month with 18, 19, 25, 31 July already confirmed protest days.
José García Relucio, General Secretary of the Federation of Services, Mobility and Consumption of UGT, said the talks “could not have gone worse” and condemned employers’ inflexibility around pay.
Meanwhile, Javier Vich, President of the Hotel Business Federation of Mallorca, blamed unions for failing to meet a compromise.
He added that employers were making all the “necessary efforts” to “reach a fair” agreement with workers.
Unions are demanding a 16 per cent increase in pay for workers over three years.
The mass walkout will coincide with peak tourist season in the Spanish holiday destination.
It comes as protests across Spain intensify with hundreds of locals regularly taking to the streets to call for an end to mass tourism.
Thousands flooded the streets of the Canary Islands in May.
Demonstrations took place across the Spanish archipelago’s islands, including Tenerife, Lanzarote, Gran Canaria and Fuerteventura.
The march carried the slogan: “The Canary Islands are not for sale, they are loved and defended.”
Other banners read: “The Canary Islands have a limit and so does our patience” and “Enough is enough!”
Spain’s anti-mass tourism movement began gaining serious momentum in April 2024 – particularly in popular tourist destinations.
Locals have been demanding an end to the problems associated with mass tourism, including pollution, traffic chaos, the lack of affordable housing and low wages for tourism workers.