Prospect’s sister union USCA, with whom our ATCOs branch has a memorandum of understanding, has called the strike to protest against disciplinary sanctions enforced by Spanish air traffic control company ENAIRE (formerly AENA).

The sanctions were a response to events on 3 December 2010, when AENA closed Spanish airspace for several hours. 

Following these events ENAIRE instigated court proceedings against the ATCOs who were due to work on 3 December 2010.

The vast majority of cases were dismissed by the judges hearing them, but the company subsequently decided to take disciplinary action against individual controllers. This included suspending 61 Barcelona controllers on no pay for a month, and dismissing another controller in Santiago, despite these individuals have been cleared of all charges by a court of law.

Prospect expresses its solidarity with our colleagues in Spain, as they are subjected to outdated and punitive social practices which have no place in modern industrial relations.