No Breakthrough in Exploratory Pay Talks Between Lufthansa, Pilots

Frankfurt — Exploratory pay talks between German airline Lufthansa and Vereinigung Cockpit (VC), the trade union representing pilots who say they are ready to strike, have failed to produce results, the company said on Saturday.

"We want to remain in talks mode and have therefore offered Vereinigung Cockpit further dates to ... work out viable solutions for the future," a Lufthansa spokesperson said.

A VC spokesperson also did not rule out further talks, but said the course of action would be hashed out in the coming days. No walkouts have been announced so far.

Regarding a report by the aviation trade portal aero.de that a strike at the highly profitable cargo subsidiary Lufthansa Cargo is now "on the cards," the VC spokesperson responded: "There is definitely no decision to strike." At Lufthansa Cargo, pilots showed a particularly high willingness to strike in a recent ballot.

Prior to these talks, six official rounds of negotiations had failed to achieve a breakthrough.

Lufthansa has accepted a VC demand for 5.5% higher pay for the rest of this year, but no agreement has been reached on an automatic inflation-indexed rise from 2023 or on changes to the rate structure.

©2022 dpa GmbH. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.