Stuttgart (dpa / lsw) – In the collective bargaining dispute over the Südwestdeutsche Landesverkehrs GmbH (SWEG), the company management has renewed its offer for the employees of the subsidiary SBS. Anyone who agrees will receive an additional 2,000 euros gross this year and next year, according to a statement on Friday. The majority of the workforce did not accept a first offer after the first deadline. Strikes by the train drivers’ union GDL are currently disrupting train traffic, particularly on the SBS routes around Stuttgart.
The wage conflict is about the fact that the union of German locomotive drivers, according to their own statements, would like to negotiate a wage agreement for the more than 500 railway workers not only for SBS, but for the entire SWEG group. The group has a total of 1800 employees. However, SWEG does not want to take over the former Abellio Rail Baden-Württemberg – today SBS – permanently. The Abellio daughter got into financial difficulties at the end of 2021. The company then took over the state-owned SWEG for an initial period of two years.
No one can seriously expect “that we will buy a company that has come out of bankruptcy and is on an indefinite strike with us,” said Uwe Lahl, chairman of the supervisory board. “We are also willing to retire earlier once the ongoing tender has resulted in a new owner.”
The Europe-wide re-tendering of the Stuttgart networks, which the SBS serves, has now taken place. It is divided into three lots. In the previous award, Deutsche Bahn had also applied for the lucrative routes. However, she was then excluded due to an allocation error.
