The Vida union and the Bord works council had announced that another works meeting for the flying staff of Austrian Airlines would be held on March 8, 2024. The Lufthansa subsidiary has filed a lawsuit against this with the responsible court. In the meantime, the meeting was canceled for a completely different reason. Nevertheless, the AUA is canceling around 150 flights.

Just last Friday The employee representatives held a similar event, which almost traditionally resulted in a spontaneous, symbolic warning strike. Another company meeting was invited to take place on March 8, 2024, just one week later. Vienna airport boss Günther Ofner practiced in his role as aviation specialist group chairman of the WKO strong criticism of the project.

A spokeswoman for Austrian Airlines confirmed to Aviation.Direct that the airline has filed an injunction against holding the works meeting with the responsible court. Due to the fact that the employee representatives canceled it and postponed it indefinitely, the legal remedy has virtually resolved itself. The lawsuit has not yet been withdrawn and a decision from the court is also still pending.

When asked why Austrian Airlines is suing against the holding of a new works meeting, the media officer replied: “From the company's point of view, this works meeting does not meet the legal requirements. According to the law, the main reason for a works meeting is to provide information from the works council to the employees. From the company's perspective, there can be no significant news between the last company meeting on March 1st and March 8th, especially since the meeting was already announced on March 1st. Furthermore, scheduling the company meeting at extremely short notice is not easy on the company and is at the expense of the passengers.”

However, despite the cancellation, there will be flight cancellations. Flight operations have already been prepared for the fact that many employees will not be available on March 8, 2024. A spokeswoman said: “As of the announcement of a works meeting, Austrian Airlines has to adapt the flight program in advance - in order to better plan for the many affected passengers and due to corporate responsibility - in order to keep the impact on passengers as low as possible. Especially after the warning strike that was recently called in addition to the BV, one must assume that there will be a significant impact on flight operations. Unfortunately, the 150 flights cannot be resumed; the approximately 12.800 passengers have already been informed. The works council and the Vida union should not cause more damage but should find common solutions at the negotiating table.”

The reason for canceling the works meeting was that the company was allegedly informed that there were no suitable rooms available to rent at Vienna Airport on Friday, March 8, 2024. Purely by chance, the owner of the building, Flughafen Wien AG, was carrying out unspecified “security checks” of the rooms on that very day. Another variant states that the necessary rooms should have been rented out for an event some time in advance and there should be no connection at all with the planned and ultimately canceled company meeting.