The Lufthansa Group follows the example of competitors such as Ryanair and establishes a new flight operation in Malta. This bears the name Eurowings Europe Ltd. and will take off with Maltese AOC. This emerges from an internal circular sent to the workforce.

It should also happen fairly quickly, because the new airline is scheduled to take off as early as the 2022/23 winter flight schedule. Aircraft are then to be successively re-registered to the Maltese AOC. The justification for the "flag change" to Malta is reminiscent of Malta Air and Lauda Europe: the aim is to avoid complicated double taxation for employees.

First of all, the Austrian Eurowings Europe GmbH is affected. Their current flight services are to be taken over by the Maltese Eurowings Europe Limited. However, a larger solution is also possible, because the Malta branch would also make it possible for it to take over the flight activities of Eurowings Germany on a large scale. The consequence of this would be: Previous collective agreements would no longer be applicable and Eurowings Europe Ltd. could start from scratch without any German collective agreements. However, there is still only talk of the fact that the bases abroad are to be switched to the Maltese AOC.

This is exactly what Eurowings is trying to dispel in the circular. Only a little should change for the employees, because the bases, contracts and so on should remain the same. The administration of Eurowings Europe GmbH is in trouble, because it will actually be needed in Malta in the future. It is currently being examined whether they can work for the new company in a kind of “home office in the office” from Schwechat. Nothing is decided yet. The union and the works council are currently in contact.

“So far there have been no (!) binding promises that workers' rights will remain unaffected. The company has not yet (!) sought talks with us about how something like this can even work. All binding commitments (e.g. for job security) are bound to the GmbH in Austria. This procedure of Eurowings and Lufthansa is to be criticized in the strongest possible terms. In an active social partnership, I expect that the trade unions will be involved in such serious decisions at an early stage. Any empty phrases to the employees that nothing will change anyway is definitely not enough!” explains Daniel Liebhart, Head of Aviation at the Austrian trade union Vida to Aviation.Direct.

The German Verdi explained to Airliners.de: "We therefore call on the Lufthansa Group to take responsibility for the employees in the cockpit and cabin at the German locations of Eurowings and to secure these jobs with us on the basis of collective agreements".