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Victoria Mindova 

Unexpected strikes until the collective labour agreement in public media is signed. This is the promise of the President of the union of technicians in radio stations in Greece, Dimitris Kamafinopoulos. GRReporter met him personally for him to tell us about the main concerns of radio technicians. "About 25% of the people in our profession have lost their jobs in the last two years. If the collective labour agreement is not signed, uncontrolled dismissals will continue and our salaries will be cut by 20% -30% and we will have no right to defend ourselves."

The first 24-hour "unexpected" strike took place on Monday, involving technical staff at radio stations and was supported also by journalists and their colleagues from the print media. Dimitris Kamafinopoulos explained that unions assess the difficult economic environment in which businesses have to operate, but at the same time, he has made it clear that many employers are willing to take advantage of the overall economic situation and allow cuts to the detriment of staff.

He explained that after the height of the debt crisis in Greece, the union he represents has entered into negotiations with employers in the sector for the signing of the collective labour agreement. The main conditions the trade unions have offered were zero salary increases, but zero discharges too. "Employers' organizations did not accept this condition of ours, which means that from the outset, they do not want to get things stabilized, but want drastic cuts." Kamafinopoulos was clear that trade unions will not accept the collapse of wages down to the level of Chinese wages, nor are they willing to compromise other employment rights like working time or the right to health and pension insurance.
 
"We are on strike, because we see that they are purposely trying to reduce our wages, provided that the media have accumulated funds, but they do not want to use them. Media revenue has increased by almost 300% from 10 years ago, except for 2010 and 2011. The salaries of their employees in no case have the same level of increase. Now, the revenue from commercials has fallen and the media have begun to cut the monthly income of staff or to fire people directly instead of covering the difference through the increased revenues from the previous period. We will not allow it." Kamafinopoulos stressed that the freezing of salary increases or their reduction by 2% - 5% is reasonable in the difficult times experienced by Greece but the sharp decline of 15% - 20% required by employer organizations is unacceptable. Trade unions will continue with various protests and strikes until the collective agreement for workers in the Greek media is signed.

The union of technicians in radio stations in Greece announced that it would join the countrywide strike of the national unions on December 1, this year. Then, they will continue with emergency strikes, until employers sign the collective agreement. Asked by GRReporter "What will make you stop striking?", the trade unionist replied, "Nothing but the signing of the collective agreement." It is not yet known how long Greece will remain without live radio shows.