“Given the results obtained in the referendum, the Works Council aims to restart the negotiating process with the objective of reaching a new understanding,” the body said in a statement, indicating that it was disappointed with the outcome of the vote.
“The conditions established, in contrast to what some aim to make people believe, represented an improvement for the workers in relation to what had previously been proposed and also rejected,” the document says. “The contents of the preliminary agreement guaranteed the continuance of workers’ rights.”
It cited that overtime would have continued to be recognised “as such”, the continued “weekly rotation of shifts” and the “continuance of the weekly hours from Monday to Friday until the start of the regime of continuous working”, foreseen for next August.
In Wednesday’s referendum, 3,145 workers voted against the preliminary deal and 1,749 in favour.
The plant’s management has said that, to assure projected production of the new vehicle to be made at Autoreuropa, the T-Roc, it will have to introduce continuous and Saturday working.
In July, 74 percent of workers had rejected a previous preliminary agreement on the new working hours, and backed a strike on 30 August - the first ever for operational reasons at that the plant.