George Zoni, President of IAM Local Lodge 2468 in Montreal, QC continued with his European visit by stopping by Siemens Energy Budapest. Zoni works for Siemens Energy in Montreal and was interested in meeting workers at Siemens operations in the cities he intended to visit in the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, Poland, Slovakia, and Hungary.
“My three guides, Attila, Laszlo, and Gabor were very forthcoming with the situation there. As is the case in many places around the world, there’s also a labour shortage in Budapest, even though it is considered a “low-cost country” as defined by at least Siemens Energy. Laszlo, who is on the Works Council for that side of Siemens Energy said the rate of unionization at Siemens Energy is approximately 25%. He feels that they do not have a strong bargaining position, as is the case with other companies within Hungary, such as Audi, which has 50% union representation.
“The average salary of an engineer at Siemens energy in Budapest is €1000 and they do not get overtime or many other benefits. Many of the articles in their collective agreement are open to interpretation and company prerogative. Further, workers are willing to move to another company even though the salary may only be a bit higher.
“Despite all this, there is quite a bit of investment in this particular company of Siemens Energy, which produces mostly compressor blades, and turbine blades. They have approximately 100 lathes, which make anything from the roots and heads of the blades to the airfoils.”
Siemens Energy in Budapest is one of the biggest blade manufacturing SE sites in Europe.
For more information
George Zoni, LL2468 President
gzoni@iamaw2468.ca
Frank Saptel
Communications, IAM Canada
fsaptel@iamaw.org
