The strike will affect passenger and freight trains for a limited period from Friday, GDL added.

National rail operator Deutsche Bahn had proposed a 10% salary increase, but GDL is holding out for a 30% rise.

Deutsche Bahn has been locked in a wage dispute for months with GDL, which says that train drivers are underpaid.

The rail operator has already agreed a smaller deal with two other unions which will see workers receive a 4.5% rise in wages.

GDL chairman Manfred Schell said that Deutsche Bahn "bears sole responsibility" for the strike.

Government officials have warned that a prolonged strike could damage the German economy.

Deutsche Bahn carries some 5 million passengers daily.

See also:

German train drivers to strike again from Friday

Reuters: Oct 1

Germany’s GDL train drivers’ union announced on Monday that it would begin new strikes on Friday after failing to reach an agreement on a wage increase with national rail operator Deutsche Bahn.

GDL Chairman Manfred Schell said in a statement that Deutsche Bahn ”bears sole responsibility for the fact that on Friday, Oct. 5 there will be a limited nationwide strike affecting passenger and freight trains.”

Deutsche Bahn, which the government wants to partly privatise by 2009, has been locked in a months-long wage dispute with GDL, which says Germany’s 34,000 train drivers are underpaid compared with their counterparts elsewhere in Europe.

After disruptive GDL strikes over the summer, the two sides agreed to hold new talks through September, but they have been unable to reach a compromise.

GDL said it formally notified Deutsche Bahn that the latest round of wage negotiations have collapsed.

At the weekend, Deutsche Bahn personnel chief Margret Suckale said the company had done all it could to try to settle the wage dispute.

”We have emergency plans in place and are readying ourselves for a labour conflict,” Suckale told Die Welt newspaper.

Deutsche Bahn had hoped to convince GDL to sign up to a wage deal that it struck with two other unions, which foresees salary increases of 4.5 per cent.

Last week, it offered to pay the drivers for an additional two hours’ work per week -- which it said would result in bottom-line salary increases of up to 10 percent. But GDL has says the new offer just means more work for the same pay.

See also:

Train Strikes in Germany Approaching

Der Spiegel: October 01, 2007

Negotiations between Germany's national railway and the train drivers' union failed on the weekend. Unless an unexpected breakthrough materializes or the courts intervene again, nationwide strikes are set to begin as early as Friday.

German trains may not be moving as of Friday

For weeks, Germany's national railway company Deutsche Bahn has been putting together a plan for how to deal with a looming strike of the country's train drivers. The idea was to ensure that at least 50 percent of all trains run despite a strike by the Gewerkschaft Deutscher Lokomotivführer (GDL), which represents 80 percent of all train drivers in the country.

At the end of this week, it looks like they will have a chance to see if their plan works. The GDL has announced that it will begin strikes on Friday after wage negotiations over the weekend with Deutsche Bahn proved fruitless.

The exact time of the strike will be announced on Thursday, GDL Chairman Manfred Schell told the Associated Press on Monday. The strike could stall thousands of trains and strand many thousands more passengers -- and Transport Minister Wolfgang Tiefensee warned over the weekend in SPIEGEL that "a strike could have a devastating effect on the economy and the current growth."

The strike was originally scheduled to begin as early as Tuesday, but it was pushed back in deference to the upcoming holiday on Wednesday, when Germans celebrate the 17th anniversary of Germany's re-unification.

But that's the only concession the union appears willing to make. Schell stressed that the union had as many weapons in its arsenal as the railway's management. Margret Suckale, Deutsche Bahn's human resources director, countered that the company would "fight the strike using all available means."

Just what those means might be were illustrated earlier this summer after warning strikes by GDL brought rail travel temporarily to a standstill. At that time, a German labor court ruled that the union could not strike (more...) until the end of September because industrial action during the peak summer holiday season would do major damage to the economy. According to Reuters, Deutsche Bahn may seek another such injunction.

The union has been seeking a 31-percent pay increase for Deutsche Bahn's more than 30,000 GDL train drivers, better working hours and a separate contract from other rail employees. The union rejected an earlier offer for a 4.5 percent pay increase, which unions Transnet and GDBA -- which represent the lion's share of Deutsche Bahn employees -- agreed to.

Deutsche Bahn CEO Hartmut Mehdorn has offered GDL a package that would increase pay by roughly 10 percent, but that would come as a 4.5 percent wage increase and bonuses in return for increased work hours, according to Bild.

Deutsche Bahn has tried to calm fears of a strike's repercussions by saying that over half of its trains will be kept running with the help of civil servants -- who are legally forbidden from striking -- and train drivers from Transnet and GDBA. Suckale also said Monday that the company's emergency plan called for the use of "foreign train drivers."

Günther Kinscher, GDL's deputy head, questioned the railway's ability to keep so many trains running, claiming that 80 percent of the company's train drivers are in the union threatening to strike, according to Reuters.

Locomotive drivers in Germany currently earn about €2,000 ($2,850) a month, and many argue that that is insufficient for the responsibility that comes with driving trains carrying as many as 400 passengers and traveling at speeds of up to 300 kilometers per hour (186 miles per hour).

The German government is preparing to sell about half its shares in Deutsche Bahn starting in 2008 through a number of channels, including an initial public offering. But there are concerns that increased wage costs could make the company less attractive to investors.