MADRID (AFP) - A strike and growing unrest at Spain's shipyards pose the first major test of industrial relations for Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, who has promised to fight the dockworkers' corner and save jobs threatened by fierce competition.


AFP/File Photo



The publicly-owned Izar group, which employs 10,700 people, is facing bankruptcy and unions have called for a strike at the group's 10 sites on Tuesday to show their rejection of a restructuring plan tabled by SEPI, the Spanish government industrial holding society which owns the docks.


SEPI's rescue plan entails splitting military and civilian shipyards and allowing private finance at some sites to help overhaul a sector in crisis since EU authorities demanded in May that it repay 300 million euros (362 million dollars) of EU aid which Brussels saw as breaching competition rules.


The European Commission (news - web sites) may additionally demand that Izar reimburse more than 600 million euros of additional aid, according to SEPI, which has put Izar's own funds came to not more than 270 million euros.


The military shipyards will retain public subsidies but the plan is to inject private funding into some of the civilian sites in a bid to stave off competition from Asia.


But mention of private cash has thrown up a warning sign for unions, wary that the sector has already undergone three restructuring programmes since the 1980s and the past fortnight has seen outbreaks of violence as workers battle with police called in to restore order.


On Monday, unions made clear their opposition to SEPI's plans.


"We wholly reject SEPI's plan calling for the separation of naval military construction from civilian sites which they want to privatise," Pedro Lorca, naval construction spokesman for the powerful pro-communist CCOO union, told AFP.


Lorca believes 4,000 jobs are under threat at Izar and accused management of failing to win a single civilian order in the past three years.


SEPI's new chairman Enrique Martinez Robles meanwhile accused the former conservative government of "undertaking a wholly irresponsible policy" towards the sector which had led it to the verge of bankruptcy.


"They did not address the problem of viability (of the publicly-owned sites and) they used illegal mechanisms in authorising public subsidies," Robles told El Pais daily.


SEPI is to hold a news conference outlining its response to the crisis on Thursday.


Union leaders, meanwhile, continue to demand assurances that their members' jobs are safe.


Candido Mendez, secretary general of the UGT union, on Monday called on the European Commission to act "to save the shipyards".


"The European Commission must do something to save the shipbuilders in our country while 'dumping' is going on regarding boats in Korea and China," Mendez told Onda Cero radio.


Zapatero, meanwhile, has gone on record as promising to "save" the shipyards insisting "no worker will be left to his fate," while simultaneously backing SEPI's efforts to restructure the industry.