Berlin: The German parliament passed a new law Friday aimed at preventing small, localised industrial disputes -- such as the recent train drivers` and pilots` strikes -- from paralysing entire industrial sectors.
The new legislation, drawn up by the left-right "grand coalition" government under Chancellor Angela Merkel, wants to streamline wage-bargaining within a company.
The new law will make the biggest trade union in one given company the sole partner to negotiate with management in an industrial dispute.
Any agreed deal would then have to be adopted by smaller unions representing employees doing the same job.
Fiercely contested by opposition lawmakers and by some unions who have announced they will file a complaint at the Constitutional Court, Labour Minister Andrea Nahles rejected claims the law curtailed the right to strike.
"We`re not touching the right of association and the right to strike," Nahles, a Social Democrat, said in the Bundestag lower house of parliament ahead of the vote.
"Sometimes one has to battle and sometimes one has to strike. Even if there is a compromise in the end, it`s necessary," she said.
"Progress and social achievements don`t come by themselves."
Lawmakers from the ecologist Greens and the far-left Linke criticised the draft, which was approved in a Bundestag vote with a wide majority, of 448 in favour, 126 votes against and 16 abstentions.
"Small unions are to be robbed of their right to exist," Linke MP Klaus Ernst complained.
Just a day earlier, railways operator Deutsche Bahn (DB) announced the end of a drivers` strike that had paralysed train services in Europe`s biggest economy, after the sides agreed to mediation.
The walkout by the small GdL union, which represents some 20,000 train drivers, was the ninth stoppage in less than a year.
The dispute centres on demands for a wage rise and shorter work hours as well as the right to represent other rail workers such as conductors and restaurant carriage staff, effectively a turf war with the larger railway union EVG, which has more than 200,000 members, and is now involved in separate wage negotiations with DB.
