Court orders end to Rotterdam dockworkers’ strike until Friday

Dockworkers who fasten and unfasten containers at the Port of Rotterdam returned to work Monday morning after a court ordered a temporary suspension of their strike, which had disrupted cargo operations for nearly a week.

The sjorders, or lashers, employed by the companies ILS and Matrans, had been on strike since Wednesday over stalled negotiations for a new collective labor agreement. The Rotterdam court ruled Saturday that the strike could continue until 7 a.m. Monday but must then be paused so workers could clear backlogs, de Volkskrant reported. The court also said the strike may resume Friday morning if talks fail to produce an agreement.

Talks between the trade union FNV and the two companies were scheduled to resume Sunday morning in an attempt to bridge the gap. FNV had initially demanded a 7 percent pay increase on top of automatic inflation compensation but lowered that demand Friday to 6.5 percent. ILS and Matrans maintain that even the revised proposal is too high.

The Port of Rotterdam Authority said the strike’s impact would continue for weeks. “Even if the lashers now return to work without further interruptions, it will take until the end of October to clear the backlog,” a spokesperson said. About 25 container ships were waiting off the Dutch coast as of Monday. The authority warned that if the strike resumes Friday, delays could extend into November.

The employers’ organizations filed an emergency lawsuit against FNV on Saturday, arguing that the strike’s consequences were disproportionate and could threaten supply chains. Businesses feared problems with supermarket supplies and potentially "empty fruit shelves."

FNV’s lawyer dismissed those concerns in court, saying that “empty store shelves are inconvenient but not an urgent social reason to prohibit a strike.”