Norway’s Labour Party-led government isn’t stepping in to stop the SAS pilots’ strike, but it did end up halting two other strikes in the space of a week. In both cases they could claim the strikes endangered either life and health both at home and abroad.
Labour Minister Marte Mjøs Persen first ordered striking aircraft technicians back to work when their labour conflict threatened to ground air ambulances. Then she also ordered workers on Norwegian offshore oil and gas platforms to halt their strike for higher pay, because their strike threatened half of all Norwegian gas exports when the gas is desperately needed by European customers.
“The consequences would have been extremely serious,” Persen said when she sent both sides in that conflict back to mandatory arbitration. She pointed to the war in Ukraine and how it’s made Russian gas unwanted by European allies already in the midst of an energy crisis.
“Norway has an important assignment to be a stable supplier of oil and gas,” Persen said, something the platform workers’ strike was endangering.
NewsinEnglish.no staff
