The Big Lie: Labour Agreement at Babylon

28.03.2011

Press Release of
Babylon's Workers Council

Since the introduction of a collective labour agreement at the Babylon cinema, neither employers nor Germany's biggest union Ver.di have sticked to its rules. In December 2009, Timothy Grossman, chairman of Berlin's cinema Babylon and Andreas Köhn, a Ver.di representative, agreed on a collective labour agreement. As Babylon is partly owned by the city of Berlin, the city's council spent 30.000 € for additional wages.

But without any force and without a worker's basis inside Babylon, Ver.di only signed a light version of a real labour agreement. New wage calculations and additional payments to workers who have worked at Babylon for years have not been realised so far. Ver.di's and Grossman's only aim was to pacify a conflict, which has been started by FAU/Berlin some month before December 2009.

Mathias Schulz, who is a member of Babylon's worker's council says: „Ver.di justified its agreement by promising additional negotiations. But today the situation looks completely different. It seems as Ver.di and Grossman only thought about silencing their critics for a cheap price“.

Negotiations should have been fiunished until December 2010. At this time Grossman promised to do so, but nothing happened until today. Despite Ver.di's labour agreement, wages in Babylon remain lower than they should, according to common labour agreements in Germany.

Matthias Schulz (Workers Council Neue Babylon GmbH)