Municipal staff in Saint-Josse to strike in December

Municipal staff in Saint-Josse-ten-Noode are planning to strike later this month following an information meeting held by trade unions on the financial situation in the Brussels commune.

“We are starting with a one-day strike, but there may be more days to follow,” said Maxime Nys, trade unionist for the ACOD-LRB public sector union in Brussels.

While no date has yet been announced, the strike will most likely take place in the coming weeks.

“We informed staff about the lack of communication from the mayor and aldermen regarding the financial crisis in the municipality,” said Nys, noting that there was a lack of clarity about the allocation and payment of end-of-year bonuses and/or meal vouchers to municipal staff.

“Even after an informal consultation last week, we still have no concrete answers to our questions. [Mayor Emir Kir] does not want to communicate with his staff himself. He’s under the impression that the trade unions are his spokespeople.”

Unions say staff are extremely concerned and have no prospects for the future: “The mayor will not be paying any end-of-year bonuses, and the payment of meal vouchers in 2026 is also very uncertain.”

Staff have officially given the trade union front a strike mandate, after already joining in the national strike action last week.

Brussels’ smallest commune isalready in serious financial difficulty, notably estimated to be €60 million in debt, is in trouble again, with municipal workers also complaining about unpaid overtime.

Trade unions say that this phenomenon is increasingly common in many Brussels communes, due to a lack of human and financial resources. But in Saint-Josse, some 10,000 employees have worked hundreds or even thousands of hours without remuneration or compensation.

“When I retired, I asked for a statement on how many hours I had worked. That’s when I realised that there was a big problem,” says Abdelkrim Ayad, who recently retired from his position as coordinator for the Saint-Josse youth service department.

From 2020 to 2024, Ayad accumulated overtime, which he reported to his manager: “As I was in charge of the holiday camps, I would arrive at 7.30 and leave at 18.30 or 19.00.”

These working hours are far from standard, so Ayad is claiming 2,150 hours of overtime, equivalent to more than a year's work, from Saint-Josse commune.

As the Saint-Josse administration refused, Ayad instructed his union to assert his rights, noting: “What I want is for my work to be recognised. I don’t like this feeling of injustice.”

The ACV-CSC public services union said Ayad was acting in good faith. Moreover, he is far from being the only person in this situation. Some 12 municipal workers are facing the same problem, with “up to 8,000 hours of overtime claimed”.

“They are often educators or activity leaders, or people who help out at events and have to stay late in the evening or work at weekends,” said Hanane El Bouzakhi, regional secretary for the union, the largest in the country.

“I wouldn’t go so far as to say that the authorities are being dishonest,” she told the RTBF. “But questions need to be asked about how the authorities are managing these workers who have placed their trust in them.”

The commune is now under the financial supervision of the Brussels region. Mayor Emir Kir has told Brussels news channel BX1 that claims of bad management are unfair and that “what the press does not say” is that Saint-Josse has saved €13 million to pay pensions.