A dispute between a militant train drivers' union and unions representing other rail workers brought a threatened strike across Germany's national rail network closer on Thursday, according to dpa. Talks between the GDL drivers' union, which is demanding a separate wage agreement from rail company Deutsche Bahn (DB), and the Transnet and GBDA unions had broken up without agreement, sources close to the talks said. Observers said the GDL could call out its members any time after October 1. The talks were being conducted in Berlin under the mediation of two veteran politicians from Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats (CDU). The GDL agreed last month not to strike until September 30 while the mediation by Heiner Geissler and Kurt Biedenkopf, both 77, was under way. The GDL, which represents some 8,000 drivers, called its members out in brief warning strikes in early August in support of demands for a separate wage deal, 30 per cent more pay and a shorter working week. The union then agreed to hold talks with Transnet and the GBDA representing 134,000 workers on reaching a unified bargaining position to take to DB. DB struck a deal in July for a 4.5-per-cent pay hike with Transnet and the GDBA, but this was rejected by the GDL.
