Executive Summary
The second quarter of 2026 saw labor action across Europe intensify, with 552 strikes recorded across 8 countries monitored by StrikeTracker — up from 458 in Q1, an increase of roughly 20%. Of these, 6 were critical (national or regional general strikes), 110 major, 265 minor, and 171 low severity. Activity was steadier month-to-month than in Q1, peaking in May with 189 strikes.
Unlike Q1's Spain-led quarter, Q2 produced a near-three-way tie at the top. Italy edged ahead with 134 strikes, dominated by its dense transport strike calendar and four separate national general strikes. Spain followed with 133, spread across public services, education, and healthcare, and France with 131, concentrated in the public sector and education. The United Kingdom recorded 59 strikes and Germany just 52 — less than half its Q1 total, as ver.di's TVoD public-sector campaign concluded. Norway surged from zero recorded strikes in Q1 to 18, while Belgium logged 18 and the Netherlands 7.
Separately, 67 announced strikes were called off during the quarter — canceled, suspended, or withdrawn before they took place. Norway and Spain accounted for the bulk of these, reflecting last-minute settlements reached during annual wage negotiations. These are covered in their own section below.
About This Data
This report is compiled from strike data automatically collected by StrikeTracker's AI-powered monitoring agents, which continuously scan and track labor actions across Europe. We manually review a portion of entries and verify reports flagged by our users, but not every entry has been human-reviewed. This data may not capture all strikes that occurred in Q2 2026, and some details may contain inaccuracies. We do not claim 100% data completeness or accuracy. If you spot an error, please let us know.
Monthly Trend
Strike activity held remarkably steady across the quarter. April opened with 176 strikes, rising to a peak of 189 in May as public-sector and education disputes came to a head in Spain and France, before easing slightly to 187 in June. The June figure was propped up by Italy, where activity built through the quarter to a 59-strike peak — the opposite of most countries, which were winding down toward the summer break.
Country-by-Country Analysis
The Big Three
🇮🇹 Italy — 134 Strikes
Italy topped the table in Q2 with 134 strikes, driven by its characteristically dense transport strike calendar and an unusual concentration of national general strikes. Activity built through the quarter to a June peak of 59 strikes, bucking the Europe-wide trend of pre-summer wind-down.
Peak month: June (59 strikes)
Key sectors: Transport dominated — general/local transport (55 strikes), air transport (23), and rail/metro/tram (20)
Critical strikes: Italy saw four national general strikes this quarter — USI-CIT's May 1 action, a nationwide general strike on May 18 covering healthcare and social services, a 24-hour base-union general strike on May 29 (CUB, SGB, SI-COBAS and others), and a June 12 national strike of outsourced and agency workers (ADL Cobas, CLAP and others).
Top unions: UILT-UIL (32 strikes), FILT-CGIL (28), FIT-CISL (22), FAISA-CISAL (16), USB Lavoro Privato (12)
Public impact: 49 strikes affected buses, 22 disrupted airports, 16 affected trains, and 13 hit tram networks. Italy again had the highest bus and airport disruption in Europe.
🇪🇸 Spain — 133 Strikes
Spain recorded 133 strikes in Q2, remaining one of Europe's most active countries with broad participation across unions and sectors. Activity was evenly spread, peaking modestly in May (48 strikes). Spain also saw the highest number of called-off strikes in Europe — see the section below.
Peak month: May (48 strikes)
Key sectors: Public services, education (18 strikes), and healthcare (14)
Top unions: CCOO (37 strikes), UGT (30), CSIF (16), ELA (13), LAB (13)
Notable actions: The recurring national doctors' strike continued its monthly cadence through June. Education disputes ran across multiple autonomous communities, and CSIF was active in public administration.
Public impact: 19 strikes affected schools and 13 affected hospitals — the highest hospital impact in Europe this quarter.
🇫🇷 France — 131 Strikes
France recorded 131 strikes in Q2, concentrated in the public sector and education and reflecting ongoing tensions over public-service funding and pay. Activity peaked in May (50 strikes).
Peak month: May (50 strikes)
Key sectors: Public sector (34 strikes), education (25), and rail/metro/tram (14)
Top unions: CGT family (15 combined), FO, UNSA, SNES-FSU, SUD Éducation — France's fragmented union landscape means action is spread across many organizations rather than concentrated in one.
Public impact: 27 strikes affected schools — the highest school disruption in Europe this quarter — while 18 affected buses and 10 hit hospitals.
The Middle Tier
🇬🇧 United Kingdom — 59 Strikes
The UK recorded 59 strikes in Q2, evenly distributed across the quarter. Education was the dominant sector, reflecting continued disputes in higher education and schools.
Peak month: May (21 strikes)
Key sectors: Education (20 strikes), transport, and healthcare
Top unions: Unite the Union (15 strikes), UCU (9), GMB (10 combined), UNISON (5)
🇩🇪 Germany — 52 Strikes
Germany's strike count fell sharply from 94 in Q1 to 52 in Q2 as ver.di's TVoD public-sector wage campaign concluded and collective bargaining moved toward settlement. Activity declined steadily through the quarter, from 21 strikes in April to 11 in June.
Peak month: April (21 strikes)
Key sectors: Transport (19 strikes), rail/metro/tram (6), and healthcare (6)
Top unions: ver.di remained by far the most active union (46 strikes), with isolated aviation actions from Vereinigung Cockpit and UFO.
Public impact: 20 strikes affected buses, 12 hit tram networks, and 9 affected hospitals.
Notable Movers
🇳🇴 Norway — 18 Strikes
Norway went from zero recorded strikes in Q1 to 18 in Q2, its annual wage-settlement season (lønnsoppgjør) bringing teachers, healthcare workers and others onto the picket line. Utdanningsforbundet (the teachers' union) was the most active, with 6 strikes. Notably, Norway also had the second-highest number of called-off strikes in Europe — 22 conditional actions were canceled when mediation succeeded (see below).
Peak month: April (9 strikes)
Key sectors: Public services, education (6 strikes), healthcare and aviation
🇧🇪 Belgium — 18 Strikes
Belgium recorded 18 strikes in Q2 — again fewer in number but high in impact, consistent with its centralized union structure. The quarter's centerpiece was a national strike and demonstration on May 12, called by the major union confederations.
Peak month: June (8 strikes)
Key sectors: Public sector (7 strikes), education
🇳🇱 Netherlands — 7 Strikes
The Netherlands had modest activity again, with 7 strikes. The standout was a nationwide strike threat from FNV, CNV and VCP for May 30 and June 22–26, tied to a May 25 ultimatum. FNV and CNV were the most active unions, with disputes centered on food-industry and public-sector pay. Two strikes affected airport operations.
Strikes That Were Called Off
A distinctive feature of Q2 — one that was almost absent in Q1 — was the number of strikes that were announced and then canceled, suspended, or withdrawn before they took place. StrikeTracker recorded 67 such actions across the quarter. These are excluded from the 552 headline count above, but they tell an important story: in many cases a credible strike threat was enough to force a settlement.
| Country | Called off | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Spain | 26 | 21 canceled, 5 suspended — many localized disputes resolved before action |
| Norway | 22 | All canceled — conditional strikes averted by successful wage mediation |
| United Kingdom | 7 | 6 canceled, 1 suspended |
| Italy | 6 | Canceled — mostly local transport actions |
| France | 4 | Canceled |
| Belgium | 1 | Canceled |
| Netherlands | 1 | Suspended |
| Germany | 0 | — |
Norway is the clearest example. Its annual wage settlement (lønnsoppgjør) works through a formal mediation process, and unions routinely file conditional strike notices that take effect only "if mediation fails." In Q2, 22 of these were called off when mediation succeeded — covering aquaculture workers, newspaper delivery, security guards, Oslo municipal employees, and offshore oilfield services. On paper these are cancellations; in practice they mark disputes resolved at the eleventh hour.
Spain's 26 called-off actions were more varied — a mix of localized transport, education, and public-service disputes that reached agreement or were postponed before the strike date.
Sector Analysis
Transport was once again the most affected area across Europe in Q2 2026, accounting for well over a third of all strikes when general transport, rail/metro/tram, air, and bus categories are combined. Italy's dense strike calendar drove most of this.
Beyond transport, education and the public sector were the next most active areas — reflecting Spain's and France's pay and staffing disputes — followed by healthcare.
Severity Distribution
As in Q1, the majority of Q2 strikes were minor severity (265 strikes), reflecting the prevalence of short-duration and warning actions. However, the quarter saw a notable rise in major-severity strikes to 110 (up from 62 in Q1), driven by multi-day transport actions in Italy and public-sector disputes in Spain and France.
The quarter also produced 6 critical-severity strikes — four national general strikes in Italy, a national strike in Belgium, and a nationwide strike threat in the Netherlands.
Public Impact
Across all 8 countries, strike actions had measurable impact on public infrastructure and services:
| Service | Strikes Affecting | Most Impacted Country |
|---|---|---|
| Bus | 99 | Italy (49) |
| Schools | 88 | France (27) |
| Airport | 42 | Italy (22) |
| Hospitals | 41 | Spain (13) |
| Tram | 40 | Italy (13) |
| Train | 25 | Italy (16) |
| Metro | 18 | Italy (8) |
Spotlight: Aviation
Air travel was one of the most visible battlegrounds of the quarter. StrikeTracker recorded 49 aviation-related actions in Q2, of which around 42 directly affected airport operations. Italy accounted for 23 of them — nearly half of Europe's total — followed by Spain (9) and France (6).
Were any airports fully shut down? Rarely, and that is by design. Most European countries impose minimum-service rules on air transport — Italy's Legge 146/1990 guarantees protected flight bands (typically 07:00–10:00 and 18:00–21:00), and Spain sets servicios mínimos — so even a well-supported strike usually produces mass cancellations and delays rather than a complete closure. The clearest exception was Belgium.
Belgium — the one near-total shutdown. The national strike on May 12 effectively grounded passenger aviation: on Belgian national action days, Brussels Airport (Zaventem) and Charleroi routinely cancel all or nearly all departing flights because security and ground staff join the walkout. A separate Skeyes air traffic control strike on June 2 then forced widespread cancellations across Belgian airspace in two waves — a second, airspace-level disruption within three weeks.
Germany — hub disruption without closure. Lufthansa Group pilots struck on April 13–14 and 16–17, followed immediately by Lufthansa cabin crew on April 15–16, hitting the Frankfurt and Munich hubs with several days of large-scale cancellations. Airports stayed open, but Lufthansa's own schedule was gutted for the better part of a week.
Italy — frequent but time-boxed. Italy's volume came mostly from air traffic control actions by ENAV and Techno Sky personnel — including coordinated 4-hour national stoppages on April 10 (13:00–17:00) touching Milan Malpensa and the Milan Area Control Center — plus airline-specific action such as the easyJet pilots' and cabin crew strike on June 13. Because these were confined to protected bands, Malpensa, Linate, Fiumicino, Ciampino and Naples saw concentrated waves of delays and cancellations rather than shutdowns.
Spain — ground handling, not closures. Spain's disputes centered on ground-handling contractors: Groundforce launched an indefinite strike with partial stoppages across 12 airports (including Madrid–Barajas, Barcelona–El Prat, Alicante, and Valencia), and Menzies Aviation ran seven 24-hour strike days over Easter week at Barcelona, Palma de Mallorca, Málaga and Alicante. These hit baggage, boarding and turnaround times — painful during peak travel, but stopping short of grounding the airports.
Elsewhere, the Netherlands' April 14 central-government strike brushed Schiphol operations, and Norway saw a conditional SAS cabin-crew action tied to its June wage mediation.
Top Unions
Union activity in Q2 2026 was led once again by Germany's ver.di, responsible for 46 publicly listed strikes despite Germany's overall decline. Spain's CCOO (37) and UGT (30) were close behind, followed by a cluster of Italian transport unions — UILT-UIL (32), FILT-CGIL (28), and FIT-CISL (22) — reflecting Italy's transport-heavy strike profile.
What to Watch in Q3 2026
Several storylines carry into the third quarter:
- Italy enters the autumn strike season with its base unions (USB, SI-COBAS, CUB) having demonstrated they can mount repeated national general strikes — expect continued transport disruption.
- Norway's wage-settlement disputes are largely resolved for the year, so its Q2 surge is likely to subside — though unresolved sectors could still flare.
- The Netherlands' FNV/CNV/VCP dispute, if its summer ultimatum went unmet, could escalate into larger action.
- Germany is expected to stay quiet now that the ver.di public-sector round has closed, barring aviation flare-ups.
- Spain's recurring monthly doctors' strike and ongoing education disputes show no sign of resolution.
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This is the second edition of StrikeTracker's quarterly European strike report. We publish these each quarter to provide a comprehensive overview of labor action trends across Europe. Follow us on X and LinkedIn for updates.