Flights in and out of France will be hit next week by a six-day strike from the country’s two largest air traffic controllers' unions.
More than 60 per cent of the 4,000 members of the SNCTA and UNSA-INCA unions voted in favour of industrial action yesterday.
The unions are striking over planned budgetary cuts from next year until 2019, cuts that are part of the European Commission's Single Sky Europe policy to reduce air navigation costs by rearranging airspace into "functional blocks".
The unions argue that the move will lead to the liberalisation and a "forced low-cost" ethos in air traffic.
Next week's scheduled strike is set to last from June 24 to 29 and is set to cause widespread disruption with an estimated 50 per cent of flights likely to be grounded.
It comes ahead of a June 30 deadline for the French government to outline its air sector budget plans for the next five years to the European Commission.
The news follows strikes in May by public sector workers and a month-long strike by French pilots union SNPL was called off just hours before it was due to begin.
The strike comes amid an ongoing rail protest that is the biggest industrial action in years.