Conspiracy theories,
If we talk about the past, before february 5th, probably we earned more per worked hour than any ATCO in the world, but like 70% of the income was from overtime. Overtimes were paid around 2,5 to 3 times the value of ordinary time. So when taking the mean income per hour, it was quite high. Now it is payed 0,8 so everything has changed. We never complained about money, but without overtime, our true fixed salary isn't at the top European class.
Regarding the "I don't accept more traffic" method, this is the most important thing that happened with the february decree: We do not have the operational control anymore, we are not the ones deciding the runway in use, we are not the ones deciding if a calibrator flight has to leave due to high trafic load, and we cannot take flow actions as before. And you are talkng about a flow action. Now it's AENA in charge of operationel decisions, made by people on a business with no ATC license, not having a clue of what's happening inside ACC's. They decide biased by economical issues, and that is the reason why flying in Spain is far from being controlled, the reason why there are so many overloads, the reason also why we cannot direct routes, and, imho, the worst thing that happened on febrary 5th. Far worse than the salary cut. It's the only country where the controllers are not the ones who are in charge of operational decisions, but we keep the responsibility intact, he he.