A crucial week for pension reform opened on Tuesday, March 7, with a sixth day of action which promises to be massive against the government’s plan and its postponement of the legal retirement age from 62 to 64. . The French, who are still mostly hostile to the reform wanted by the executive, according to the polls, must prepare to live twenty-four hours of a country “at a standstill”, as promised by the unions.
“There is a right to protest. There is a right to strike. I think that, on the other hand, using words such as bringing the French economy to its knees seems serious to me, “said Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne on Monday evening on France 5, in response to the words of the Secretary General of the CGT-Chemistry, Emmanuel Lépine. “A France at a standstill”, as envisaged by all the trade unions, “it’s obviously bad for our fellow citizens” and “the first to be penalized, when we have strikes, are the most modest French people” , said the head of government.
The unions want to do better than January 31, when the police had identified 1.27 million participants and the inter-union, more than 2.5 million in France. The CGT has already identified 265 rallies for Tuesday.
“I call on the employees of this country, the citizens, the retirees to come and demonstrate massively,” said CFDT Secretary General Laurent Berger on Monday. “The President of the Republic cannot remain deaf,” urged the Cedto leader. Solidaires predicts a “social tsunami”. Between 1.1 million and 1.4 million demonstrators are expected in France, including 60,000 to 90,000 in Paris, with 300 to 500 radical elements and 400 to 800 “yellow vests”, according to a police source.
In Paris, the demonstrators will leave Boulevard Raspail at 2 p.m., to reach Place d’Italie at 7 p.m., via Boulevard du Montparnasse, Boulevard de Port-Royal, and Avenue des Gobelins. Motorists are strongly advised to circumvent the area very widely, major disturbances are to be expected within this perimeter.
Rail traffic heavily impacted, air traffic disrupted
For the Minister Delegate for Transport, Clément Beaune, it will be “one of the most difficult days we have known”. The SNCF and the RATP in Ile-de-France have already announced that in addition to Tuesday, traffic would also be very disrupted on Wednesday, all the unions having called for renewable work stoppages. At the SNCF, the strike began Monday at 7 p.m., and 80% of the TGV Inoui and Ouigo are canceled, as well as almost all the Intercités, with degraded or even interrupted international connections, between France and Germany and France and Spain in particular.
In Ile-de-France, on the SNCF network, one train out of three is planned on the RER A and B and on the H, K, U railway lines, one train out of five on the RER C and D, as well as on the lines J, L, N, R, and one in ten on the RER E and line P.
In Paris, on the RATP network, two metros out of three during the day will run on line 4. Traffic will be normal only on lines 1 and 14 (automated). Line 6 will be open from 5:30 a.m. to 8 p.m. with one train in three on average, like line 12 – one train in four during off-peak hours. The other lines will only be open during peak hours (6:30 a.m. to 9:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.) and on certain sections.
In Lille, no major disruption is expected, but in Marseille the two metro lines and one in three tram lines will be closed, with 85% of the buses affected by the strike. In Nice, no tram will run.
In the air, the General Directorate of Civil Aviation has asked companies to reduce their flight schedule on Tuesday and Wednesday (by 20% at Paris-Charles-de-Gaulle and by 30% at Paris-Orly, Beauvais, Bordeaux, Lille, Lyon, Nantes, Marseilles, Montpellier, Nice and Toulouse). Air France plans to operate nearly eight out of ten flights, including all of its long-haul destinations, without excluding “last minute delays and cancellations”.
Among truckers, filter dams caused slowdowns and traffic jams near Lille or Rouen on Monday morning, at the call of Force Ouvrière-UNCP in particular.
‘Get the movement tough’ in education and among garbage collectors
According to the Snuipp-FSU, the leading primary union, more than 60% of primary school teachers will be on strike on Tuesday. No figures expected for colleges and high schools, teachers not being required to declare themselves forty-eight hours before.
Sporadic blockages by high school students are also expected. Same in the faculties. Student and high school organizations have called for a “hardening of the movement” against the reform, with a day of youth mobilization on March 9. In Marseille, all school canteens will be closed on Tuesday, around thirty in Arles (Bouches-du-Rhône), as well as around thirty nurseries in Montpellier.
The garbage collectors, who depend in particular on the transport branch, are called to strike renewable Tuesday throughout the country by the CGT. Monday, those of the city of Paris, which ensure the collection in half of the districts (2?, 5?, 6?, 8?, 9?, 12?, 14?, 16?, 17?, and 20?), went on strike, confirmed Natacha Pommet, general secretary of the CGT-Public Services. According to her, the bins were not collected Monday evening in four districts of the capital, the 6?, the 14?, the 17? and the 20?. One of the three incinerators around Paris, Porte d’Ivry, has also been blocked since Monday by city officials, preventing waste from being burned there.
‘Black week’ in energy, industry slows down
In energy, the movement started Friday afternoon at the call of the CGT, after the vote, Saturday evening, by the Senate of article 1 of the text on the abolition of special pension schemes, including that of energy companies.
The declines in electricity production that started this weekend intensified on Monday. They reached 3,450 megawatts (MW) at nuclear power plants and 3,165 MW at thermal power plants, the equivalent of six nuclear reactors, according to the CGT. Added to this is a drop in available power from the dams of 3,600 MW on Monday at 7 p.m., according to EDF.
On Tuesday, the general assemblies could locally decide on a “takeover of the network” without causing a loss of power, but by removing from the hands of the RTE network manager the possibility of controlling the machines remotely, the CGT told AFP. -Energy, which promises “a black week”.
In the refineries, the strikers intend to block shipments from the refineries to the depots. The valves of the three Bouches-du-Rhône refineries will be closed between Monday evening and Tuesday morning. In gas, three of the four LNG terminals in France were shut down for “seven days” on Monday by the unions, without creating a gas shortage at this stage. The oil and chemicals branch is called upon to strike, in the pharmaceutical sector, and among refuellers, responsible for supplying aircraft with fuel.
New in the industry: a call for a strike in the whole of the metallurgy, and in particular among the giants of the aeronautics, automotive and steel sectors. The CGT construction and trade federations have joined the CGT’s interprofessional call for a renewable strike.
Mobilization looks uncertain in these sectors. In construction, by the very admission of its CGT federal secretary, Jean-Pascal François, it is “more difficult” to mobilize on pensions than on wages.
