Globalist Fueled Revolution in France

France: Open-Ended Strikes Over Pension Reforms Begin

October 12, 2010

Associated Press – Workers tried to shut down France on Tuesday with strikes affecting transportation, schools and the postal service in a showdown with President Nicolas Sarkozy over his government's attempt to raise the retirement age by two years to save money.

Hundreds of tourists visiting the Eiffel Tower were ushered away after workers there voted to join the strike. Refinery workers also walked off the job — leading one union to warn of looming gasoline shortages.

The battle over raising France's retirement age from 60 to 62 has gone on for months, but this week could prove decisive. With the Senate expected to pass the pension reform bill by the week's end, some unions have upped the ante by declaring open-ended strikes, meaning Tuesday's walkouts could drag on for days or even weeks.

The parliament's lower house approved the reform last month. The Senate has approved the article on raising the retirement age to 62 but is still debating the overall reform.

The government says the plan is the only way to save the money-losing pension system, and Prime Minister Francois Fillon told lawmakers that backing down would be "economic madness and a social catastrophe." He spoke as a demonstration of tens of thousands of protesters began to weave through the streets of Paris.

Tuesday's strikes marked the fourth day of protests in five weeks. Past walkouts lasted only one day.

Bernard Thibault, head of the CGT labor union, told i-Tele news channel that this time the strikes "will continue for as long as needed."

Train drivers launched an open-ended strike Monday night, and the work stoppages widened to other sectors Tuesday. High school students were also expected to walk out of hundreds of schools.

Lawmaker Jean-Francois Cope, who heads Sarkozy's UMP party in the National Assembly, lashed out at unions and the opposition Socialist party for "manipulating high school students."

More than 200 street protests were planned throughout the country. Last month, similar demonstrations attracted one million people, according to police estimates, though union organizers insisted turnout was three times as high.

Around 30 percent of flights were canceled at France's busiest airport, Paris' Charles de Gaulle, while cancellations at the capital's second airport, Orly, reached 50 percent, according to aviation authorities. Most of the affected flights were short-haul domestic flights or inter-European flights.

Workers at all six of oil giant Total SA's French refineries were striking, and two of them had begun preparations for total shutdowns, company spokesman Michael Crochet-Vourey said. He declined to estimate how long it would take before the strikes translated into gas shortages at the pump.

Participation in the strikes varied by sector. The Education Ministry said fewer elementary and high school teachers were striking compared to the last strike Sept. 23, while the national railway said participation had risen.

Around 19 percent of civil service employees stayed off the job, the government said, in line with participation in last month's strike.

A union-led demonstration filled Marseille's Old Port with red flares and smoke, and tens of thousands of workers marched in Toulouse. Beyond that, "the closure of the monument is a symbol," said Yann Leloir, a striking employee at the monument. The tower is to reopen Wednesday.

With service on suburban trains and the Paris subway and bus lines slashed by about half, commuters rolled into work on bikes, rollerblades and skateboards. The French capital's free bike racks were empty as many took advantage of the brisk, sunny morning to cycle to work.

"I understand the strikers, I tolerate it," said Fuad Fazlic, 38, a tailor at French luxury label Chanel, as he rolled his bicycle out of the Gare du Nord train station on his way to work.

Fazlic said he had learned his lesson after strikes in 1995 brought much of France to a standstill for about two months. "

I have been biking to work ever since," Fazlic said.

Unions fear the erosion of the cherished workplace benefit, and say the cost-cutting ax is coming down too hard on workers.

Sarkozy's conservatives say the country has a huge budget deficit and sluggish growth must get its finances in better order. Even with the change, France would still have among the lowest retirement ages in the developed world.

Sarkozy's government is all but staking its chances for victory in presidential and legislative elections in 2012 on the pension reform, which the president has called the last major goal of his term. France's European Union partners are keeping watch, as they face their own budget cutbacks and debt woes.

France Strikes Again Over Pensions, Leading to Travel Chaos

Travellers to France face air and rail misery on Tuesday as hundreds of thousands of French workers begin a strike in protest against President Nicolas Sarkozy's pension reforms.

October 11, 2010

Air France's unions have called a 24-hour strike starting at midnight on Monday while a third of flights to and from Roissy-Charles de Gaulle and Beauvais airports and half of those to and from Orly are to be cancelled. Air France said all long-haul flights would be maintained.

A third of national rail services will be running while Paris' bus and metro transport face severe disruption, but Eurostar trains between London and Paris should run normally.

Teachers, truckers and postal workers will also take to the streets.

Three mass protests in the past month have only forced minor government concessions, but unions hope that their rolling strike call will strong-arm Mr Sarkozy into calling off a reform that will raise the legal retirement age from 60 to 62. They have called for a further day of demonstrations on Saturday. All unions at the state railway company SNCF have called for renewable strikes, along with the main union in the major gas and energy utilities.

Mr Sarkozy sees the reform's success as key to him being re-elected in 2012 and has vowed not to back down.

"(He) cannot give in, otherwise he will become a one-term president," one of his close aides told Le Monde, the daily newspaper, on Monday.

Union leaders are hoping for a repeat of 1995, when massive national strikes forced Jacques Chirac, the former president, to revoke his pension reforms and fatally weakened his government.

"This is one of the last chances to make the government retreat," said Francois Chérèque, head of the CFDT, one of France's main unions.

Mr Sarkozy has predicted that the strikes will fizzle out when parliament approves the entire bill by the end of the month. The Senate has already voted in the clause increasing the minimum retirement age to 62, and was last night due to push through another key change – raising the full pension entitlement age from 65 to 67.

However, a CSA poll published yesterday said 69 per cent of French people still back Tuesday's strike, with 61 per cent in favour of more open-ended industrial action.

The Elysée, and to a lesser extent the unions, are concerned that the enlistment of students in the protests could lead to a "radicalisation" of the conflict that neither camp could control.

In 2006, students managed to force the government to withdraw a reform in the employment law introducing more flexible short-term work contracts after paralysing the country. They have vowed to do the same today with "operation dead university day".