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Page last updated at 23:28 GMT, Wednesday, 21 May 2008 00:28 UK

France braces for day of strikes

President Sarkozy shows no sign of bending to stiff opposition
French workers at the national rail company, SNCF, have begun strike action against President Nicolas Sarkozy's plans to reform public-sector pensions.
Workers from other sectors are expected to join them early on Thursday in a one-day protest to pressure Mr Sarkozy to reverse his economic reforms.
Bus drivers nationwide were expected to strike, air service may be disrupted and about 50% of trains are to be cut.
The strikes follow protests by fishermen that blocked French ports.
High-speed international trains between Paris, London and Brussels were not expected to be affected by the SNCF workers' action.
The transport workers are due to be joined by postal, utility and other public sector workers across France.
Job cuts
The walkouts are not expected to cause the widespread travel chaos of last November when transport workers staged a nine-day strike against Mr Sarkozy' plan to scrap their special pension rights.
The government and the unions negotiated an end to the strikes but now workers are upset over plans to make them stay on the job one year longer - for 41 years - before receiving a full state pension.

Original posting

April 23: Workers at France's seven biggest ports went on strike today to protest a government plan to sell dock-equipment management to private companies and take staff off public payrolls.

Sixty-seven vessels including thirty-nine tankers stranded at the harbor's entrance. Government officials, port managers and union representatives are yet to tally the costs of the strike. A 17-day walkout last year in Marseille alone cost Manutention Generale Mediterraneenne, the port's biggest cargo- handler, ?1.5 million ($2.4 million).

The ports plan is set to threaten jobs and unions say there will be "serious economic consequences" if the government doesn't back down on its port reforms for which they say there is "no real economic and financial necessity".

Port workers pledged to intensify disruptions after today's one-day walkout. The CGT called for strikes three nights a week and an end to overtime work. Ports will be blocked during the nights of April 24 and 25, it said. Le Havre will be closed for 24 hours starting mid-day on May 26.

By Antoine Lerougetel - World Socialist Web Site, 11 August 2007

On August 2, the French National Assembly passed a new law requiring public transport workers to maintain a minimum level of service. The new measure represents a historic restriction of the right to strike and is directed in particular against rail, bus and urban transport workers. At the same time, the new law gives trade unions the responsibility of organising and policing, in collaboration with the employers, minimum service levels in the event of a strike.

The minimum service law stipulates that transport staff must, individually and on pain of sanctions, give 48 hours notice of their intention to strike and that—after a week on strike—management may organise a secret ballot of workers on the continuation of the industrial action. This measure essentially hands over responsibility for any further industrial action to the company management.

The vote on the law took place on the last day of an extraordinary session of parliament starting on July 3, called by the newly elected right-wing Gaullist president Nicolas Sarkozy of the UMP (Union for a Popular Movement). The session passed a series of reactionary “emergency” legislative measures designed to transfer wealth from working people to the rich through regressive tax reforms, the lowering of the age of responsibility for delinquent youth, and the reorganisation of university education, opening it up to market pressures and capitalist enterprise.

By Alex Lantier - World Socialist Web Site, 7 July 2007

The newly elected government of French President Nicolas Sarkozy is preparing to introduce a law to establish a guaranteed “minimum service” in the public transportation sector. The measure, which ruling circles have clearly been planning for some time, is now being shown to employers’ organizations and the trade unions for consultation. Approved by the government’s council of ministers on July 4, it will proceed to the Senate for debate on July 12.

During these discussions, the provisions of the bill are being kept secret by the relevant government ministries, industry groups and trade union leaders. However, some accounts have appeared in the French corporate media. It is already clear that the bill is a major attack on the right to strike, aiming to suppress the rail and transport workers, who have historically been one of the most militant sections of the French working class—launching important strike actions in the late 1980s and 1995 and participating in the multimillion-strong anti-pension reform strikes of 2003 and the “First Job Contract” demonstrations of 2006.