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Rubbish strike in Paris to continue for FIVE more days

Trade unions in Paris have vowed to continue their strike, which means uncollected rubbish will continue to pile up in the capital. Other cities around France are also overflowing with rubbish.

Published: 9 June 2016 17:05 CEST
Rubbish strike in Paris to continue for FIVE more days
Photo: AFP
Any hope of a pristine Paris for the Euro 2016 tournament can be kissed goodbye, as the CGT union announced on Thursday afternoon that the garbage collection strike would continue until at least June 14th.
 
The tournament, which begins on Friday night, will likely come with a bit of a stench as temperatures rise. 
 
“We are extremely worried about the absence of cleanliness is several neighbourhoods,” said deputy Paris mayor Bruno Julliard, who is in charge of street cleaning in the capital. “We must be extremely careful.”
 
And it's not just in Paris that black bin bags are stacking up on the streets. 
 
Other host cities such as St Etienne and Marseille have also had to put up with rubbish piling up on the street.
 
 
The strike has seen workers blockading waste processing centres in Paris, causing uncollected rubbish to pile up in ten of the capital's 20 districts.
 
Strikers have also blocked access to the rubbish collection trucks.
The arrondissements affected are the 2nd, 5th, 6th, 8th, 9th, 12th, 14th, 16th, 17th, and 20th. 
 
With nowhere else for locals to dump rubbish, the garbage has begun to spill over onto the streets across Paris. 
 
Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo has called for an end to the strike action and promised to get the rubbish collected as soon as possible.
 
“We are redeploying staff to sort out the situation where it's most critical today,” she said.
 
The picture below, taken in the 5th arrondissement on Thursday afternoon, shows that some rubbish is indeed being cleared. 
 
Photo: Michael Damstrup
 
Other streets weren't so lucky, such as this one below near Etienne Marcel in the 2nd arrondissement. 
 
Photo: The Local
 
Officials said that private companies were being hired to remove the accumulating waste.
 
They added that they were in discussion with union heads in a bid to come to an agreement. 
 
The strikes are part of a much larger movement that has seen French union members protesting labour reforms that essentially will make it easier for companies to hire and fire employees. 
 
 
 
But the president's hope of a strike-free Euros have been dashed, it seems. 
 
And many of the locals aren't impressed either. The owner of a clothes store in the 2nd arrondissement told The Local on Wednesday that the piled up rubbish in front of her shop was “horrible”. 
 
“It just adds to the terrible image of France in the press at the moment,” she said.
 
“People think there's a war going on here with the protests. It affects the number of customers coming into my shop, as does everything else happening in France that has scared tourists from visiting. No-one wants to come to France and especially Paris at the moment.”
 
 
Uncollected black refuse sacks were also gathering in Saint-Etienne, the central city that will host four Euro 2016 matches, as well as Marseille in the south.

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TRAVEL NEWS

German train strike wave to end following new labour agreement

Germany's Deutsche Bahn rail operator and the GDL train drivers' union have reached a deal in a wage dispute that has caused months of crippling strikes in the country, the union said.

Published: 26 March 2024 09:55 CET
German train strike wave to end following new labour agreement

“The German Train Drivers’ Union (GDL) and Deutsche Bahn have reached a wage agreement,” GDL said in a statement.

Further details will be announced in a press conference on Tuesday, the union said. A spokesman for Deutsche Bahn also confirmed that an agreement had been reached.

Train drivers have walked out six times since November, causing disruption for huge numbers of passengers.

The strikes have often lasted for several days and have also caused disruption to freight traffic, with the most recent walkout in mid-March.

In late January, rail traffic was paralysed for five days on the national network in one of the longest strikes in Deutsche Bahn’s history.

READ ALSO: Why are German train drivers launching more strike action?

Europe’s largest economy has faced industrial action for months as workers and management across multiple sectors wrestle over terms amid high inflation and weak business activity.

The strikes have exacerbated an already gloomy economic picture, with the German economy shrinking 0.3 percent across the whole of last year.

What we know about the new offer so far

Through the new agreement, there will be optional reduction of a work week to 36 hours at the start of 2027, 35.5 hours from 2028 and then 35 hours from 2029. For the last three stages, employees must notify their employer themselves if they wish to take advantage of the reduction steps.

However, they can also opt to work the same or more hours – up to 40 hours per week are possible in under the new “optional model”.

“One thing is clear: if you work more, you get more money,” said Deutsche Bahn spokesperson Martin Seiler. Accordingly, employees will receive 2.7 percent more pay for each additional or unchanged working hour.

According to Deutsche Bahn, other parts of the agreement included a pay increase of €420 per month in two stages, a tax and duty-free inflation adjustment bonus of €2,850 and a term of 26 months.

Growing pressure

Last year’s walkouts cost Deutsche Bahn some €200 million, according to estimates by the operator, which overall recorded a net loss for 2023 of €2.35 billion.

Germany has historically been among the countries in Europe where workers went on strike the least.

But since the end of 2022, the country has seen growing labour unrest, while real wages have fallen by four percent since the start of the war in Ukraine.

German airline Lufthansa is also locked in wage disputes with ground staff and cabin crew.

Several strikes have severely disrupted the group’s business in recent weeks and will weigh on first-quarter results, according to the group’s management.

Airport security staff have also staged several walkouts since January.

Some politicians have called for Germany to put in place rules to restrict critical infrastructure like rail transport from industrial action.

But Chancellor Olaf Scholz has rejected the calls, arguing that “the right to strike is written in the constitution… and that is a democratic right for which unions and workers have fought”.

The strikes have piled growing pressure on the coalition government between Scholz’s Social Democrats, the Greens and the pro-business FDP, which has scored dismally in recent opinion polls.

The far-right AfD has been enjoying a boost in popularity amid the unrest with elections in three key former East German states due to take place later this year.

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