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JOHN LICHFIELD

OPINION: The French government’s use of strike-breaking powers could be a political hand grenade

A strike over pay by workers at French oil refineries took a political turn on Tuesday when the government decided to use emergency strike-breaking powers - John Lichfield looks at the likely consequences and why the government has decided to act.

OPINION: The French government's use of strike-breaking powers could be a political hand grenade
Workers and CGT unionists take part in a blockade at the entrance of Total Energies refinery in La Mede, southern France. Photo by Nicolas TUCAT / AFP

All strikes in France are political but some are more political than others.

The oil-refinery strike which has closed filling stations in large parts of France is not, in theory, political. It is about wages and the right of refinery workers to share in the windfall profits of oil companies.

The strike has just become very political indeed. The government’s decision to use its emergency powers to “requisition” workers in two of the five striking refineries will be used on the left of the Left to stoke Macronphobia and social unrest this Autumn and winter.

The government, for precisely that reason, wanted to stay out of the dispute. It found itself with little choice.

Something like one in three filling stations has run out of petrol and diesel – more in the Paris area and northern France. In some places, it is becoming difficult for vital public services, from school buses to district nurses, to operate.

MAP: How to find petrol or diesel during France’s fuel shortages

The government has already broken into its strategic oil stocks. Its spokesman, Olivier Véran, says that it will if necessary send in the police to lift the union barricades of refineries and fuel depots.

The Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne announced on Tuesday that she would use her powers to force key staff at two refineries back to work. A 2003 law, used only once before, allows governments to “requisition” workers to “protect public order, cleanliness, calm and security”.

In our Talking France podcast you can listen to John Lichfield discuss the fuel blockades and what’s likely to happen next. Download here.

Requisitioning workers and breaking barricades may be justified but it could, in political terms, be like setting off a grenade in an oil-refinery. It could – as the government knows – be a gift to Jean-Luc Mélenchon and other left-wing leaders.

Mélenchon has already called on marchers against inflation in Paris this Sunday to “outdo” the starving Parisian women who marched to Versailles in October 1789 and “kidnapped” the King and Queen. Was that an appeal for violence, Citizen Mélenchon? Of course not.

Was this oil strike fundamentally political from the beginning? Oui et non.

The dispute began with that very French thing a “pre-emptive strike” – a strike which starts before there have been negotiations with the bosses. That is itself a political act – an assertion that “class struggle” is more effective than negotiation.

The strikes and blockades of refineries and oil depots have been led by the Confédération Générale du Travail (CGT) – one of the most militant of the eight different French trades union federations.

In British terms, France has eight different Trades Union Congresses, which have different political hues or none. The splintering of the trades union movement by political allegiance or inclination, rather than by job or by trade, is another very French thing.

It makes all trade union activity “political” in a way. The union federations become like political parties, fighting one another for influence, as much as fighting for their members’ interests.

Some government officials and deputies believe that the oil strikes are political in a more specific sense. They say that they are part of a mood of defiance which is being encouraged this Autumn on the left of the Left to try to defeat President Emmanuel Macron’s plans to delay the minimum retirement age.

Some would say that the mood has been encouraged by Macron himself. Macron says that he will talk about pension reform but will accept no significant changes and will use his emergency constitutional powers to force his plan through parliament.

READ ALSO Macron’s 3 big battles in France this autumn

In these circumstances, moderate trades union leaders and left-wing politicians complain, it is difficult to argue against “pre-emptive strikes” and the scorn of militants for the “normal” process of negotiation.

The government now faces a difficult balancing act. If it goes all out to break the strike, it could deepen the mood of social unrest generated by inflation and pension reform. If the strikes persist, they could damage an already stuttering economy.

A prolonged strike could also generate public anger against the refinery workers and the CGT.  Both TotalEnergies and Esso ExxonMobil have offered to bring forward annual pay rises. Moderate trades union federations have accepted the Esso offer.

CGT members at the five striking refineries (out of eight in France) are refusing to go back to work until both of the oil giants cave in. They want pay rises of 10 percent, including bonuses for the big profits earned by oil companies this year.

Refinery workers are already pretty well-off in French terms. They work a 32-hour week, retire on full pensions at 59 and earn on average €60,000 a year – 50 percent more than French average earnings.

TotalEnergies says it accepts that they should share in its windfall profits but says that they have already enjoyed profit-related bonuses in 2022.  Union officials say that all these figures are misleading: younger refinery workers typically earn only €30,000 a year (pre-bonuses).

Public sympathy for the strikers is, at present, low to non-existent. If the government does send in the police and requisitions more workers, that may change. It will certainly be used by the more hot-headed anti-inflation marchers this Sunday as a justification for anti-Macron and anti-state violence.

Is this a political strike? Not exactly. But it could rapidly become one.

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POLITICS

Macron warns of ‘civil war’ if far right or hard left win election

President Emmanuel Macron warned that the policies of his far-right and hard-left opponents could lead to ‘civil war’, as France prepared for its most divisive election in decades.

Macron warns of ‘civil war’ if far right or hard left win election

French politics were plunged into turmoil when Macron called snap legislative elections after his centrist party was trounced by the far-right Rassemblement National (RN) in a European vote earlier this month.

Weekend polls suggested the RN would win 35-36 percent in the first round on Sunday, ahead of a left-wing alliance on 27-29.5 percent and Macron’s centrists in third on 19.5-22 percent.

A second round of voting will follow on July 7th in constituencies where no candidate takes more than 50 percent in the first round.

Speaking on the podcast Generation Do It Yourself, Macron, 46, denounced both the RN as well as the hard-left France Unbowed party.

He said the far-right “divides and pushes towards civil war”, while the hard-left La France Insoumise, which is part of the Nouveau Front Populaire alliance, proposes “a form of communitarianism”, adding that “civil war follows on from that, too”.

Reacting to Macron’s comments, far-right leader Jordan Bardella told French news outlet M6: “A President of the Republic should not say that. I want to re-establish security for all French people.”

Bardella, the RN’s 28-year-old president, earlier Monday said his party was ready to govern as he pledged to curb immigration and tackle cost-of-living issues.

“In three words: we are ready,” Bardella told a news conference as he unveiled the RN’s programme.

READ ALSO What would a far-right prime minister mean for foreigners in France?

Bardella has urged voters to give the eurosceptic party an outright majority to allow it to implement its anti-immigration, law-and-order programme.

“Seven long years of Macronism has weakened the country,” he said, vowing to boost purchasing power, “restore order” and change the law to make it easier to deport foreigners convicted of crimes.

He reiterated plans to tighten borders and make it harder for children born in France to foreign parents to gain citizenship.

Bardella added that the RN would focus on “realistic” measures to curb inflation, primarily by cutting energy taxes.

He also promised a disciplinary ‘big bang’ in schools, including a ban on mobile phones and trialling the introduction of school uniforms, a proposal previously put forward by Macron.

Prime Minister Gabriel Attal of Macron’s Renaissance party poured scorn on the RN’s economic programme, telling Europe 1 radio the country was “headed straight for disaster” in the event of an RN victory.

On Tuesday, Attal will go head-to-head with Bardella and the leftist Manuel Bompard in a TV debate.

On foreign policy, Bardella said the RN opposed sending French troops and long-range missiles to Ukraine – as mooted by Macron – but would continue to provide logistical and material support.

He added that his party, which had close ties to Russia before its invasion of Ukraine, would be “extremely vigilant” in the face of Moscow’s attempts to interfere in French affairs.

Macron insisted that France would continue to support Ukraine over the long term as he met with NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg.

“We will continue to mobilise to respond to Ukraine’s immediate needs,” he said alongside Stoltenberg at the Elysee Palace.

The election is shaping up as a showdown between the RN and the leftist Nouveau Front Populaire, which is dominated by the hard-left La France Insoumise.

Bardella claimed the RN, which mainstream parties have in the past united to block, was now the “patriotic and republican” choice faced with what he alleged was the anti-Semitism of Mélenchon’s party.

La France Insoumise, which opposes Israel’s war in Gaza and refused to label the October 7th Hamas attacks as ‘terrorism’, denies the charges of anti-Semitism.

In calling an election in just three weeks Macron hoped to trip up his opponents and catch them unprepared.

But analysts have warned the move could backfire if the deeply unpopular president is forced to share power with a prime minister from an opposing party.

RN powerhouse Marine Le Pen, who is bidding to succeed Macron as president, has called on him to step aside if he loses control of parliament.

Macron has insisted he will not resign before the end of his second term in 2027 but has vowed to heed voters’ concerns.

Speaking on Monday, Macron once again defended his choice to call snap elections.

“It’s very hard. I’m aware of it, and a lot of people are angry with me,” he said on the podcast. “But I did it because there is nothing greater and fairer in a democracy than trust in the people.”

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