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France faces massive strikes over pension reform

French trade unions are heading for what is expected to be a decisive showdown with President Emmanuel Macron over pension reform, with massive strikes from Tuesday aiming to bring the country "to a standstill".

French strike
People take part in a demonstration in Paris on February 16th, 2023 as part of a fifth day of nationwide strikes and rallies against French president's pensions reform whose headline measure is raising the legal retirement age from 62 to 64. Photo by: Emmanuel DUNAND / AFP

After five separate days of protests so far this year, this week’s stoppages herald a new phase in the battle between the centrist government and opponents of the changes, which includes an overwhelming majority of French voters.

“We always said that we would go into a higher gear if necessary,” the head of the influential hard-left CGT union, Philippe Martinez, told the Journal du Dimanche newspaper on Sunday. “It will be the case on Tuesday.”

More than 260 demonstrations are expected nationwide, many in small and medium-sized towns where opposition to the reform is strong, while strikes will affect transport, the energy sector and public services.

Police are expecting between 1.1-1.4 million people to hit the streets, a source told AFP on condition of anonymity.

The upper limit of that range would represent the biggest day of protests in decades, higher than the 1.27 million who took part in demonstrations on January 31st, and bigger than previous pension reform protests in 2010.

Unions representing workers on the national SNCF railways, the Paris metro and the energy sector, including refineries, have called for rolling strikes for the first time, with other industries expected to join in.

All eight major French trade unions have called for the stoppages to bring the country “to a standstill” on Tuesday, with shopkeepers also encouraged to down shutters.

“The 7th (Tuesday) is going to be very difficult,” Transport Minister Clement Beaune admitted on Friday, calling on workers to stay home where possible.

Unfair reform?

Macron’s plan to raise the official age of retirement from 62 to 64 is a flagship policy of his second term in office, which began last year after he defeated far-right leader Marine Le Pen.

He has called the change “essential” because of deficits forecast for the system for most of the next 25 years, according to analysis by the independent pensions ombudsman.

France also lags behind its neighbours and other major European economies where the retirement age has already been hiked to 65 or above to reflect higher life expectancy.

But opponents see the changes as unfair, penalising low-skilled workers who start their careers early, while reducing the right to leisure and a long retirement at the end of working life.

Labour Minister Olivier Dussopt insisted in an interview on Saturday that 1.8 million low-income retirees would see their pensions increase by up to 100 euros a month from September if the reform is enacted.

“That won’t make them rich, but it’s a substantial effort that has never been carried out despite announcements over the last 20 years,” he said.

Countdown

Time is running out for the unions and other opponents of the reform to force the government into a U-turn.

The legislation has already been discussed in the lower house National Assembly, and is currently being debated in the upper-house Senate, where it is expected to be amended but approved.

A final vote from both chambers is expected from the middle of March and by March 26th at the latest.

Macron has faced numerous challenges from the unions in the past and, almost without exception, has succeeded in pushing through his pro-business agenda and social security reforms.

The former investment banker, often accused of being aloof and out of touch, has tasked Prime Minister Elizabeth Borne with being the face of the pension reform and leading negotiations with opposition parties and labour leaders.

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FRENCH ELECTIONS

French election breakdown: TV clash, polling latest and ‘poo’ Le Pen

From the polls latest to the first big TV election clash, via a lot of questions about the French Constitution and the president's future - here's the situation 17 days on from Emmanuel Macron's shock election announcement.

French election breakdown: TV clash, polling latest and 'poo' Le Pen

During the election period we will be publishing a bi-weekly ‘election breakdown’ to help you keep up with the latest developments. You can receive these as an email by going to the newsletter section here and selecting subscribe to ‘breaking news alerts’.

It’s now been 17 days since Macron’s surprise call for snap parliamentary elections, and four days until the first round of voting.

TV debates

The hotly-anticipated first TV debate of the election on Tuesday night turned out to be an ill-tempered affair with a lot of interruptions and men talking over each other.

The line of the night went to the left representative Manuel Bompard – who otherwise struggled to make much of an impact – when he told far-right leader Jordan Bardella (whose Italian ancestors migrated to France several generations back): “When your personal ancestors arrived in France, your political ancestors said exactly the same thing to them. I find that tragic.”

But perhaps the biggest question of all is whether any of this matters? The presidential election debate between Macron and Marine Le Pen back in 2017 is widely credited with influencing the campaign as Macron exposed her contradictory policies and economic illiteracy.

However a debate ahead of the European elections last month between Bardella and prime minister Gabriel Attal was widely agreed to have been ‘won’ by Attal, who also managed to expose flaws and contradictions in the far right party’s policies. Nevertheless, the far-right went on to convincingly beat the Macronists at the polls.

Has the political scene simply moved on so that Bardella’s brief and fact-light TikTok videos convince more people than a two-hour prime-time TV debate?

You can hear the team from The Local discussing all the election latest on the Talking France podcast – listen here or on the link below

Road to chaos

Just over two weeks ago when Macron called this election, he intended to call the bluff of the French electorate – did they really want a government made up of Marine Len Pen’s far-right Rassemblement National (RN) party?

Well, latest polling suggests that a large portion of French people want exactly that, and significantly fewer people want to continue with a Macron government.

With the caveat that pollsters themselves say this is is a difficult election to call, current polling suggests RN would take 35 percent of the vote, the leftist alliance Nouveau Front Populaire 30 percent and Macron’s centrists 20 percent.

This is potentially bad news for everyone, as those figures would give no party an overall majority in parliament and would instead likely usher in an era of political chaos.

The questions discussed in French conversation and media have now moved on from ‘who will win the election?’ to distinctly more technical concerns like – what exactly does the Constitution say about the powers of a president without a government? Can France have a ‘caretaker government’ in the long term? Is it time for a 6th republic?.

The most over-used phrase in French political discourse this week? Sans précédent (unprecedented).

Démission

From sans précédent to sans président – if this election leads to total chaos, will Macron resign? It’s certainly being discussed, but he says he will not.

For citizens of many European parliamentary democracies it seems virtually automatic that the president would resign if he cannot form a government, but the French system is very different and several French presidents have continued in post despite being obliged to appoint an opponent as prime minister.

READ ALSO Will Macron resign in case of an election disaster?

The only president of the Fifth Republic to resign early was Charles de Gaulle – the trigger was the failure of a referendum on local government, but it may be that he was simply fed up; he was 78 years old and had already been through an attempted coup and the May 1968 general strike which paralysed the country. He died a year after leaving office.

Caca craft

She might be riding high in the polls, but not everyone is enamoured of Le Pen, it seems, especially not in ‘lefty’ eastern Paris – as seen by this rather neatly crafted Marine Le Pen flag stuck into a lump of dog poo left on the pavement.

Thanks to spotter Helen Massy-Beresford, who saw this in Paris’s 20th arrondissement.

You can find all the latest election news HERE, or sign up to receive these election breakdowns as an email by going to the newsletter section here and selecting subscribe to ‘breaking news alerts’.

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