The Continuing French Strikes

Sandeep Banerjee

Last year and before we discussed the unusual phenomenon – the fight of Gilets Jaunes. In that struggle we often heard “convergence”, not only from the Gilets Jaunes for getting more support, but even the biggest trade union CGT indirectly controlled by the French Communist Party (PCF) wished it [1]. We shall see what that means. First of all, we should try to see who were the Gilets Jaunes. In usual parlance we are told by the media that the western world is full of muddle classes with some billionaires and millionaires on the top and some uncouth poor like those who sleep in the open. In one sense the French market survey expert IFOP gave a soft blow to this concept by telling us the reason behind the phenomenon as “L’adieu À La Grande Classe Moyenne: La Crise Des «Gilets Jaunes», Symptôme De La «Démoyennisation» [2] or “Bye to the Grand Middle Class: The Crisis of the “Yellow Vests” is symptom of “demiddleisation””. Another survey, carried out on a small sample, was published in the big French daily Le Monde in 11 Dec 2018 (primary phase of the Gilets Jaunes movement), suggested participation in the movement made up of 10 to 15% of craftsmen, traders, small business owners (against 6.5% of them in the population), 35 to 45% of employees (against 27% of them in the population), 15 to 20% of workers (21% in population), 10 to 13% of intermediate professions (26% in population), 7% of executives and higher intellectual professions (18% in population) and 26% of inactive (retired, not working then, etc) [3] – we found this part in a publication by New Party Anti-capitalist [4]. Many of the Gilets Jaunes thought them close to the workers and during strikes by workers they did put the number of strikers and supporting activists together in their twitter (https://twitter.com/lenombrejaune or @LeNombreJaune), for example after the 23 Dec 2019 Strike by railway workers they reported 6,175,081 activists gathered in 11,217 actions [5]. In the aforementioned news of CGT stating their desire of ‘convergence’ with Gilets Jaunes, the CGT chief Philippe Martinez said that the union was as it was necessarily an industrial trade union but it had not yet managed to deploy itself in the new economy too. He further asserted in the L’OBS interview on 13 May 2019 that the CGT is aware of it – “In its discussions, there was a desire to open up to the new categories of workers. There are, moreover, well-documented studies in the scientific literature which explain … that trade union organizations need to open up more, that they turn to women, graduates of higher education (would be unemployed or unemployed educated ones? – the present author) … The CGT is aware of it and is trying to redeploy itself to these new workers, for example bicycle deliverers and (workers in) Uberized trades. But discussion is not enough, we also need teams on the ground. And I'm not sure that this job is done.” [1] Mélenchon, the leader of La France Insoumise and the third runners up in the Presidential Election with 19.58% votes and Philippe Poutou the presidential candidate of New Party Anti-Capitalist (who is a Ford worker and he got 1.09% votes) were seen to be walking with yellow vests in many ‘Actes’ of yellow vests. Anyway, now it is the workers turn, their strikes are continuing and the Gilets Jaunes protests are also continuing.

The strikes against the Pension Reform plan of Macron Govt. are as usual very French in nature, where we see in spite of dwindling Trade Union Density (% of workers who are members of Trade Unions), now less than 8%, there are always millions in big strike actions, and nobody can guess what might be the next step and when. One of the very unthought-of things done this year was an action of Electricity Workers who disconnected electricity, in these wintery months, of some of the big multinational offices like that of Amazon and many other large offices also perhaps the HQ of the ruling party; and they also connected electricity of the poor households who could not pay their due bills; and Phillipe Martinez boldly said in the media that yes, these were targeted power cuts [6] though the unions also said they are sorry for collateral damages, i.e. power cuts in neighbouring areas [7]. (In this context, perhaps, we can remember that last year the SNCF (railway) workers carried gilets Jaunes supporters without fare who were going from suburbs or villages to the cities for protest actions.) There were many interesting scenes in the strike. Thousands of advocates put their black robe hanging on the fence in front of the ministry of justice. The famous ballet dancers of Paris Opera joined the strike, stopped the shows but “The ballet and the orchestra of the @operadeparis perform an extract from "Swan Lake" on the forecourt of the Opera Garnier" twitted many persons who saw the show of Tchaikovsky’s piece.

The govt. and the media pressurised the electricity and transport workers to call off the strike at least for the Christmas and winter holidays, but the workers did not agree and continues to put pressure on the govt., because they have no faith whatsoever on the govt that had they listened to the govt. would also reconsider. The railway strikers did the strike in such a way that any one or other two sections remain closed almost all through the period except few days. There are detail figures in the Wikipedia which interested readers may see.

Did the public get angry with the strikers? Apparently, the numbers of persons “for” and “against” the strike remained favourable towards the strike after 45 days of strike actions according to IFOP market research organisation’s survey released by Le Journal du Dimanche on Jan 19 this year [8].

Source: Les Français et la mobilisation contre la réforme des retraites – IFOP [9]

If we at India hear the words ‘one country one law one system’ we guess it its from the top notches of BJP – and this was stated regarding pension system of France by the govt there. There are 42 different pension systems for different trades in France (including those who work on farms or family-farms or peasants and agricultural-workers). It may seem ridiculously divergent and persons above may want to rationalize these into one single system as the govt. is trying. But these 42 systems did not fall from the sky – they have histories, various fights for pensions from different trades. If it is to be rationalised then only workers together can ponder over it and try some solutions. But govt. mechanically, without thinking of intricacies of the trades concerned tried to iron out the differences. Govt leaders do not know that masons, engine drivers and peasants and sailors have different work stresses and hence they need different retirement ages and a decent pension to live. Govt. has other arguments like – people nowadays have more life expectancy and this is putting pressure of govt coffers. But they are not considering that people are contributing more to the GDP with developed system of production within shorter time and they deserve more. A booklet Réforme des retraites: nos points de suspicion by L'Union syndicale Solidaires [10] explains very beautifully the points of the workers. If only salary of best twenty years and points accrued from work – as the govt suggests, is put into practice (more holidays, leaves, unemployed phases, etc. will mean less points) then many particularly women will suffer more. They calculated and stated that:

“In 2014, the salary of women was 74.3% of the salary of men (for the scheme general).

In 2016, new retirees received retirement equal to 69% of that of men.

Tomorrow with the reform, we risk the worst except to work beyond the age of 62, which is already the case for a very large number of women (21% of them work until age 67 against 8% of men).

Ratio between the direct entitlement pension of women and that of men:

Agirc (executives) Association for the Supplementary Pension Scheme for Employees: 41%,
CNAV (National Old Age Insurance Fund): 74 %,
State civil service: 85%.”
They also provided a useful statistic:

Breakdown of value added (INSEE)

Source: Page – 9 of the booklet mentioned [10]

If the govt. argument is followed workers will have to work longer for their retirement benefits just because they are living longer nowadays thanks to life expectancy increase. But this is a sham argument if seen from humane perspective. Nowadays the workers are contributing more to the GDP or the National Wealth in shorter time and hence the country or the nation is obliged to give them more pension and lower retirement age so that they can enjoy life fuller with recreative, educational etc activities they could not do during their working life (some 35-40 years) – actually life with more freedom starts after retirement. This is one of the main arguments of the workers.

It is to be seen how longer the workers and employees of France can continue their strike and how the strike and public support to that forces the government. Last Friday, 25 Jan 2020, was the 51st day of the strike wave and 1,300,000 demonstrated all over France as per CGT. Le Parisien newspapers stated that the number of demonstrators increased last Friday from the previous event [11]. According to newspaper Ouest France, 24 Jan 2020, the govt has published online an impact study of its pension reform plan which has 1000 pages. The govt. ‘encourages’ working people to delay their retirement. People who stop a year before the ‘pivotal age’ or ‘equilibrium age’ of 65, that is if they retire at 64, would have a definitive pension reduction of 5%. And those who leave at 66, will get a permanent bonus of 5%. Moreover, this breakeven age would increase with increasing life expectancy, at the rate of one month per generation, the government writes. In other words, it would be 66 years for the 1987 generation. And 67 years for the 1999 generation!! [12] This is simply inhuman. The elite does not know how the workers live and what is their health condition at 66 or 67 years. The fight of the workers of France is very important as governments in all major economies are trying to squeeze workers rights and increase human plights. 25 Jan 2020. 

Sources:
[1] La CGT espère une convergence des luttes avec les “gilets jaunes” https://www.nouvelobs.com/economie/20190513.OBS12829/la-cgt-espere-une-convergence-des-luttes-avec-les-gilets-jaunes.html
[2] 16 May 2019, N°196 // L’ADIEU À LA GRANDE CLASSE MOYENNE : LA CRISE DES « GILETS JAUNES », SYMPTÔME DE LA « DÉMOYENNISATION » https://www.ifop.com/publication/ladieu-a-la-grande-classe-moyenne-la-crise-des-gilets-jaunes-symptome-de-la-demoyennisation/
[3] « Gilets jaunes » : une enquête pionnière sur la « révolte des revenus modestes » Un collectif de chercheurs présente, dans une tribune au « Monde », les premiers résultats d’une étude détaillée qui s’appuie sur 166 questionnaires distribués sur des ronds-points et lors de manifestations.Publié le 11 décembre 2018 https://www.lemonde.fr/idees/article/2018/12/11/gilets-jaunes-une-enquete-pionniere-sur-la-revolte-des-revenus-modestes_5395562_3232.html
[4] The above data were in https://npa2009.org/idees/social-autres/la-nature-de-classe-des-gilets-jaunes-indications-pour-les-prochaines-batailles
[5] https://twitter.com/LeNombreJaune/status/1209243529630932993
[6] for example https://www.ouest-france.fr/economie/retraites/coupures-d-electricite-borne-condamne-fermement-ces-actes-la-cgt-menace-de-nouvelles-actions-6660091 and https://issues.fr/les-grevistes-coupent-lelectricite-des-grosses-entreprises-et-retablissent-le-courant-chez-les-pauvres/
[7] https://www.lunion.fr/id117385/article/2019-12-18/la-cgt-annonce-quelle-va-poursuivre-les-coupures-delectricite-pour-noel
[8] https://www.lejdd.fr/Politique/sondage-reforme-des-retraites-29-des-francais-soutiennent-toujours-la-greve-3943832
[9] https://www.ifop.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/117072_Rapport_Ifop_JDD_Retraites.pdf
[10] Réforme des retraites: nos points de suspicion can be downloaded from https://solidaires.org/Reforme-des-retraites-nos-points-de-suspicion-actualisation-octobre-2019
[11] http://www.leparisien.fr/economie/direct-reforme-des-retraites-suivez-la-mobilisation-de-ce-vendredi-24-janvier-24-01-2020-8243367.php
[12] Réforme des retraites. Quatre questions sur l’âge pivot à 65 ans https://www.ouest-france.fr/economie/retraites/reforme-des-retraites-quatre-questions-sur-l-age-pivot-65-ans-6705604

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Jan 28, 2020