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Transport chaos threatens Midsummer

A public transport strike appears likely to kick off on Wednesday night after unions and state-transport heads failed to agree on workers' pay and conditions after three days of discussions.

Published: 18 June 2013 15:30 CEST

Transport chaos threatens Midsummer

Workers are expected to go on strike after employers refused to increase their wages by 1,740 kronor ($270) over three years, according to the Dagens Nyheter newspaper (DN).

A further 1,400 employees are expected to strike from next Saturday if agreements cannot be reached.

The Kommunal union, which represents municipal and county employees, has threatened to halt bus traffic and commuter trains on Wednesday night in Stockholm, Södertälje, and Umeå in northern Sweden.

The red line on Stockholm’s underground network, which covers 36 stops, may also be affected.

If the strikes go ahead, thousands of Swedes will suffer setbacks to their plans for Midsommar Eve on Thursday, a day that marks the start of many Swedes’ long Midsummer weekend, with Friday a national public holiday.

There are even risks that Gothenburg and the Skåne region to the south will be hit by the strikes, but Stockholm would be hardest hit.

“This will have gigantic consequences,” regional transport network SL spokeswoman Lovisa Åbom told the TT news agency.

On a usual day in Stockholm, 770,000 people use the public transport services that may be affected by Wednesday’s potential strike.

Out in Gothenburg, a strike could dash the chances of many Swedes’ plans for getaway trips up along the coastline.

“Midsummer is one of our biggest holiday weekends. Travel is huge, especially up to Bohuslän. It’s already a challenge for us normally,” Västtrafik spokesperson Kristian Lans said.

When asked if people should in fact stay at home for the long weekend,

“That’s up to the individual,” he said.

“But you should be aware that this is an extraordinary situation that we’re unable to influence.”

TT/The Local/og

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Hundreds of thousands take to streets against Macron's pension plan

Unions hope they can still force Macron to back down as parliament debates the draft law, with the National Assembly and the Senate moving towards a final vote as early as this month.

“This is the final stretch,” said Marylise Leon, deputy leader of the CFDT union. “The endgame is now,” she told the franceinfo broadcaster Saturday.

This week, Macron twice turned down urgent calls by unions to meet with him in a last-ditch attempt to get him to change his mind.

“When there are millions of people in the streets, when there are strikes and all we get from the other side is silence, people wonder: What more do we need to do to be heard?”, said Philippe Martinez, boss of the hard-left CGT
union.

“This country’s leaders need to stop being in denial of this social movement,” said CFDT head Laurent Berger on Saturday.

Police said they expect between 800,000 and one million people at 230 planned demonstrations across France, of which up to 100,000 were likely to march in Paris.

It was the second protest day called on a weekend, with unions hoping that demonstrators would show up in greater numbers if they did not have to take a day off work.

“I’m here to fight for my colleagues and for our young people,” said Claude Jeanvoine, 63, a retired train driver demonstrating in Strasbourg, eastern France. “People shouldn’t let the government get away with this, this is about the future of their children and grandchildren,” he told AFP.

READ ALSO: 5 minutes to understand … French pension reform

At the last big strike and protest day on Tuesday, turnout was just under 1.3 million people, according to police, and more than three million according to unions.

Several sectors in the French economy have been targeted by union calls for indefinite strikes, including in rail and air transport, power stations, natural gas terminals and rubbish collection.

The French Senate, meanwhile, early Saturday resumed debate on the reform whose headline measure is a hike in the minimum retirement age to 64 from 62.

Senators have until Sunday evening to conclude their discussions, and a commission is then to elaborate a final version of the draft law which will be submitted to both houses of parliament for a final vote.

Should Macron’s government fail to assemble a majority ahead of the vote, Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne could deploy a rarely-used constitutional tool, known as article 49/3, to push the legislation through without a vote.

An opinion poll published by broadcaster BFMTV Saturday found that 63 percent of French people approve the protests against the reform, and 54 percent were also in favour of the strikes and blockages in some sectors.

Some 78 percent, however, said they believed that Macron would end up getting the reform adopted.

READ ALSO: LATEST: How strikes will affect France this weekend

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