News Desk
ISLAMABAD/PARIS: French trade unions staged crippling mass strikes against President Emmanuel Macron’s reform plans that seek to increase the age of retirement.
Unions on strike
Macron’s programme faces a make-or-break moment as trade unions observed announced another day of strikes on Thursday across the country as he pushes to raise the retirement age from the current 62 to 64.
The proposed bill, due to go through parliament, seeks to raise the retirement age at which people could stop work from 62 to 64.
According to the CNN, intercity and commuter train services across the country were expected to be badly disrupted.
As a result of the strikes, many schools and other public services were expected to be shut. At the Orly airport in Paris, one in five flights had been cancelled while on the Paris metro only two driverless lines would work normally.
Large demonstrations were expected in Paris and other cities, where police will be deployed to deal with possible violence from ultra-left “black bloc” infiltrators.
Under a proposal delineated earlier this month by Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne, people will have to work for 43 years from 2027 to qualify for a full pension, as opposed to the current 42 years.
Touted by the government as a vital step to safeguard France’s sharing pension system, the reform programme is proving deeply unpopular among the public and trade unions with 68 per cent saying they were opposed to it, according to an IFOP poll this week.
All the country’s unions, including so-called “reformist” unions have condemned the new measure as well as by the left-wing and far-right oppositions in the National Assembly.
Communist Party leader Fabien Roussel said that the walls of the Élysée palace should tremble.
As his Renaissance party did not have a majority in the assembly, Macron would have to rely on support from around 60 or so MPs of the conservative Republicans party, though some of them had earlier warned they could vote against it.
With the parliamentary process expected to take several weeks, Macron faced a rolling campaign of opposition, with further days of action likely in the days ahead. The worst outcome for his government would be rolling strikes in transport, hospitals and fuel depots, effectively bringing the country to a grinding halt.
A recent poll suggested 68 per cent of people were opposed to the pension reforms.
