More French workers strike over retirement
On June 3 new layers of French workers joined
the struggle started by public employees against reforms
proposed by the government that would add years to the
retirment age and cut pensions. Workers from the private
sector--steel, chemicals, trucking, even retail--struck and
marched.
Some 250,000 workers marched in Paris and 250,000 in
Marseilles, France's second-largest city. One million marched
elsewhere in France, in small and large cities, before
government offices, corporate headquarters, city halls and
train stations. Some 80 percent of air flights were canceled as
well as a majority of inter-city trains. Some mass transit in
the larger cities ran, but most did not.
Teachers and school staff came out in large numbers over the
issue of retirement and also the government's plan to
restructure education, even though the government now says it
is going to postpone until the fall any parliamentary action on
its plan to restructure education.
Some 500,000 workers in Austria held a one-day general
strike in solidarity with the French workers and because they
face the same issue of retirement changes. There were major
demonstrations in Italy and 90,000 steel workers in eastern
Germany also went out for equal wages with their western
colleagues.
European workers say that joint actions in a spirit of
solidarity give them additional strength.
--G. Dunkel
Reprinted from the June 12, 2003, issue of
Workers World newspaper
This article is copyright under a Creative
Commons License.
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