3 million protest new anti-worker law

Three million students, workers, many of whom first walked off their jobs, retired workers and supporters demonstrated on March 28 in every large city in France against a new anti-worker law. Known as the First Employment Contract (CPE), it is aimed at eliminating job protection for workers less than 26 years old.

Paris

According to union organizers, 2 million people marched in Paris, 250,000 in Mar seilles, 100,000 in Bordeaux, 30,000 in Rennes, 15,000 in Strasbourg, 10,000 in Lille and 40,000 in Toulouse.

Both police and the demonstrators estima ted that the March 28 demonstrations were twice as large as earlier ones on March 18.

All the labor and student unions turned out. Many primary schools closed completely, with teachers, administrators, staff, parents and their children marching in the protests. Even employees in the private sector, who generally refrain from political protests, came out in large numbers.

Bordeaux

The sharpest clashes between cops and protesters were reported in Grenoble, a university and research-oriented town, where cops used flash grenades and tear gas to disperse protesters. Cops also confronted demonstrators in Lille, Paris and Rennes, a very important rail center, when protesters occupied the main railroad station.

On the Paris Metro (subway), cops roughly searched the bags and clothes of young Black and North African youths who were headed towards the protest. Even with television news filming them, the police obviously tried to provoke the young people to do something to justify an arrest.

Lille

French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin, who designed the new law, pretended he was doing “business as usual” during the strike. He greeted King Juan Carlos of Spain, while asserting he was not going to withdraw the CPE but was “open to dialog.”

De Villepin is growing increasingly isolated. Even his party rival, right-wing Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy, suggested the law be withdrawn and negotiations begin. With workers and oppressed peoples uniting and growing angrier, it is possible a Constitutional Court decision March 30 will nullify the law.

Struggle on since February

Since February, a coalition of students and trade unions has confronted the French government, which is trying to make it easier for bosses to legally fire young workers.

Alternating “center-left” and conservative governments since 1977 have put the rights of French workers under attack. Despite this, 85 percent of all salaried French workers still have the right to dispute a firing before an elected local court. In fact, one of the most important functions of French unions is to provide workers representation before this court.

All major French trade union confederations have stuck together in demanding the repeal of the law authorizing the CPE. Student unions like UNEF and FIDL have gone further, demanding the resignation of De Villepin’s center-right government.

Railroad workers in vanguard

All French-language media since late February have put the strike and the struggle against the CPE at the top of the news, focusing on two key areas: the attitudes of the workers on the French railroads (SNCF) and opinion in poor suburbs like Clichy-sous-Bois, where struggles of youth of North African and West African origin began in November 2005.

The railroad workers have offered the strongest, most class-conscious, union-led resistance to the French state over the past 20 years.

In an interview on French television, Elisabeth Beddad, a Black woman conductor on the TGV—France’s premier high-speed train line—said she would strike on March 28 out of solidarity with the students and youth. “Workers at the SNCF are covered by a special labor code. But youth and students deserve justice and job security.”

Jean-René Carcouet, a train operator, pointed out that in fighting to repeal the CPE, workers were fighting to protect their children and their future. Naturally, the television reporter found a worker who wasn’t totally opposed to the CPE. “Let’s try it out for six months or so” was his line. But the reporter couldn’t find one SNCF worker who solidly supported the government.

The youth in Clichy-sous-Bois said that the protests in October and November were about local issues like police harassment, lack of respect and lack of a future. They said that the CPE was a national issue and that if it made it easier to hire disadvantaged youth, it also made it far easier to fire them. The mayors interviewed felt that the situation was very tense, but not yet out of control.

Students at the Alfred Nobel High School in Clichy-sous-Bois, a few hundred yards from where two students died in October, sparking two months of protests, were inter viewed by the French newspaper La Croix. They were going to protest on March 28. They were not sure of the details of the CPE but were strongly against it. One of them said it was “because it is unjust. For two years, they can decide to keep us or let us go. Me, I don’t want to string together CPE jobs. I want to be hired permanently.”

Identified only as Kader and Nabil, two jobless workers interviewed said they aren’t covered by the CPE because they are over 26 years old. Nevertheless, Kader said, “Frankly, there’s nothing to be gained with this kind of stuff. We are still losers. What the youth want is a real job.”

Nabil was even more bitter. “For us to get a permanent job, we would have to lose our skin [color]. The only laws that apply to us are the penal code.” Nabil is supported by statistics: a youth coming from the suburbs with a name that is not French is six times less likely to be hired than a youth not from the suburbs with a French name. (Le Monde Diplomatique, March 2006)

Statement after statement from anti-racist groups like SOS-Racisme, ATTAC and others make the same points as Kader and Nabil: The CPE is no solution for oppres sed youth; it is a political trick, a trap, an empty promise.