France: The Struggle to Defend the French Pension System

Lisbeth Latham

Since December 5, France has been gripped by ongoing strikes and mobilisations by a coalition of trade unions, high school and university student unions, as well as the gilet jaunes (yellow vests) to defeat the attack by the Macron and the Philippe government on France’s pension system. Whilst the alliance has been able to sustain a period of heightened mobilisations that have put the government under pressure, it remains unclear that the movement is powerful to defeat the attack, and there are serious barriers if the movement is to expand and grow.

Pension Counter Reforms
During the 2017 election campaign, Macron promised that he would look to “reform” France’s pension system. The current attacks both build on the changes to the pension system pushed through by the Sarkozy and Fillon government in 2010, and the failed attacks on the Special Retirement Plans for workers in a number of public services and recently privatised companies, launched in 1995 and 2007. These attacks have been justified on the need to make the pension system sustainable in the face of France’s ageing population (France’s pension system relies on pensions being paid out on the payments of current workers, with excess payments going into an investment fund).

The changes affecting the majority of French workers would increase the age which workers could access their pensions to 64 (in 2027) up from 62 years of age currently (Pivot Age), increase the period of time that workers have to have been working in order to qualify for a full pension from 42 to 43 years, and increase the age at which workers can retire on a full-pension without which working the minimum qualifying years work (Equalising Age).

The Special Retirement Plans refer to 42 different pension schemes received by workers in 15 organisations including rail workers with SNCF (French National Railway Company) and RATP (Autonomous Operator of Parisian Transportation), members of the Paris Opera, lawyers, members of the army, sailors, and the National Police. Workers in these primarily public organisations had had pension schemes (some of them dating back to Louis XIV) that had been in place prior to the introduction of the national pension scheme in October 1945. The Special Retirement Plans, tend to allow earlier retirement – many of these jobs are extremely physically strenuous, provide for workers to receive a higher defined benefit than the standard pensions, and have better indexation (the standard pension is indexed at inflation, whilst the majority of the Special Retirement Plan pensions provide for workers to have their pensions to be indexed with wage increases in their former industry). This attack on these has been justified on the basis of providing transparency and equality to the French pension system and would also secure the financial basis of the pensions in these plans (all of which are in sectors in which there have had significant contraction in employment and so there are substantial more retirees dependent on the pensions than workers contributing to the schemes), with the aim of splitting opposition to the pension reform.

Union Responses
Opposition to the proposed changes have been premised on four major arguments:
First that the changes will disproportionately affect women, who due to the socialised norms around responsibility for child-rearing means that women are more likely to have substantial career breaks and already many French women are unable to qualify for a full-pension prior to reaching pivot age, unions argue that increasing both the qualifying period and the full-pension age will cast greater numbers of women poverty in retirement - currently, women who have children are given credit towards their pension qualification, 1 year per child in the public sector, two-years per child in the private section, the proposed changes would remove this. Women currently receive 29% of the pensions of men, however, the CGT (Confédération générale du travail - General Confederation of Labour) expects this gap to rise to 42% if the current protections for women are removed as proposed.

Secondly, that increases in the pension ages mean that workers will increasingly be unable to retire prior to the onset of the illnesses of old age, and so fewer and fewer workers will be able to have a healthy period of retirement prior to the onset of these illnesses.

Your pharmacist recommends retirement before arthritis

Thirdly, the changes will unfairly impact workers who work in more physically demanding
industries. These workers currently are able to retire earlier, the extension of the pension age will put heavy pressure on the bodies of these workers to be able to work to the new pension age. Whilst the government has pulled back on the removal for some categories of workers, notably police and firefighters, sewage workers, who on average die seven years earlier than other workers and 17 years earlier than managers, will lose their current early retirement. 

Finally, that workers who lose their jobs later in their working lives, who already find it difficult to obtain work, will have to face a longer period of either unemployment or underemployment prior to reaching the pension age.

Convergence of struggles
The present movement draws together separate struggles that have been occurring in France during the Macron presidency. The left has, and the more militant unions have sought to draw together and converge the existing struggles within French society into the pension struggle. This has included pre-existing workers' struggles but has also included movements of students that have campaigned against both fees and the introduction of increased university entrance requirements which has seen thousands of young people fail to gain entrance to university and the introduction of increased student fees for international students and the mobilisation of thousands of university and high school students which has seen schools and universities blockaded and the call for exams to be totally cancelled to allow the full involvement of students in the movement. This process of convergence is not new, and his been an objective of a range of militant organisations since prior to the Macron presidency, and particularly in relation to the emergence of the Front Social and the Nuit Debout during struggle against the El Khomri attacks on the Labour Law and the gilet jaunes as a new force mobilisation which, since November 2018, has drawn into motion sections of the French popular classes that unions and other progressive forces have not been able to mobilise for an extended period of time.

State and Government Responses
In response to the mass movement the state, just as it has to other mobilisation since the November 2015 introduction of the (withdrawn in November 2017) state of emergency following the terror attacks in Paris, has responded with escalating repressive violence. There has been widespread footage of CRS (Republican Security Companies) and Gendarme riot police beating protestors, as well the deployment of a range of “non-lethal” weapons, including explosive tear gas grenades (France is the only European country to deploy explosive canisters in law enforcement) and flash balls, that has seen a steady rise in the number of people who have been maimed at protests.

In addition, the government has sought to manoeuvre in the hope of dividing and blunting the movement. The tactic has been the announcement of the “temporary” withdrawal of the first phases of the increase in the Pivot Age, that had been scheduled to begin in 2022. A withdrawal that is based on finding an alternative way of saving €12 billion “in order to secure the system by 2027” - the government has proposed a conference on January 30 to identify alternative mechanisms to make savings in the pension system. The “concessions” have primarily been aimed at the conservative unions, particularly the CFDT (Confédération française démocratique du travail - French Democratic Confederation of Labour - the largest French confederation when measured by the number of members and second-largest in employee representative bodies) and UNSA (L'Union nationale des syndicats autonomes - National Union of Autonomous Trade Unions, which is the second most popular union within both the SNSF and RAPT), who have responded positively to the concessions, with CFDT general secretary Berger calling the withdrawal of the 2022 Pivot Age phase-in date a victory for the CFDT and called on CFDT members to desist from participating in strikes and mobilisations against the pension reform. However, the more militant unions have rejected the overtures of the government, arguing that legislation is not amendable and that it should be withdrawn. The CGT, in a January 11 statement said, “that debate on the Pivot Age is simply aimed at winning the support of certain unions”. Léon Crémieux, a militant in SUD Rail, the trade union Solidaires union within the SNSF and RAPT, and leader of the NPA (Nouveau parti anticapitaliste - New Anticapitalist Party), argues that the conference is a trap which “ is going to close quickly since this conference will only be able to put the “pivotal age at 64” back in the frame, forcing retirement two years later, or lengthening the number of years worked necessary to retire (43 years today)”. SUD Rail, in a statement on January 24, said it would refuse to meet with the government and would continue to mobilise its members until the withdrawal of the bill. 

 The current movement has significant weaknesses
Despite significant public support, opinion polls suggest that support for the movement has reached peaks of 65%, however, the movement has failed to not only meet that level of support but the size and breadth of the major working-class mobilisations of the past three decades.

This has meant that the current movement is substantially bigger and longer-lasting than the peak of the counter government movements of the last decade, but the movement is substantially smaller than the big movements against government attacks against the working class of the last three decades, particularly the movements of 1995, 2003, and 2010. In 1995, the movement was primarily within the public sector, and was not directly supported by the more conservative unions particularly the CFDT, but were driven by the CGT and FO (Force ouvriere - Workers Force) - however, the more militant unions were able to draw much broader layers of the working class, including significant sections of the CFDT’s membership and support base, into motion. 2003 the movement against the first employment contract, which focused on the employment rights of young workers,, was primarily driven by mobilisations by students and education workers. The 2010 movement to defend the pension system, peaked at mobilisations of 3.5 million, and seven mobilisations of more than 2 million across eight weeks, in addition there indefinite strikes in a number of industries particularly oil refining which resulted in widespread fuel shortages. However despite the larger size of these earlier movements, they at best achieved partial victories, and in the case of 2010 movement, it failed totally and demobilised on the promise that a future Parti Socialiste (PS) government would repeal the changes - which the PS government never attempted to do, instead it introduced new attacks on the unions and France’s working class. Defeats which have contributed to the current inability of the movement to spread.

At the same time the ability of the movement to sustain itself and force the government to offer “concessions” has given hope that perhaps the movement can outlast the resilience of the government or potentially capital. Importantly, the movement has been expanding, the more than 200 mobilisations across France on January 24, drew an estimated 1.3 million people onto the street up from 800, 000 on January 16. At the centre of the struggle has been the strikes within the SNCF and RATP with 45 days of strike action which ended January 24. This strike was initiated by the militant union federation within both SNCF and RATP, and was primarily built on the back of the September strike within RATP against pension reform. Other key areas have been the depth of the struggle within France’s cultural institutions particularly the Paris Opera, which has been on strike and performing at the mass demonstrations in Paris, the Louvre, and the French National Library, the blockading of oil refineries which occurred between January 8 to 11. On January 24, the CGT stated it was seeking to initiate discussions with workers in those workplaces not yet on strike, to draw them into action. This is occurring through the holding of general assemblies of workers and at the workplace and municipal level. Whilst the inability to draw the more conservative unions, particularly the CFDT consistently into the movement is a real weakness and break on the movement’s potential to mobilise, it potentially could be a strength, as it reduces the influence of the CFDT on the movement and government cannot rely on the CFDT’s sudden withdrawal from the movement, which happened in 2010 after the pension changes were passed, to undermine and demobilise the movement. This has the potential to place considerable additional pressure on the government, as it is less likely, compared to 2010, that the movement will simply evaporate following the passing of any legislation. Added to this, with the splintering of the PS in the wake of the 2017 presidential elections, it is hard for more conservative forces to advocate an electoral solution to addressing the assault on pensions.

'

The current national intersyndicale which brings together the CGT, FO, CGC-CFE (Confédération française de l'encadrement - Confédération générale des cadres - CFE-CGC), the trade union Solidaires, FSU (Fédération syndicale unitaire - Unitary Union Federation), FIDL ( Fédération indépendante et démocratique lycéenne - Independent and Democratic High School Federation), MNL (Mouvement national lycéen - National High School Student Movement), UNL (L’Union nationale lycéenne - The National High School Union), and UNEF (Union Nationale des Étudiants de France - National Union of Students of France) has called for three further days of mobilisation on January 29, 30, and 31. These days of mobilisation will be an important test as to the direction of the movement’s inertia.

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France: Joint Union/Student Call for Strikes and Mobilisations on October 9

CGT – FO – Solidarity – UNEF – UNL

Map of October 9 Mobilisations

Originally published August 30 2018 For union organisations of employees, university students and high school students – the General Confederation of Labour (CGT), Workers Force (FO), Solidarity, National Union of Students of France (UNEF) and the National Union of Secondary Students (UNL) - met on 30 August 2018, a statement is necessary and is reinforced, that of an ideological policy aimed at the destruction of our social model, promoting in particular the explosion of inequalities and the breakdown of the collective rights.

This policy as well as the measures recently announced by the government, are part of a logic of individualisation which undermines solidarity and social justice, essential values of the social cohesion and undermining once again the weakest, the most precarious and the poorest.

These include: 

• threats to the rights of employees and job applicants to unemployment insurance; 
• the questioning of the right of young people to a future through the introduction of selective entry to higher education and the waste that is universal national service; 
• undermining of the public service, in particular CAP 22[1]; 
• job destruction through deindustrialisation;
• attacks on our health system; 
• The destruction of our pension system; 
• Freezing of social benefits;

The signatory organisations call on the Government to hear the multiple social expectations that have been expressed in public and the private sectors, by working people, young people, unemployed and retirees, and that it no longer be guided an obsession to decrease public spending. At a time when an explosion of dividends in France and in the world is once again being announced, it is time to pursue a policy of sharing wealth, to increase wages, pensions and the social minima.

Faced with this situation and regressive decisions in opposition to the legitimate demands of workers and youth, it is time to defend the foundations of our social model and win new rights.

That is why, the signatory organisations have decided to make October 9 a major day of day of mobilizations and strikes by unions, university and high school students.

Concerning the day of mobilization and strikes, the Trade Union Solidarity will authorise it during the meeting of its national leadership next week.

The signatory organisations invite the other trade unions and youth organisations to join them widely and be part of the mobilisation process.

Paris, 30 August 2018 

1 Public Affairs Committee 2022 report aimed at deepening the neoliberal restructuring of the French public sector with the aim of "improving" public accounts by €30 billion.

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France: The UNEF condemns police violence at Paris-Nanterre University

CW Police violence

By Angela Lopez
Originally published by Union Nationale des Étudiants de France
(National Union of Students of France - UNEF)
10 April 2018

For several weeks, students and staff at Paris Nanterre University have been mobilized against the so-called Student Orientation and Success Act. In this direction, yesterday morning, the students made the choice as a mode of action to block a number of campus buildings. Following this came a general meeting where the students were able to debate the direction to be given to the movement and the next steps to be taken in protests against the reform of the Students Plan. In response to this, an administrative closure of all the buildings was ordered by the president of the university and denied to allow students to access their course buildings.

The president of Paris-Nanterre University decides to use force against students.

Faced with the mobilization of the students, the president of the University Paris Nanterre made the decision to respond with force and to send onto the campus companies of the CRS (Compagnies Républicaines de Sécurité - Republican Security Companies). Once on site, the only purpose of the CRS was to dislodge by force the students who were in the social and human sciences buildings. These are students who have been gassed, hit and worse. Many of them have been wounded, one of them seriously. Added to this is the arrest of seven students, even though they did not put up any resistance, among whom is Victor Mendez, a UNEF activist.

It is unacceptable that the response of a university to students' claims to be able to mobilize is a response of force, the police have no place in our universities!

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Angela Lopez is president of l'UNEF in France's Department 31

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France - Militants, we denounce sexual violence and sexual violence in the UNEF

In an open letter in Le Monde November 28, 83 members denounce the "real control of women's bodies" imposed by several leaders of the student union for many years.

[Le Monde published this letter signed by eighty-three women, former unionists of the National Union of Students of France (UNEF), denouncing sexism and violent behaviour which they were subject to or had knowledge of within the movement. Ordinary activists, local and national leaders and executives of the organization, they are mostly from regions. They sign their first name, the initial of their family name and specify the length of time they have been active in the union. Le Monde was able to verify the identities and the commitment of each one. In parallel, we publish today an investigation revealing a "predatory system" that took place in the very heart of the UNEF.
The young women are speaking after Libération's revelations of harassment and sexual assault in the Young Socialist Movement (MJS) and the original article in Le Monde revealing the sexist behaviour of the student union. These investigations acted as an explosion in the union organization: for a fortnight, the testimonies mount. On November 16, a mailbox was even opened to receive them. Offensive, these former activists call for this release of speech affects all trade unions, political and associative.]

Tribune. For several weeks, the voices of thousands of women victims of harassment and sexual assault have risen. Generations of activists, feminists and progressives, committed to the UNEF at the local or national level since the early 2000s and members of different trends, we now also dare to denounce this violence and their systemic scale.

Many of us have been victims of violence within our organization. For a longtime, we felt alone and ostracized by the number and severity of the facts. We are now aware of the extent of this sexist and sexual violence. How have we been able to campaign with so much energy and self-sacrifice in an organization while letting women, ourselves, endure such violence?

Now united, we want it to stop at last. Some reminded us of the need to "protect the organization". This argument helped to silence the victims all these years. It allowed aggressors to act with impunity; protected them. This argument, we will not hear it anymore. Errors and deviations should now be able to be denounced, victims able to speak freely, accompanied by the exclusion of perpetrators to protect activists. In our view, this is the only way to really and effectively protect activists and therefore the organization.

A Chavinist Mentality
On a daily basis, the chauvinist mentality crushed the progressive values that we defended, notably through an exacerbated expression of physical and sexual domination. Many people praised the omnipotence they exercised over their partners, mocking degrading practices in order to shine in front of their peers and to accentuate a little more the discomfort of their female audience.

The springs of this triumphant masculinity were multiple: hunting charts, scary and systematic classification (physical attributes, sexual performances ...). In their intimacy, women were continually categorized, evaluated, controlled, and watched. Under the guise of sexual liberation, it was actually a real control of women's bodies.

The extremely hierarchical pyramidal functioning with ascension by cooptation, as well as the social dependence and the socio-economic isolation of women some of whom were only just independent for the first time, favoured the mechanisms of influence, allowing the amplification and systematization of sexist and sexual violence.

Silence was in order
We have often referred to our guilt. We had to keep quiet so as not to weaken the organization. And finally, was it so bad? Was it that? Did we have evidence of what we had seen and/or suffered? It was clear that to question the behaviour of some in the leadership would mean in turn to be accused of treason, of being unstable, jealous, bitter or of not having a sense of responsibility.

How many times have we been asked for the phone numbers of younger comrades? How many times have we refused? How often have these notorious predators obtained their contact information by other means? During the national meetings, some men made use of the weaknesses of the organization to develop particularly grave strategies: to approach their prey, sometimes very young, to make them drink, even to drug them, to do without their consent.

Those who resisted were stalked and harassed right in front of the door of their home. In case of pregnancy, silence was needed. The responsibility rested entirely on the shoulders of young women, who had to overcome this ordeal in the most complete isolation, even as cadres rose to the platform to defend women's rights to dispose of their bodies, access to abortion and to contraception.

Collective awareness
We already know a number of the attackers. We will not name them. But we will no longer avert our gaze, we will not be bowed again. We respect the victims, so we will not usurp their status and respect their word, like their silence. Because neither social networks nor forums are intended to replace the work of justice.

"United, we will help those who decide to file a complaint against their aggressors"
United, we will help those who decide to file a complaint against their attackers. We will support each other to help survivors overcome feelings of awareness, anger and multiple trauma.

To those who try to exploit this approach to throw discredit on the UNEF, we want to remember that it is also thanks to the progressive struggles and feminists discovered and begun during our commitment that this collective awareness is made possible. We also know the work undertaken by the current activists and activists, leaders and leaders of the UNEF, is also presided over by a woman for the first time in sixteen years.

Finally, we appeal to women from all union organisations, associations and politicians to take the floor in their turn. We know that we are not the only ones. One in two women in society is facing violence. To deny it is an additional violence inflicted on those who have already suffered it. Beyond our political opinions, our disagreements, our past sectarianism, what binds us is our condition as Women.

Alexia S., militante à l’UNEF de 2007 à 2010, Annaïg P., 2003-2010, Anaïs H., 2007-2009, Anne L., 2003-2008, Anne-Sophie A., 2004-2007, Anissa B.-F., 2007-2012, Anouch Z., 2007-2010, Amandine E., 2008-2014, Aude L., 2005-2009, Aude L., 2007-2011, Aurélie M., 2005-2008, Béatrice L., 2007-2010, Beril B., 2003-2008, Charlotte B.*, 2005-2008, Camille M., 2011-2013, Camille M., 2003-2009, Camille P., 2005-2012, Catarina V., 2006-2009, Catherine M., 2003-2007, Céline A., 2008-2011, Chloé D., 2010-2017, Claire F., 2010-2013, Claire J.*, 2009-2015, Coralie B., 2008-2009, Delphine B., 2006-2009, Elise G., 2009-2012, Elodie L., 2003-2009, Erell D., 2004-2007, Estelle D., 2011-2015, Eve R., 2006-2008, Gaëlle K., 2005-2008, Hayat L., 2008-2011, Hélène P., 2002-2009, Houda N., 2002-2007, Julia C.*, 2001-2015, Julia V., 2007-2011, Julie B., 2007-2011, Julie C.*, 2012-2013, Julie E.*, 2009-2016, Julie J., 2006-2009, Julie N., 2003-2009, Julie T.-F., 2007-2012, Julie T., 2008-2012, Juliette B., 2008-2011, Juliette G., 2005-2009, Katia B., 2010-2014, Lara B., 2012-2017, Lauranne W.-G., 2011-2015, Lauriane V., 2006-2010, Laurianne D., 2003-2007, Laurine B., 2004-2008, Léa D., 2011-2016, Léa D., 2007-2013, Lisa R., 2007-2014, Lorédana A.-B., 2012-2013, Louise B.*, 2007-2011, Lucie F., 2007-2009, Lucile J., 2005-2010, Lucile M., 2010-2016, Maëlle J., 2003-2008, Maeva B., 2007-2011, Manon A., 2007-2011, Margaud A.-F., 2008-2012, Margot P.-B., 2009-2014, Maria C., 2005-2011, Marianne M., 2002-2007, Marie-Anne B., 2004-2008, Marion O., 2005-2010, Marine B., 2008-2012, Marine F., 2007-2010, Maud J., 2003-2008, Mélanie V., 2011-2016, Mélodie G.-B., 2006-2009, Ophélie M., 2008-2011, Pauline G.-M., 2009-2011, Sahra A., 2006-2010, Salomé M., 2004-2010, Sandra C., 2007-2014, Sarah B., 2011-2016, Sayna S., 2007-2013, Sorayah M., 2008-2012, Virginie C., 2006-2009, Viviane B., 2007-2010 (* These first names have been modified).

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France - Sexual assault allegations rock France's main student union

Content Warning: Descriptions of Rape, Assault, Rape Apologism
[This article originally appeared in the French left-wing daily Libération. It follows revelations in Le Monde in November of widespread sexual abuse within the National Union of Student of France - one of France's largest student organisations. It comes after 83 former women activists of UNEF published an open letter in Le Monde condemning sexual violence within UNEF. I'm reproducing these due to the similarities with how power has been abused in albeit much smaller left-wing Anglophone organisations].

Sexual abuse: the testimonies that overwhelm the UNEF
By Laure Bretton and Ismaël Halissat
February 19, 2018
Libération

Libération gathered the testimonies of sixteen women victims who have reported harassment, sexual assault and rape by leaders of the student organization between 2007 and 2015. Long inaudible, or silent, these former activists recount years of union sexism and its apparent laissez-faire attitude to sexual violence. 

When she settles down to sleep at the Fête de l'Humanité, in September 2014, Laurie* is exhausted. Having only recently become an activist of the Unef (National Union of Students of France), she just spent the day running the union stand with her friends. Like the end of every summer, this meeting of a substantial part of the left is the occasion for the organization to recruit new members. Despite the fatigue, Laurie is not going to sleep.

A member of the leadership of the union, and having joined UNEF in the mid-2000s, Grégoire T. insists on following her to her tent, pitched in the campground of La Courneuve. They have already had several sexual encounters but were not in an ongoing relationship. But tonight, Laurie does not want it. "I had planned to sleep with another activist but he invited himself, says the student. He hoped to be able to sleep with both of us. " Soon, the second young woman falls asleep. "He tells me he has the right to a blowjob in compensation, which I refuse," says Laurie. He begins to press my head. I refuse again. He is pressing more and more strongly. I beat him back again. He puts his hand in my pants and kisses me with force. And starts again for several minutes. " The activist cannot take it anymore. She wants it to stop: "I ended up letting myself go." For a long time, Laurie does not really realize what she's experienced. Today, she's talking about rape. Three years after the events, Grégoire T., who became a journalist, had another version of the evening, assuring that his partner was consenting for a blowjob and that everything went "without coercion".

A complaint of "rape"
Two years later, Laurie became a seasoned activist, she is "up" in the instances of UNEF and is now part of the National Office (NO), the body that supports the leadership. With Grégoire T., the exchange of text messages has continued since September 2014. They talk about trade union activities and sometimes invite each other to spend the night together without this ever happening. In June 2016, Laurie saw recently in a campus nearby local union in the XIXth arrondissement of Paris. That night, she drinks shots of alcohol with fellow comrades in the leadership. As she prepares to go home to sleep, Grégoire T. announces that he will accompany her home. Without asking her opinion."I told him," I do not want to, "and I left," recalls the young woman.

But when she arrives home, Grégoire T. is there and waiting for her. Laurie repeats that she does not want to spend the night with him. Then follow negotiations. Tired, the young woman finally accepts that he goes up while clearly stating that nothing will happen between them. But hardly the door of the open apartment, Gregory T. undresses completely and tells her to do the same. Laurie refuses. According to her, he forces her to lie on her bed. She drank too much, her head is spinning because of alcohol. "He's starting to undress me. I try to push him away, to tell him I do not want to, but I have no strength left. At that moment, I feel like a doll, lifeless. He rapes me. There are no other words, Laurie says coldly. The next morning, Grégoire T. will try to impose a sexual relationship again, but she will have the strength to push him away. She then locks herself in the shower and stays there for forty minutes hoping he leaves. But when she goes out, Grégoire T. is still there and retries one last time before leaving.

"I cried all day and then I forgot," says Laurie. When this story is told to him, his contests and assures that they had agreed to return together, that they had sexual intercourse without violence and that he did not insist the next day. In a relationship with Grégoire T. in the summer of 2014, Joséphine* also tells of being a victim of rape. One night in July, "I woke up because he was penetrating me," she says. I did not understand what was happening. I asked him at least to put on a condom. It stopped at that moment. " Asked about this scene, Grégoire T. explains that he was also asleep at that time.

In mid-January, Laurie decided to file a complaint of rape against Grégoire T, reveals Libération today. And Josephine, who has just surrounded herself with a lawyer, is about to do the same. The end of long years of silence in what was for a long time the premiere student union in France.

A direction where "men think, women organize"
An omnipotent leadership - "deified", in the words of a former leader - women removed from power and sexual abuse at least minimized: for several months, Libération investigated the top of UNEF. Its leaders for a few years given and expected everything from the union. Forty interviews to collect testimonies and stories of sixteen victims of declared harassment and, for some, sexual assault and rape. When the UNEF bends the Villepin government, forced to withdraw its first-time contract in spring 2006, the student union is at its peak. A year later, Nicolas Sarkozy is elected, the left is organized against the president and relies on its youth battalions. At the height of its power, the National Union of Students of France will have up to 30,000 members from just over 2.4 million students. A heterogeneous group in which it is - statistically - normal to come across cases of harassment and aggression."Not impervious to the ills of society".

After Bruno Julliard, it is Jean-Baptiste Prévost who takes the orders of the Unef in 2007. A student from Sciences-Po, this former parliamentary counsellor inherits a powerful organization where sexism and machismo have always had a free reign. In the leadership, "it was said: men think, women organize," says Marion Oderda. Former national leader, she will be one of the few to openly oppose the very personal management of the union by its president. "I will not be your pimp," she says slamming the door of UNEF in 2010, an expression reported by at least three activists interviewed by Libération. An incident and an early departure that Jean-Baptiste Prévost puts, down to a just being a result of an internal union dispute.

The Prévost presidency will, however, be marked by many excesses. Seen as legitimate by some, these practices seem to have given an implicit green light for many leaders. The UNEF then becomes a sexual hunting ground. On the other side, Prévost appears on television sets to defend the student cause and campaign against the power of the right. On the flip side, the man draws phone numbers from the union files to access multiple sexual partners. "The regional training weekends, it was the supermarket", recalls Elodie Le Moigne, ex-president of the Unef at the University Paris-XIII. "There was pressure from the local presidents and members of the national office to retrieve the numbers or addresses of activists. They were acting for themselves or on behalf of the National President". "Jean-Baptiste chose girls, it was a typical profile of girl", speaking of this side of him, Annaïg P., a former member of the national office. "They are often young, moreover provincial, isolated and beginners, so fragile. At the Unef, we say a "little girl"".

In 2009, one of them, Marine*, an activist in the provinces, thought to have kept secret the relationship she has with the President for a few months. One September night, she tries to escape discreetly at the end of a meeting to join him at his hotel. Some comrades wince but a friend of Prévost releases her with a wink, "It's the boss, when he demands something, we run." "I took it smiling at the time," says Marine. "Prévost took advantage of the organization. He did not need to be violent, he had his status as president". When an activist finally dares to complain about the actions of a member of the management, regardless of his rank, it is suggested to keep quiet. Because"Unef is not a people's court, " that "it is a valuable companion" or that one suspects always "a political machination". Pretexts to minimize. And, in fact, impose silence. "At each stroke, I was answered:" You have evidence of what you're saying? You cannot say that it's the president, " says Elodie Le Moigne. "Under the term "big rehearsal", there were many different things and nobody really wanted to see the reality that it covered", explains Sarah Aoudia, former president of UNEF Nîmes and member of the national office. "And in fact, the circle of the national leadership had a kind of invisible protection".

To "follow" the faculties for which they are responsible, the members of the national office crisscross France. During these years, also sets up a funny game, to which the members of the leadership devote themselves: to get number and address of a militant whom they spotted before calling her down from her house in the middle of the night and insist on being lodged. Methods that Jean-Baptiste Prevost completely refutes, explaining that he "never searched or found a number in the files of the Unef" and that he never chose "himself" his accommodation in the provinces. These evenings sometimes end with sexual intercourse. Then the question of consent arises. Tacitly granted, forgotten, extorted?"They were playing on solidarity, compassion and their status as national leaders: we were in the middle of an abuse of unequal power" says Maria C., a member of the organization's leadership from 2006 to 2009, for whom "many cases at the UNEF do not fall under the law because it is inadequate".

What most of the women interviewed by Libération tell us seems at least to be harassed by Jean-Baptiste Prévost. But the rest, all the rest? We enter a grey area. Initially, most activists accepted the game of seduction and sexual intercourse. And since they said nothing at the time, they fear not to be believed or to be the target of pressure from their former comrades. "To survive the Unef, you have to be a strong woman, it's impossible to be perceived as a victim," says Sorayah M., member of the national office from 2008 to 2012. "We were taught to arm ourselves, strength was valued and allowed you to progress in the union, to speak would have been an admission of weakness, adds Florine Tillié, former president of Unef Champagne-Ardenne. But the psychological consequences of such a devaluing system for women are destructive, even years later. "

Single-sex meetings and vote on a "feminist motion"
The leadership screed cracked little by little. Single-sex meetings have been in place for a few years to allow women to speak freely. Thanks to the mobilization of some leaders and men more sensitive to the feminist cause - Julie Mandelbaum or William Martinet -, the union goes year in year out to continue its change. "To blame the organization is too easy: it is about individual behaviours, explains Lilâ Le Bas, the current president of Unef. A host of sexist schemes have been deconstructed by our tools, they now allow women to speak without fear of harming the image of the organization".

In 2013, at the Toulouse congress, the UNEF activists voted for a "feminist motion". From the back of the room rises the song of the MLF (Women's Liberation Movement): "We recognize, women. Let's talk, let's look at ourselves. Together, we are oppressed, women. Together, let's revolt. " Half of the room sings to heart and applauds wildly. At the podium, one of their comrades pushes the point: "Tonight the organization is saying goodbye to sexism. Good Djebara! " The pun, transparent, aimed at Azwaw Djebara, vice president of Unef on departure. He is very close to former President Prévost. Indirectly targeted, it reflects a large deep anger in the room, revolted treatment that is reserved for his friend. For him, a man of the direction, it is respected."When Prévost became president of Unef, he twisted, analyzes today a former general secretary of the union. His attitude has unlocked stuff in the heads of other guys in the national office. They felt allowed to mix everything up. "

No medical support or court report
Entered the UNEF in the mid-2000s, A., 30 years old today, illustrates for many the laissez-faire of the UNEF in the face of sexual violence. For several years, the reports about him will go up to the top of the pyramid, without anything move. The testimonies collected by Libération nevertheless seem to allow to trace at least half a dozen criminal facts wrong.

Sometimes, her victims have never spoken, as Laurence*, an activist in the Paris region. Before confiding in Libération, she had never even "said aloud" what happened to her one evening in December 2007, after a party with activists of the Unef in Paris. The hour of the last subway passed, Laurence has to sleep on the spot and settles in a room which one lends to her. A comrade arrives next to her on the mattress on the floor. It's A. "After a while, I felt something hard against my buttocks. I'm panicked: I did not want any relationship before marriage, recalls the former activist. I say no, I ask him to stop. And he says in my ear: "If you want to remain a virgin, you can suck me, or I take you from behind." " Far from stopping in the face of resistance from Laurence, the activist continues: "He touches my buttocks even more intimately with their fingers. " Terrified, she finds the strength to leave the bed, the bedroom and the apartment: " I preferred to be alone in the street at 2 in the morning rather than stay in this situation. " During his years at the UNEF, Laurence never slept with other comrades and will keep anger.

But often, the victims of A. have alerted. In 2008, Sophie*, a provincial activist, sympathizes with him. After an event at his college, he waits at home for his train to Paris. While they are discussing, the young man gets up, goes behind the militant and begins to massage her shoulders. "I went into a state of stupefaction, says Sophie. I remember then being on my bed, I think he carried me there. He acted like an animal, my head dissociated from my body. I see my naked breasts, my body was not responding. He said to me: "Come on, we'll do it quickly, we can do it in fifteen minutes, we both know how good it is."The activist's cell phone rings, interrupting what she now calls sexual assault. She lies, says that her sister arrives. But A. insists. "I just want him to leave, I'm scared. I smile, " recalls Sophie, who gets rid of the activist after a long negotiation. Quickly, she reports what happened to her to the leadership. They believe it but they do not act. "We'll have an eye on it," says Sophie. But no medical accompaniment or court report. Nothing. Perhaps because he is the archetype of a dedicated unionist, always available, able to stand up to other union forces. "A. was the complete activist," confirms a former executive.

Protecting Individuals
Today, A. does not dispute the facts, although he explains that he did not know at the time that this was under the criminal code. In the long written answer which he sent to Libération, the thirty-year-old teacher in Ile-de-France recounts his heavy family history. He does not give in - "the facts are true" - but he explains his background: a father who mistreats his children and ends up convicted for the rape of his two sisters and a young cousin, the family that explodes in flight, the union as a refuge. "When I arrived at university, the Unef seemed like an outlet for my family context," he explains.

After passing through several Parisian schools, he landed at the University Paris-I to finish his studies. The Sorbonne, the largest local UNEF, including several activists will speak of having been victims of sexual assault on his part in the year 2013. Like Diane*, who spent an evening at home with other members of Unef, in July. The last subway missed, she asks to sleep there. "He proposed to me to sleep in his bed telling me that he was going to sleep somewhere else," recalls the activist, who falls asleep before waking up with a start in the morning. "He had his hands on my breasts and in my panties. I tried to push him away, he insisted. I dropped from bed to escape and left without saying anything. "This time, A. argues the misunderstanding but again recognizes a sexual assault. After much hesitation, Diane talks about what happened to Marie D., the local president, who decides to conduct her investigation and accumulates several stories of aggression. At the start of the academic year, Diane worries: "I was afraid for new students who did not know him. We organized ourselves never to leave him alone in the room with the younger ones. " Individual protections. The actions of the militants are no longer described euphemized the local ranks. "Before, all these cases were below the waterline," says a former leader. "The water level is falling and issues are coming back to the surface. Little by little, thanks to UNEF's progress on these questions, A. was less and less protected".

But it will take more time for management to officially position itself on his case. Given the testimony that accumulates, many women will try to obtain a sanction from the board of control of Unef against A. What they are denied. The body is nevertheless responsible for deciding on the most serious cases and allows - normally - the official exclusion of activists. "In 2006, during the campaign against the CPE, members of a minority trend of Unef had punctured the tires of one of our trucks in the middle of a protest, they were expelled this commission," says a former leader. Nothing like that for sexual abuse. "We were told that it could not be about sexual violence, we were strolled", remembers Lauranne Witt, a former Unef executive, who hoped to put in place a valuable tool in case similar events happen again. "The way we managed this is very revealing, says Sebastien Chaillou, treasurer of the Unef at the time. It was not organized and it was about the will of a few people. We protected the union, but not its members."

"A written record"
In February 2014, the National Council, which includes all Local Presidents, will end up voting on a resolution directly referring to A's behaviour. "It happened, is happening and will happen that women in the organization are victims of violence or harassment. It is important to be able to provide an answer that will build the union", reads the text, but A. was erased at the last minute. We still pray the activist not to come in the official meetings of the UNEF.

Far from the "militant cadres", A. continues however to frequent the friendly evenings and maintains his connections to the Unef. Having become a teacher, he takes his card at Snes and tries to recruit supervisors. In early summer 2015, he posted an ad on Facebook. Recently enrolled at the Unef, looking for a job, Charlotte*, a barely major activist, contacted him without worry. She finds A. in a bar in Paris: "He paid me glasses without asking my opinion. One, two, three, five ... Then we went to his place. I was drunk, I drank too much, " says Charlotte. A. undressed. "I was lying on the bed, he undressed me, tells the young woman.And then he was on me and penetrated me. I told him that I did not want and that I was tired, he tried to kiss me, I was totally stuck. "

Today, A. disputes this version of the facts: for him, this sexual intercourse was consensual. Charlotte will erase this moment from her memory for months. But in March 2016, she finally decides to file a complaint of "rape". Near the Halles, in the centre of Paris, a police officer at the police station reception asked her to tell him about her rape. Outside and without a written statement. "His reaction was between humiliation and the gritty joke, I left," says Charlotte. She then crosses the Seine and goes to another police station. There, listening to her story, a young police officer dismisses her. For him, "it was not a rape," and "it was enough to just say no".

On the advice of an officer and a police more responsive to Charlotte eventually came to the head of Paris's 3rd judicial police district. She remembers the brigadier who never asks her about the facts but about her reactions: "Why did you not fight?", "Why did not you scream?" ... It also makes Charlotte understand that with a complaint, she will face her attacker and that the procedure will be long and expensive. As a result, she is content with a diary entry. Consulted by Libération, the entry of March 17, 2016, ended with these words: "I just want a written record of these events to exist". A little paper evidence in the middle of the silence.



* names of individuals have been changed

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France: Unions debate how to fight Macron’s anti-worker reforms

Lisbeth Latham

One of France's largest union confederations, the General Confederation of Workers (CGT), held a strike on October 19 as part of the campaign against the anti-worker and anti-union ordinances adopted by the Emmanuel Macron government.

The mobilisations were far smaller than the previous three days of protests and have further fuelled discussion within the movement over how to overcome divisions and weaknesses and mobilise the widespread latent public opposition to the government's attacks.

The October 19 strikes and mobilisations by the CGT were announced on October 9 – a day prior to a public sector workers’ strike – with the aim of driving forward the movement. However, the result was about 100,000 workers participating in the October 19 mobilisations – roughly half the size of the September 21 mobilisations and about a quarter of the size of the September 12 protests, the largest mobilisation of the campaign to date.

The call for the strike came after the first inter-union meeting involving all the union confederations was held on October 9, the first of its kind during the current campaign. It was widely known that the CGT would call the strike and that the militant trade union Solidaires would support, but there was no effort made at that meeting to draw the other confederations into the mobilisations.

Conservative unions

The failure to seek to draw other unions into the mobilisation reflects deep problems in the current campaign.

This includes the refusal by conservative unions, particularly the French Confederation of Democratic Workers (CFDT), to join the movement.

The potential of drawing them in seems even bleaker following the publication in Le Monde on October 23 of statements made by CFDT secretary general Laurent Berger at the confederation’s October 18-19 National Council meeting. Berger described the joint mobilisations as a “demonstration of weakness” and the CGT as “the Titanic, who wants to ride on the Titanic?”.

However, the left unions have also displayed an inability to engage and draw in more militant members of conservative unions.

While this objective is easier said than done, the CGT has been heavily focused on individual sections of its own confederation rather than trying to find ways to broaden the movement. While this has at times achieved some gains – such as truck drivers and wharf workers securing concessions that would limit the extent to which enterprise agreements can undermine sectoral agreements – the isolated strikes have had a tendency to leave the more militant sections of the movement on their own.

Where they have won concessions, those victories have undermined the capacity to mobilise these militant and strategically-located workers in support of the broader movement.

New Anti-Capitalist Party (NPA) militant Robert Pelletier, writing in the NPA's l'Anticapitaliste, argues that a major problem undermining mobilisations has been the determination of the leaders of the major confederations to participate in "dialogue" with the government.

The worst perpetrators have been the leaders of Workers Force (FO) and the CFDT, who despite anger from their rank-and-file and lower-level leaders, have accepted the attacks and argued that engagement with the government has served to limit the damage and helped to make progress in building "social dialogue".

However, this engagement has not been limited to the more conservative unions. CGT leaders have also engaged in dialogue and are seeking to participate in the next round, which will focus on the government's proposed attacks on vocational training, apprenticeships and unemployment insurance.

Pelletier argues that this engagement undermines the extent to which the government fears union threats of mobilisation. He argues that the focus should instead be on building upon the existing resistance by workers – particularly through the calling of indefinite strikes – while moving away from union-by-union and sector-by-sector strikes towards a united movement.

United convergence

Solidaires has continued to push for united mobilisations supported by all union confederations. It had been seeking to bring union leaders together for a discussion on a united response since May – that was only achieved on October 9.

In a statement following their leadership's October 17 meeting with the government to discuss the ordinances, Solidaires called for the rejection of the current ordinances, the repeal of the anti-worker 2016 El Khomri Law brought in by the previous Socialist Party government and rejection of the government’s prioritisation of "flexibility" over security for workers.

Solidaires is working to win agreement for a mid-November convergence of the struggles of workers, unemployed and retirees. It presented proposals for how to achieve this convergence to the inter-union meeting on October 24. Solidaires stated that "the constitution of a strong and determined social movement is urgently needed".

An agreement was reached at the October 24 meeting between the CGT, Solidaires and the FO for a joint mobilisation on November 16. Although opposed by the CDFT, the call has also been endorsed by UNEF, France’s main university student union, and two high school student unions. These student organisations played a critical role in the early stages of the 2016 protests against the El Khomri Law.

Another organisation pushing for a united mobilisation has been the Social Front (FS), which was established in late April by activists frustrated by the collapse of the 2016 movement.

FS has been building up its support with more than 130 union, social justice and political organisations from across France affiliating to the organisation.

It also successfully built a series of united mobilisations against Macron following the first round of the presidential elections in April. FS has called for a joint protest on November 18 against Macron’s policies. Activists from FS addressed the October 24 inter-union meeting seeking to win support for the mobilisation. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[This article was originally published inGreen Left Weekly #1159]

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France: Struggle over workplace rights looms as Macron secures power

Lisbeth Latham

The parliamentary majority President Emmanuel Macron’s coalition won in the second round of legislative elections held on June 18 was reported as a triumph against the weakened forces of both the left and the traditional right.

But questions have emerged over the real strength of the government as it prepares an assault on the rights of workers and their unions.

The parliamentary majority secured by Macron’s La Republique en Marche (LREM) and the allied Democratic Movement (MoDem) was smaller than expected. They won 360 seats in the 577-seat body (313 LREM and 47 MoDem respectively) — down from predictions after the first round of as many as 440 seats.

Despite still winning a clear majority, the stability of the government is questionable. In the week after the second round, the government had four ministers resign over a 48-hour period. The resignations relate to two separate sets of corruption scandals.

All of MoDem’s ministers have resigned, including party leader Francois Bayrou, over allegations that MoDem misused European Union parliamentary funds. Another minister who resigned was Richard Ferrand, also LREM’s secretary-general, who faces allegations of profiting from real estate sales while the head of a health insurance fund.

None of the four ex-ministers have been charged, and two now lead LREM and MoDem in parliament.

The traditional right-wing parties were weakened in the elections, losing 93 seats to hold just 136. The far-right National Front failed to reproduce Marine Le Pen’s success in the presidential elections, winning eight seats (up from the two in 2012).

However, the big losers were left parties.

The combined left vote, including Jean-Luc Melenchon’s France Unbowed(FI), was the lowest combined vote in the first round for socialists/communists since World War II. The Socialist Part and its allies won just 45 seats, down from 331 in 2012.

FI won 17 seats, allowing it to form its own parliamentary group. The French Communist Party (PCF) received its lowest vote ever, but still increased its seat tally from seven to 11.

There were efforts to form a united parliamentary group between the FI and PCF. However, attempts were blocked by ongoing tensions between the groups.

Although the PCF does not have sufficient seats to form its own parliamentary group on its own, it was able to do so by securing the participation of five left MPs elected from France’s overseas territories.

The PCF and FI pledged to work together to fight against Macron’s neoliberal agenda for France. While the pledge may be undermined by their forces being divided in parliament, a far bigger problem is that the forces do not exist in parliament to build a left opposition capable of blocking Macron’s agenda.

Therefore, if Macron is to be stopped, it will be in the streets.

The first major attack looming against the popular classes is new proposed workplace laws. These follow on from the laws passed last year.

On June 28, the government presented an enabling bill that would introduce temporary ordinances to undermine the Labour Code. Once an enabling law has been passed, such ordinances are short term orders that change the laws for a period of time while the legalisation is still being debated. The enabling bill (but not the ordinances) will be debated on July 24. The text for the ordinances isnot expected to be published until September.

The exact character of the attacks is unclear. The government has only been willing to meet with unions for six hours to verbally outline their plans. However, the changes are expected to further weaken the historic principle in French industrial relations that the three levels of agreements — national, industry, and enterprise — should only improve workers’ rights as the agreements flow down to the local level.

Since 2004, changes to France’s labour laws began to allow enterprise agreements to begin to undermine industry agreements to a limited extent. The General Confederation of Labour (CGT) expects the new changes to dramatically expand the areas in which an enterprise agreement can undercut industry level agreements.

Adding to this danger are the changes introduced in last year’s El Khomri labour laws, which make it dramatically easier for enterprise agreements to be imposed. The laws remove the ability of unions representing more than 50% of workers in workplace to veto an agreement negotiated by unions representing more than 30% of workers. Such an agreement can now be approved based on a ballot of workers.

If a new agreement undercuts existing conditions, it won’t automatically apply to existing workers. However, the El Khomri labour laws allow a company to sack any worker who refuses to accept the new lower conditions.

The CGT labelled the laws the death of industry level agreements and of the employment contract.

Resistance to the new laws has been muted. Protests have primarily been led by the Social Front (FS), which was established in April to bring together dozens of unions and social movement groups. FS called mobilisations on May Day, May 8 and June 19, with thousands taking to the streets in cities and towns across France.

A section of the more militant unions have begun to organise. On June 27, the CGT, Workers’ Force (FO), the trade union Solidaires and the United Trade Union Federation (FSU), along with the university student union UNEF, held a series of small demonstrations across France to coincide with MPs taking up their seats.

These unions have also called for joint mobilisations on September 12. The CGT has called for a day of strikes and protests.

This is an important step in building a movement in opposition to Macron’s attacks, but unions face a big hurdle in building a united movement to defend workers’ rights that they were unable to overcome last year. This is the refusal of the more conservative union confederations to mobilise their members to oppose the attacks.

Laurent Berger, the secretary- general of the French Democratic Confederation of Labour, expressed concerns at the pace at which the government is seeking to push through its changes. However, it has resisted being drawn on the proposals themselves.

This suggests the militant unions and the FS have considerable work ahead if they are to draw the members and supporters of the conservative unions into the streets.

Originally published in Green Left Weekly #1143.

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France: "Employment" Bill - After the government coup, the inter-union coordiation call for the amplification of mobilisations

Wednesday, May 11, 2016
Humanite.fr
CGT, FO, FSU, Solidaires, UNEF, UNL, FIDL call workers, youth, and students to strikes and demonstrations on May 17 and 19.

Draft Employment Law: Amplify the mobilization against the denial of democracy! Communique of the inter-union coordination.

While wage earners, young people, private sector employees, and retirees mobilised for more than two months for the withdrawal of the labor bill and to obtain new rights, and while public opinion remains overwhelmingly opposed to the text of the bill, the government decided to force it through using Clause 49.3[1]. Unacceptable!

These mobilisations forced the government to propose amendments[2] to the bill that would minimise its impacts. But this is not enough!

A labour code for business which undermines the "hierarchy of norms" which provides protection and equality, endures in the bill. Scandalous!

Several professional sectors continue to develop actions and strikes (railway, road transport, energy, chemicals, construction, Paris airport, etc.), which are supported by dynamic elements in pursuit of amplifying and expanding the balance of forces.

This reinforces the need to amplify the mobilisations already planned throughout the country for May 12.

From all this, the trade unions CGT, FO, FSU, Solidaires and youth organisations, UNEF, UNL and FIDL invite their structures to hold general meetings with the wage earners to discuss the forms of actions and strikes and for their renewal.

They call their organisations to build two new days of strikes and demonstrations for Tuesday, May 17 and Thursday, 19 May.

In addition, they do not depart from any initiatives for the coming weeks, including a national demonstration.

To assert their proposals they decide to go together to the President of the Republic to be received urgently.

A new meeting of trade unions will be held early next week to decide on new mobilisations.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 Refers to Article 49-3 of the French Constitution, "commitment of responsibility" it allows the government to pass a bill without a vote unless a vote of no confidence is successful against the government with 48 hours of bill being pushed through.
2 More than 5000 amendments were made to the bill when it was introduced into parliament, the text of the bill had also undergone significant changes during the process of it being accepted by the council of ministers - these changes had been aimed at splitting more conservative forces away from the more militant unions and to undermine mobilisations.

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France: Worker and Student Unions Call for Further Strikes and Protests on April 5 and April 9

CGT, FO, FSU, Solidaires, UNEF, UNL and FIDL

Joint Communique

March 31, 2016

The powerful day of strikes and demonstrations involving more than a million people in 260 cities demonstrated the unwavering determination of university and high school students, wage earners, private-employment and retirees to obtain both the withdrawal of the labour bill and to conquer new social rights.

The unions CGT, FO, FSU, Solidaires, UNEF, UNL and FIDL reaffirm that in a context of rising unemployment, explosion of precariousness and poverty, this text will organize a general regression of rights, creating a dumping social between companies of the same territory and the same branch and aggravate inequalities between wage earners.

Contrary to the government, labour bill would create in any case the permanent jobs needed for recovery and investment.

The government must listen to the thousands of university and high school student, wage earners, workers in private companies and retirees who were today in the streets and at the strike calls in many companies. They must hear calls on behalf of the 70% of the population who believe the government must remove the text, it is not amendable as its overall philosophy would remain unchanged.

The signatory unions argue again that governments must guarantee the right to demonstrate, to assemble, to organize, while ensuring the safety of protesters.

They confirm their readiness to meet with the government and make new proposals on rights in terms of employment, wages and pensions, working time, social protection, group benefits, working conditions, training and rights union freedoms. Bearing proposals for social progress and corresponding to the reality of work today and for tomorrow.

Already, new days of mobilization with strikes and demonstrations are planned and that on 5 April at the initiative of the youth organizations. The wage earners will mobilize in various forms, including with the interpellation of parliamentarians.

On April 9, they call for the success of a new great action day of strikes and demonstrations.

If the government does not respond, the trade unions CGT, FO, FSU, Solidaires, UNEF, UNL, LDIFs remain determined to continue and mobilization, including demonstrations and general strikes, for the withdrawal from the labour bill and conquer new social rights. They decided to meet again on 6 April.

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France: As mass protests and strikes loom, the challenges and potential of a movement to defeat the work law

Lisbeth Latham
Today (March 31) workers, students, unemployed and retirees will join the fourth mass mobilisation against the attemps of the Parti Socialiste lead government of Prime Minister Emmanual Valls to pass a new work law. This new legislation if passed will significantly reduce the rights of French workers The, legislation which is popularly referred to as El Khomri, in reference to labour minister Myriam El Khomri, will deepen the efforts of previous efforts by both the current PS government and earlier right-wing government’s to make workers and other popular sections of French society pay for capital’s crisis. Despite the mobilisations against the law, media commentary are seeking to portray these mobilisations as fruitless against the inevitable introduction of the "necessary" liberalisation of France’s labour laws. This dismissal has centred on the relatively small size of the current movement in comparison to previous French mass mobilisations around workers’ rights. This article will explore the proposed bill and the emerging movement against the new laws comparing this movement with previous mass French mobilisations within the world of work and examining the new challenges it faces within current political landscape in France.

The initial proposed bill contained significant attacks on both working conditions and unions, these included:

Increased number of consecutive weeks where workers can be required to work overtime – the French working week is 35 hours, however this can currently be increased to 44 hours (with paid overtime) for a period of 12 consecutive weeks. The bill would this to be extended 16 consecutive weeks – where an enterprise agreement had been reached this could be extended to 46 hours over a maximum of 16 weeks;

Capping of payments to workers who are unfairly dismissed at 15 months of salary;

Making It easier to for employers to force part-time employment – current provision requires that for part-time work to be implemented, the employer must give prior notification to the labor inspectorate in order to avoid abuse. The bill proposed that the employer be able implement part-time work unilaterally;

Removal of the legal entitlement to bereavement leave (presently set at two days) with local agreements determine whether workers have access to such leave and its duration;

Increase in the maximum duration of night work from 40 hours per week for three months to 40 hours a week for four months;

Increased use of "package-days" where work is expressed in days rather than hours – 50% of French managers already are employed on this basis – the change would extend the practice to more workers – with enterprises with less than 50 employees not needing an enterprise agreement to implement. The proposal would also remove responsibility for ensuring workers take minimum hours of rest between work days or days off;

Varying of work time over three years. Under France’s 35 hour week it is possible for hours to be averaged over a number of weeks (if the average over this time is not above 35 hours) then no overtime is paid. If there is no enterprise agreement then the maximum span of time that hours can be averaged over is four weeks – with an agreement the maximum is one year. The proposed change is that this be extended to three years. In companies with less than 50 employees were no agreement is in place the four weeks could be extended to sixteen weeks;

Increase in the work week for apprentices under the age of 18 – the current maximum working hours are 35 hours per week and eight hours a day – the new maximums would be 40 hours a week and ten hours – this increase would not need to be approved by the labour inspectorate;

Making it easier for employers to force through enterprise level agreements – current provisions requires that for an enterprise agreement to be valid it must be agreed to by one or more unions representing 30% of employees (based on votes France’s union representative elections) and that the agreement is not opposed by unions representing more than 50% of workers. The new law would allow a company referendum will validate an agreement even if the unions representing 70% of workers are opposed;

Companies would be able to reduce wages or increase working hours (with no increase in wages) even when company is not having financial difficulties. Currently can do this (for a maximum of two years) if they are facing financial difficulties if workers and unions agreed – the proposed change would allow companies to propose the change if they felt it would enable them to meet a business opportunity, to do so they would be able to bypass unions and put a vote to workers – if a majority approved the change any worker who refused to accept the change could be sacked without any redundancy payment;

Ending the right to  11 consecutive hours of rest between "package-days" – instead breaks would be able to be broken up with periods of work within these 11 hours. If a worker is on call then on call, the period that they on call and not  engaged in work would count as part of the rest period;

Change of mission of occupational physicians – occupational physicians are currently primarily responsible for prevention of workplace injury, and is in place with a focus on the health of workers. Their objective is to maintain of employees to perform their duties - by proposing adaptations to them if necessary. The new bill would give physicians a new mission: to certify "the ability of the employee to exercise any of the existing tasks in the company" and "to ensure the compatibility of the worker's health the position to which he is assigned" – which is an inversion of the current role and significant attack on workplace safety;

Leave during natural disaster no longer be legally guaranteed - currently the length of leave for natural disasters is 20 days guaranteed by law. With the bill, it is the branch or company agreement that will define its duration and the conditions for access;

The duration and terms of a sabbatical would no longer guaranteed by law - the minimum duration of the sabbatical leave is currently set at a minimum of six months  and a maximum of eleven months. With the bill, any access to a sabbatical, and its duration, would be defined in an enterprise or branch agreement;

Weakening of job training programs – currently young workers or older unemployed workers can enter into a "professional contract" which includes on the job training for a recognised qualification while receiving a subsidised wage – the bill would allow these contract to include more limited on the job training that would not result in a recognised qualification;

Increased use of three year wage deals – currently there are mandatory annual negotiations on wages. Since 2015, it is possible for an enterprise to hold its negotiations every three years if there is a majority agreement in place in that company. The bill will allow a branch agreement to be negotiated triennially based on 30% support in that branch of industry;

Allow for the state to finance private apprenticeship training providers;

Facilitate dismissals during the transfer of business - currently, when a company sells all or part of its business, jobs are maintained and work contracts are automatically transferred into the new structure. The bill will provide for a portion of employees to be transferred with the business, but will allow for the dismissal of others;

Allow for part-time worker to be paid less for additional hours – currently when part-time workers work hours in addition to their contract they get a differented payment of additional wages – for those hours that constitute upto 1/10 of the contracted hours they receive a loading of 10% on the additional hours worked and a loading of 25% for all hours in addition to this – only a branch agreement can change this arrangement to a flat additional payment of 10%. Under the bill all part-time workers would receive a 10% loading – this change will have a significant impact on gender equality as women workers make up 82% of all part-time workers in France;

Reduce notice period for changes in rosters – currently part-time employees must given seven days notice of a change in their work schedule – only a branch or enterprise can reduce this to a shorter period (with a minimum of three days). The bill provides for that the schedule change is possible for all part-time workers with three days notice;

Employers able to change paid leave arrangements at short notice - the law currently provides that employers should take into account workers’ family situations when determining dates for paid leave. Within a month scheduled beginning of a workers’ leave the employer has no right to change the start or finish dates of the leave. With the proposed bill, these mandatory measures were transformed into 'supplemental' provisions. They can be challenged by way of enterprise or branch agreement;

Under the bill enterprise agreements would have a maximum of 5 years – Current enterprise agreements last indefinitely, unless otherwise provided in the Agreement, or terminated by either party. The agreement can be unilaterally denounced by trade unions signatories or by the employer. In this case, the rights and entitlements within the agreement continue to apply until there is a new agreement. Once terminated there is a three-month notice period before renegotiation begins, allowing trade unions to prepare, inform and mobilize workers ... With the proposed bill, all enterprise agreements have a term of 5 years. The provisions of the agreement are immediately canceled and cease to apply, even if there is no new agreement. There is no notice period prior to the beginning of negotiations;

Overpayment: employment centre can draw directly on unemployment benefits - When an employment centre claims to have made a mistake in the payment of unemployment benefits and wishes to recover the overpayment it must get the approval of a judge. This ensures that the overpayment was actually made (sometimes it hasn’t been) and allows the unemployed person to arrange for repayments to be made in instalments. With the proposed bill the judge's approval is no longer mandatory. The employment centre will directly deduct the overpayment from following month’s benefits payment. If the employment centre made a mistake, it unemployed person to go to court to their money repaid. This risks unemployed workers suddenly facing having little or no money one month to another. The spreading of repayments, which has been previously easily accessed, will be much harder to obtain;

On call-time may be counted as rest time – in violation of the European Committee on Social Rights requirements that time when works are required to be on call not be counted as mandated rest-time between working time the proposed bill will allow this to occur;

Reduced protections for employees who invalidly made redundant - when a court declares a redundancy void the worker is entitled to reinstatement. When this is not possible the current law provides 12 months of salary compensation to a minimum. The new law will limit this to six months, and this will only be for works with at least two years of service with the company;

Lower allowances for dismissed sick and injured workers - when a worker is dismissed for incapacity following an industrial accident or an occupational disease and the employer took no steps to find alternative work or arangements – the dismissal is not valid. The current law provides for compensation of a minimum of 12 months of salary. The bill proposes that this be only 6 months salary;

Enterprise agreements will be able to reduce overtime payments – the Labour Code provides that the first eight hours of overtime attract a penalty rate of 25% with subsequent hours paid an additional 50%. Under the proposed bill management will be able through an enterprise agreement to reduce the overtime rate to a flat 10% rate.

The government has motivated these changes on the idea that France’s existing labour code deter investment in the French economy and discourage companies from taking advantage of business opportunities (for fear of a subsequent contraction in the business) – the reality is that much of the changes have a significant capacity to undermine job creation – this is particularly the case for the provisions for increasing the work week – even those that supposedly make investment "less risky" they don’t address the key cause of France’s economic woes (the ongoing effect of the GFC) nor do they address the reality that outside of a sharp decline in demand companies have the capacity to adjust employment numbers without recourse to redundancy through mechanisms of natural attrition.

Blaming the growth on precarious employment in France on "rigid employment laws" is undermined by the reality that more liberalised labour markets, like Australia, have extremely high levels of insecure and precarious employment.

The proposed bill has caused widespread anger across France – with opinion polls indicating 70% opposition. A change.org petition against the bill launched in February received 200, 000 signitures in the first four hours of being online, the petition has now been signed by more than 1.2 million people.

March 9 strikes and mobilisations
Strikes and mobilisations were called in 140 cities and towns across France for March 9. These protests were supported by the three most militant union confederations – the CGT (Confédération générale du travail – General Confederation of Labour), FO (Force Ouvri – Workers Force) and the trade union Solidaires – in addition the call for the mobilisation was supported the large education union the FSU (Fédération syndicale unitaire – United Union Federation)and the university and high school student unions UNEF (Union Nationale des Étudiants de France – National Union of Students of France), FIDL (Fédération indépendante et démocratique lycéenne Independent and Democratic Secondary Student Federation) and UNL (Union Nationale Lycéenne – National Union of Secondary Students). Between 250, 000 and 500, 000 people participated in the protests across France (both the unions and the interior ministry employ official protest counters to count the size of protests – these counters differ in their methodology as to who should be included as a participant in the protests – with police only including those who within the confines of the march on the street – whilst the union counters will tend to include those who are on the edges of protests along the footpaths – which particularly makes sense on big mobilisations).Think this is too long to be in brackets and needs some full stops and that. The largest of these was held in Paris with between 27, 000 and 100, 000 participating in three protests across the day. In addition to the protests a number largest of these was in the SNCF (France’s national rail system) where four main rail unions (including reformist unions such as the Confédération française démocratique du travail (French Democratic Confederation of Labour - CFDT) and the Union nationale des syndicats autonomes (National Union of Autonomous Trade Unions)) had issued a strike notice resulting in significant disruptions to rail services over a range of issues including the ongoing reduction in the SNCF workforce via natural attrition of some 25, 000 workers over the past decade.

At the Paris union march from the MEDEF (Mouvement des entreprises de France – Movement of the Enterprises of France) to the ministry of labour, CGT general secretary Philippe Martinez told the crowd that in the CGT’s call (reformatting) that the government withdraw the bill that "The message is clear. Mr Hollande and Manuel Valls to stop incorporating the proposals of employers".

Some of the student slogans at the March 17 and March 24 protests included:
“On strike until retirement!”
“Be young and shut up!”
“Less valls, more tango” - a play on valse (waltz)
“You do not let us dream, we will not let you sleep!”
"The night is made for kissing, not for work”

In the lead up to the March 9 mobilisation the government announced that the presentation of the bill to the council of state would be delayed from the scheduled date of March 9 until March 24 – this was to provide more time for the draft bill to be amended to take on criticisms from both within PS and concerns from the more moderate unions particularly the CFDT - with three aspects expected to be changed. In the wake of the protests El Khomri announced that she would take on board calls. Prime Minister Valls announced he would meet with student organisations to discuss their concerns.

The bill presented to (and adopted by) the council of ministers on March 24 had undergone considerable changes including:

• Return to a maximum of 12 consecutive weeks of overtime;
• The proposal to extend the maximum number of consecutive weeks of overtime will be subject to a consultation period up until October;
• Proposal to cap unfair dismissal payments has been removed however there has been an indicative scale in place since 2013 for during the conciliation stage of unfair dismissal cases – the government has indicated that it will change this scale by decree (avoiding the need to have the law passed) and extend the scale to apply to awards in cases that move to trial;
• The provision to remove bereavement leave from the Labour Code has been withdrawn but other forms of leave such as carers leave will be determined in the enterprise agreement;
• For a company to implement the spreading of overtime over three years an enterprise level agreement would not be sufficient, instead there would need to be branch agreement in place;
• Increase in the hours for young apprentices was withdrawn (although companies will be able to apply to the labour inspectorate for an increase);
• proposal to allow unilateral introduction of part-time work dropped;
• Proposal to extend "package days" was modified to stop employers being able to unilaterally implementing "package days" – any shift would require agreement with union representatives in the enterprise;
• In the revised bill, the referendum on adopting a contested enterprise agreement is called "consultation". Initially, these "consultations" will not be implemented for determining working hours, however the bill provides for referendum to eventually apply to all sections of the Labour Code including working hours;
• Removal of the entitlement leave for caring for parent or close family with illness or disability (currently set at three months) and would have to be provided in an enterprise agreement.

In addition a new change was included removing the minimum payment for wrongful dismissal – at present if a worker is unfairly dismissed they receive a minimum payment of six months if the company has more than ten employees and they have more than two years of experience – the new proposal is to strip this protection entirely meaning a worker who is wrongfully dismissed could receive nothing.

While MEDEF and other employer groups have been critical of the government for buckling to the movement– the unions leading the mobilisations are clear that they want the bill withdrawn in its entirety.

A limited Movement?
Much of the mainstream English language media coverage of March 9 protests (the later student protests have barely rated a mention) have focused on the fact that this mobilisation was smaller than previous mass union mobilisations in France, (new sentence) most notably the 2010 movement against Francois Fillon’s assault on pensions – which featured seven days of mass strikes and protests between September 7 and October 28 of that year involving more than two million people and ongoing strikes in a number of sectors most notably the oil industry.

While these observations are true, they fail to recognise either the different context in which the current movement is occurring. Much of these conditions act to undermines mobilising capacity of the unions; or that of the big union mobilisations across the last decade only one of these began with truly large union mobilisations, while the others grew into a larger movement from a more modest beginning.

Looking at the experience of the previous campaigns there arethree distinct experiences for the movements of 2006, 2009 and 2010. In 2009 the movement against the austerity policies that sought to make working people pay for the capital’s crisis began with two mobilisations of more than two million people on January 29 and March 19. By May Day protest numbers were down to 1.2 million people, and the movement dissipated after the summer holidays. By comparison the unsuccessful campaign against pension reforms in 2011 began with mobilisations of around 800, 000 in March of that year (this mobilisation was supported by the entire labour movement). While the campaign against the first employment contract (CPE) in early 2006 initially attracted limited union participation in the protests. Instead the movement was driven by hundreds of thousands of university and high school students whose action during February helped to overcome the resistance of a number of union confederations to participating in the movement (largely to regain control of the movement from the insurgent student). Once the unions came on board the protests and strikes grew rapidly. With 1.5 million and 2.71 million on March 18 and 28 respectively and 3.1 million on April 4, resulting in the scrapping of the law on April 10 (another anti-worker law – the equal opportunity law – remained in place but the movement split and dissipated in the wake of the scrapping of the CPE).

The last three big national labour movements in France all occurred under governments of the right. The defeat of the 2011 movement saw a shift away from street mobilisation into hopes that change could be achieved through the ballot box – demonstrated by through the PS victory in the 2012 presidential and national assembly elections and the rise of Front de Gauche’s (an alliance of left parties centred around the PCF and the Parti de Gauche) whose presidential candidate Jean Luc Melechon achieved a vote of 11.10% in the presidential election. Since the 2012 election the PS and its governmental allies have been a disappointment to much of its base and the social forces to its left– not only has the PS failed to reverse the pension changes but has also deepened the liberalisation of the labour market in the interests of capital. These actions have resulted in the electoral rise of the Marine Le Pen’s far-right Front Nationale – and electoral decline of the PS and more importantly the parties to its left.

Unlike the previous mass worker and student mobilisations – the current mobilisations have not been united (with the "reformist" worker and student organisations not supporting the March 9 protest). This division makes it more difficult to build as large protests as in the previous movements. As to bring the members and supporters of the reformist unions (particularly the CFDT - , France’s largest union by membership) into motion, they have to be appealed to over the heads of the leaderships of their unions. However the absence of these forces means that there is a stronger basis for ongoing mobilisation as differences in objectives between the two wings of the union movement (demands for total withdrawal of the bill by the militant class struggle unions vs. calls for consultation and modification of the proposed text of the bill by the reformist forces) are not expressed within the movement itself. This presents a greater opportunity for mobilisations to continue if the legislation is passed, particularly compared to 2011, when the reformist unions who had sought greater consultation by the Fillon government withdrew completely from the movement once the legislation passed – resulting in the almost immediate collapse of the campaign.

An additional factor impacting on the mobilisations against the El Khomri bill is the continuing state of emergency in France (the state of emergency was initiated in the wake of the terror attacks in Paris on November and has since been extended twice). From its inception the state of emergency has stifled the re-emergence of union mobilisations – with strikes cancelled in the week following November declaration of the state of emergency. The state of emergency has also provided a space in which the state has been able to exercise significant levels of repression particularly directed at students- both at student mobilisations and against student organising. The most notable case of repression was the assault by riot police and BAC undercover police on a 15-year-old high school student who had his jaw broken by police - the video of this violence was shared widely and forced the Minister of Education, Najat Vallaud-Belkacem tweet regret about "shocking violence violence against high school student" (the police officer is now facing criminal charges and is expected to go on trial in May). A number of universities have been closed administratively to stop them being used as organising spaces, whilst there have been reports of CRS riot police actively excluding union activists from university general assemblies to stop them from participating in the deliberation and votes on further actions in the campaign.

Despite these difficulties and challenges there are important signs that movement that can challenge and potentially defeat the bill is developing. The most important aspect of this has been both ongoing organisation of students through the holding of general assemblies of students at universities and schools but also the development of joint actions between works and students between the mass days of mobilisations – which was so central to the 2006 campaign against CPE, albeit at lower level than in 2006. Since the lead up to the March 9 protests, student unions have holding general assemblies in which students come together to decide on the course of action at their institution – including whether the institution should be operating. These meetings, particularly at universities involve hundreds of students.

Where to for the movement

Today’s protests are an important test for the campaign. The growth in the size of the protests from March 9 will be important to maintaining momentum and in bringing pressure to bare on the government MPs, particularly those from the PS who are divided over the law - with its right-wing objecting to the concessions to the movement, center supporting the amended bill and left-wing opposing it.

The early signs for a growth in the movement are good with more protests scheduled across both metropolitan France and the overseas territories than on March 9. Equally important a statement by the leadership of Solidaires indicates that their militants are reporting that at the local level at least, it appears likely that members, and possibly some branches, of the CFDT will participate in some of the actions despite that confederation’s leadership not supporting the strikes and protest. However, the experiences of 2006, 2009 and 2010 suggest that the growing may not be enough for the movement to force the defeat of the bill either in parliament or once if it is passed. For the movement to have a strong chance of success it will need to increase in intensity and again in both amongst students and workers there are signs this is possible. Amongst students the general assemblies of students, particularly at university continue to grow – with some meetings involving more than 1000 students on individual campuses. Moreover like in 2006, there are reports of students linking up with striking workers and helping to spread the movement. Amongst workers, in a number of sectors, most notably the SNCF, there are discussions of launching "renewable strikes" where workers meet in the local workplace each day to vote on whether to continue their strike action – with general assemblies of workers being organised for tomorrow (April 1). There has already been a further day of protest called by the "facs in the struggle" – the campuses whose general assemblies have voted to participate in the campaign – for April 5.

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