Strikes mar festivities in France

Press, 26 December 1986, Page 5

Strikes mar festivities in France

NZPA-Reuter Paris Christmas in France has been marred by a rail strike that has virtually frozen all train travel in the country, and threatens to spread to other public industries.

Huge traffic jams snarled up the capital as Parisians sought to reach their holiday destinations by road as the week-long dispute over wages, working conditions and career prospects was still going strong on Christmas Eve.

Tour firms and the State-owned S.N.C.F. railways were forced to lay on buses to ferry travellers from blocked stations to the ski slopes and other areas.

The dispute has also delayed mail and driven up food prices because of distribution problems. Big Paris department stores have also suffered from a strike in the underground Metro system, and the absence of shoppers ' from the provinces.

The three-day Metro strike ended on Wednesday after talks between the main union, Syndicat Autonome Traction, and management. But no accord was reached on pay and other issues, and other unions called for a strike on December 30 and 31. Rail unions and S.N.C.F. management broke off discussions on Tuesday, with unions saying the S.N.C.F. refused to negotiate over working condi-

tions and career structure. S.N.C.F.’s managing director, Jean Dupuy, has described the company’s financial proposals, which include a 1.7 per cent wage rise in 1987, as “considerable.” Meanwhile, strikes by c seamen belonging to the Communist-led C.G.T. union, who oppose a Government plan to restructure the merchant navy, disrupted many ports, including Marseille in the south and Nantes-Saint-Nazaire in the west. Unions at the Stateowned gas and electricity utilities, G.D.F. and . E.D.F., threatened to start industrial action on January 5 unless the Government opened negotiations on pay. The strikes are a serious test for the nine-month-old Rightist Government of the Prime Minister, Jacques Chirac. The Government, which has already taken numerous measures to liberalise the economy and make working, time and conditions more flexible, is committed to fighting inflation . and unemployment. The Budget Minister, Alain Juppe, has said that the Government is ready to talk but wants to ensure that salaries did not get out of control in 1987. "The loss of control over salaries means the loss of control over inflation ... it means a new rise in unemployment,” he said.