The French post office union federations, CGT, SUD-PTT, CFDT, FO, CFTC and CGC, have called on postal workers nationally to strike and demonstrate on Tuesday, September 23 against the privatisation of La Poste.
The announced transformation of the public service into a public company (société anonyme) from January 2010, and the introduction of private capital from January 2011, means the privatisation of France’s no. 1 public service.
The unions have warned that opening up La Poste to private capital will be considered as a ‘declaration of war’.
During the summer the unions have been collecting signatures on petitions entitled ‘Hands off postal services’.
So far the the CGT has collected 80,000 and SUD-PTT 10,000. Meanwhile the ‘left parties’ – the PS, MRC, PRG and the PCF – are launching their own anti-privatisation petition, and the daily paper ‘Liberation’ is calling for the organisation of a referendum against post privatisation.
Also, this week the new school year began for some 12 million pupils.
Next week on Thursday, September 11 the teachers’ struggle resumes with a national day of action to protest about the 11,200 teaching posts cut by the Sarkozy government.
Also in the firing line will be the issues of oversize classes, increased teaching load and reductions in the quality of the curriculum on offer.
Primary education ‘reforms’ come into being this term with the school week being shortened to 24 hours as against the previous 26.
Teaching days will be either four or four and a half days per week with most schools opting for the four day version.
This will mean very long school days for the youngest children in the system.
Fears are that the four day week will become entrenched nationally.
Children who need extra help are supposed to qualify, after assessment, from October for an extra two hours per week tuition provided by teachers working ‘supplementary hours’.
The new primary programmes of study are being hurriedly introduced, against much educational opposition, on the orders of education minister, Xavier Darcos.
A right-wing ‘back to basics’ approach is the order of the day with the new teaching programmes putting the accent on maths, French language, the establishment of moral attitudes, and civic education.
A national demonstration in defence of state education, to take place in Paris, has just been called for Sunday, October 19.
Meanwhile, now that the summer holidays are over the French employers are due to reveal their plans which aim at getting rid of the famed French 35-hour week, one of the greatest achievements of the working class, and governed by the Aubry laws passed in 1998 and 2000.
How to unpick this legislation and increase the exploitation of the French workers has been a special project for the Sarkozy government.
Voted by parliament on July 23 and validated by the Constitutional Council on August 7th, a law concerning the reform of working time came into force on August 21.
It is framed so that the text says that the legal duration continues to be 35 hours per week, but gives the employers several ways of getting round the Aubry laws.
They are now empowered to conclude new working time agreements on a plant by plant, or industry basis, or enter into direct negotiations with their workers which will allow the lengthening of the working week.
However, the Sarkozy government’s key objective in its soon to be announced new health law: ‘Patients, Health, Distribution’ is the restructuring of the hospital system.
It plans to cut expenditure by eliminating as far as possible local small hospitals by linking them to larger central ones; the role of the local hospitals will be changed and essentially downgraded.
Previously Sarkozy had said that the changes would be the result of ‘incentivised’ local voluntary decisions but now it has been revealed in a draft of the new law that the state will be able to force hospitals to merge.
Once this is done the director of the new larger unit will have the power to direct resources away from the local sub-units.
Local resistance to any moves to weaken health provision is strong in France, as it is in the UK.
This was demonstrated in the community’s stubborn battle in Carhaix-Plouger (Finisterre) where the threatened maternity facility and the immediate future of the local hospital was saved.
The government’s restructuring plans are expected to meet similar determined opposition throughout France.
The French ‘reforms’ are being driven by the crisis of the ‘Eurozone’.
This was further revealed on Thursday when the euro sank to its lowest level of the year against the dollar after the European Central Bank cut its growth forecasts.
The dollar gained on sterling but fell against the yen as the market assessed potentially critical economic news from Europe and the United States.
At 2100 GMT, the euro was quoted at 1.4321 dollars against 1.4492 late on Wednesday.
The dollar stood at 107.33 yen from 108.27 on Wednesday.
Although stock markets were hammered by weak news from the US retail and job front, the dollar was supported by a survey from the Institute for Supply Management (ISM) which showed a rise in service sector activity in the United States.
The ISM index of nonmanufacturing activity came in at 50.6 from 49.5 in July and 48.2 in June, indicating modest economic expansion with a reading above 50.0.
‘The US economy appears to be muddling along and the people at the front lines, the purchasing managers, seem to agree with that sentiment,’ said Joel Naroff of Naroff Economic Advisors.
The outlook in Europe proved to be more troubling for currency traders.
Both the European Central Bank and the Bank of England announced Thursday that they had kept their key lending rates unchanged at 4.25% and 5.00%, respectively.
The decisions were widely expected, but comments by ECB president Jean-Claude Trichet moved the market afterwards.
He said the central bank had cut its 2008 growth forecast to 1.4% from 1.8%, and estimated growth next year at 1.2%, compared with its earlier outlook of 1.5%.
He gave no indication the bank was ready to lower interest rates to help stimulate the increasingly fragile-looking eurozone economy.
He did take note that the ‘euro area economy is currently experiencing an episode of weak activity,’ following a contraction in the second quarter, the 15-nation bloc’s first such decline.
‘There’s definitely an air of panic surrounding the health of national (European) economies,’ announced an analyst at CMC Markets, James Hughes.
The news came after British finance minister Alastair Darling said at the weekend that Britain was arguably facing its worst economic downturn in 60 years.
The whole of the ‘Eurozone’ is now starting to shiver with fear at what is about to happen to the economies of the main euro states, including France.