Vinícius Portella
Porto Alegre,
22 0408 out 2010.
Struck off
Oct 13th 2010, 12:01 by The Economist online | PARIS
GIANT inflatable helium balloons. Vibrant flags and T-shirts in crimson, orange and fluorescent yellow. The sounds of chanting, laughter and the marching bass drum. There was a festive air about the demonstrations and strikes in France against pension reform yesterday, when up to 3.5m people took to the streets, a record turnout. Railwaymen, bus drivers, teachers, postmen, printers, public-sector workers and dockers were joined by schoolchildren in over 300 lycées (who have their own unions), and oil workers in 11 of the country’s 12 refineries, disrupting services across the country. But behind the merriment and street theatre lies the toughest test this year of the unions’ ability to force the government to back down.
A law that will raise the legal minimum retirement age from 60 to 62 years is going through parliament, and the upper house is due to conclude its voting on it next week. The stakes on both sides are high. President Nicolas Sarkozy needs to show that he can deliver reform despite his low popularity, partly to maintain France’s credibility in the bond markets. For the unions and the opposition on the left, whose leaders joined the rallies, the protests are their last chance to flex their muscles over the reform. This is why, for the first time this year, some sectors, including the SNCF rail operator and oil workers, have continued with rolling strikes. A further day of protests is planned for October 16th.
Certainly, the numbers impress. Even the government count, always below the unions’ more extravagant claims, recorded 1.2m protesters. Back in 1995, when weeks of crippling strikes forced Alain Juppé’s government to abandon an earlier attempt at pension reform, official figures put the biggest turnout at only 1m. When another prime minister, Dominique de Villepin, ceded to the street over labour-market reform in 2006, the authorities counted at most 1.1m. Buoyant union leaders say they will not give up, even after the law is voted. There is muttering about petrol shortages. With school pupils taking part, egged on by the Socialist Party, things could yet spin out of control.
There are, however, two differences with this round of protests. First, although the numbers on the streets are high, it is the strikes, not the demos, that have the power to disrupt. Thanks in part to a law designed to ensure minimum service in schools and on public transport during strikes, and to the fact that workers are no longer paid when they walk out, strikes do not paralyse the country in quite the way they once did. (French commuters have also learned to take one of their numerous days off during strikes, reducing the pressure on trains.)
At the same time, public opinion has shifted. This is not immediately clear from polls. Some 70% of respondents to one said that they backed the strikes, more than the 54%-62% in favour in late 1995. Yet this may be precisely because strikes are less intolerable now for those who do try to get to work. And for all the drama on the street, in the same poll 53% said that the raising of the retirement age was “acceptable” and 70% that it was “responsible vis-à-vis future generations”. A silent majority seems to know that demography and economics make pension reform inevitable.
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