A third of service stations are still on strike. Pressure from Paris remains ineffective for the time being.
From north to south of France, the same scenes are repeated: closed stations, endless queues, rising prices and the morale of motorists at half mast.
For several weeks, the country has been affected by strikes in refineries and fuel depots, at the call of trade unions demanding wage increases. This social movement has started to create major difficulties for motorists since last week.
“When there are proposals for negotiations, you have to seize them. Otherwise it’s no longer a strike to obtain results, it’s quite simply a blockage of the country, and that’s not acceptable”, declared the Minister of the Economy Bruno Le Maire, on the media France Info.
“If (the union) CGT categorically refuses to engage in this discussion, we will have no other way than to requisition the means necessary to release the deposits and operate the refineries, quite simply because our compatriots cannot be the collateral victims of a social conflict between a trade union organization (…) and a private company”, he added.
“The government calls for all the blockages to be lifted without delay. Otherwise, we will take our responsibilities, that is to say that we could be forced to lift them”, also affirmed the government spokesperson. Olivier Véran, the day after an emergency meeting.
“Lack of anticipation”
At TotalEnergies, the employees voted again Monday morning “by a large majority for the continuation of the strike”, announced Eric Sellini, of the CGT. This concerns in particular its refinery in Normandy (north-west of France), its fuel depot in Flanders (north) and its “bio-refinery” in La Mède (south).
On the Esso-ExxonMobil side, the two French refineries have also renewed the movement, at the call of the FO and CGT unions, despite the signing the day before of a wage agreement by two majority organizations at group level but not refineries.
In the event of a requisition, “we will go to court to have them canceled”, assured Mr. Sellini, while the CGT of Esso-ExxonMobil denounced “a questioning of the right to strike”.
“We are not here to block the lives of all French people but to demand decent living conditions,” said Lionel Arbiol, spokesperson for CGT Esso.
The unions highlight the super profits made by the oil groups, which benefit from the surge in prices linked to the war in Ukraine. TotalEnergies thus reaped $10.6 billion in profits in the first half.
However, many motorists and certain leading professions deplore this situation, such as private nurses, who are worried about not being able to visit their patients and endangering their health.
“I spent three hours (noon yesterday) in the queue for a station. I had to do my rounds in speed and leave my patients on stand-by to go and fill up quickly”, explained to AFP Sandrine Monteiro, 35-year-old liberal nurse.
The oppositions accused the government, the right and the extreme right criticizing a “lack of anticipation” and a “febrility”, when the left denounced “threats for the employees but (of) caresses for the bosses”.
Mr. Véran estimated that regaining “normal functioning” in the most affected regions would “take a few days”, and assured that “this will be the case within 15 days”.
He also considered it abnormal that “a few strike profiteers” have caused “the prices of gasoline at the pump” to jump in certain stations.
This article has been published automatically. Sources: ats / blg / afp