FRANCE: Tens of thousands of people marched through the streets of major French cities yesterday to defend jobs, purchasing power and the rights of workers.
The biggest demonstration took place in Paris, between the Place de la République and the Place de la Nation. The communist trade union CGT claimed 150,000 people participated in the march, under a sea of red flags.
An estimated 11,000 marched in Lyons, 13,000 in Nantes, 15,000 in Toulouse and 26,000 in Bordeaux.
Yesterday was the first big strike day since March 10th, and it was hard to escape the impression that the steam has gone out of protest in France.
Even the warning by Bernard Thibault, leader of the CGT, was tepid: "If in the next few days there are not tangible signs that the government and MEDEF (employers' syndicate) are responding to demands, we are resolved to follow up."
The Villepin government is careful not to offend anyone, especially the civil servants who comprise one-third of the workforce. There's not much to reproach the government for, other than the contrat nouvelle embauche which allows employers to fire without justification for the first two years.
Joblessness has decreased by 80,000 in the past three months, bringing France just under the 10 per cent unemployment line. But there is widespread dismay that the shoe manufacturers Kélian and Jourdan, Hewlett Packard computers, the food group Nestlé and the SNCM Corsican ferry service are all shutting down, laying off or privatising.
Outside Paris, public transport was severely affected by the strike, but in the capital, a new system of "guaranteed service" on strike days was tried for the first time. One-third of trains and two out of three buses and metros functioned normally.
Most of the socialist party's half dozen 2007 presidential candidates marched in regional demonstrations, including party leader François Hollande, Laurent Fabius and Jack Lang.
The National Assembly was half empty.