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| Europe |
| French unions challenge work order |
| 2010-10-24 |
| [Al Jazeera] French unions have challenged a back-to-work order in court, a day after the country's senate voted in favour of the government's controversial pensions reforms. Protesters showed no sign of giving up further industrial action and have vowed more days of strikes in their months-long struggle against the bill that extends the retirement age from 60 to 62. The union's legal challenge on Saturday focuses on a "requisition" order to employees at the Grandpuits oil refinery, a key plant that supplies the Paris region with 70 per cent of its fuel, for them to return to work. A requisition can be issued by French authorities when they believe a strike poses a threat to public order and compels strikers to return to work, under threat of prosecution. Riot police were sent in to clear pickets blocking the site early on Friday, clearing an 80-strong "citizens' cordon" of strikers and local supporters. Union officials said a number of the protesters were hurt when they were kicked by police. But staff who had been ordered back to work downed tools again overnight after a judge ruled the government's requisitioning had been illegal. The judge said the prefect, or central government's local representative, had erred by requisitioning virtually all the workers at the refinery, which meant the site was running normally. The authorities immediately issued another requisition order at the plant, which the unions are now appealing against. The interior ministry said that the new requisition only ordered to work a "strictly necessary" number of staff and that trucks were taking fuel from the refinery's depot. French families faced major fuel shortages on Saturday at the start of half-term holidays, with unions blockading all 12 refineries in the country. Six out of 10 filling stations were dry or had run out of at least one fuel in western France and a third in the Paris region, Jean-Louis Borloo, the energy minister, told journalists. Seven of France's 100 administrative areas or departments were short of fuel after a spate of panic buying brought, he said. |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #1 French unions have challenged a back-to-work order in court.. Sometime around a hundred years ago, the French railway unionist went on strike shutting down the economy. The government ordered the strikers back to work with the threat that if they did not, all of them would be 'drafted'/activated into the army, put in front of courts martial, and shot. Strike ended. How times have changed. |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2010-10-24 12:22 |