{"id":434165,"date":"2025-09-18T18:03:13","date_gmt":"2025-09-18T18:03:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/434165\/"},"modified":"2025-09-18T18:03:13","modified_gmt":"2025-09-18T18:03:13","slug":"strike-action-across-france-as-hundreds-of-thousands-join-protests-france","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/434165\/","title":{"rendered":"Strike action across France as hundreds of thousands join protests | France"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hundreds of thousands of people have marched in street demonstrations across France as trade unions held a day of strike action<\/a> to pressure the new prime minister, S\u00e9bastien Lecornu, to rethink budget cuts and act on wages, pensions and public services.<\/p>\n

There was disruption to public transport as train, bus and tram drivers went on strike, hospital staff joined protests and nine out of 10 pharmacies were closed as pharmacists protested against pricing policies. About one in six teachers at primary and secondary schools went on strike, as well as school canteen staff and monitors. Several high schools from Paris to Amiens and Le Havre were blockaded by students. Protesters held more than 250 demonstrations and marched in cities from Paris to Marseille, Nantes, Lyon and Montpellier.<\/p>\n

CGT union members during a demonstration in Marseille. Sophie Binet, the head of the union, said: \u2018It\u2019s the streets that must decide the budget.\u2019 Photograph: Manon Cruz\/Reuters<\/p>\n

\u201cThe anger is huge, and so is the determination \u2013 my message to Mr Lecornu today is this: it\u2019s the streets that must decide the budget,\u201d said Sophie Binet, head of the leftwing CGT union, as Macron\u2019s new prime minister scrambles to put together a budget for next year<\/a>, as well as form a new government.<\/p>\n

The day of strikes and protests came at a time of political crisis in France. Last week, Macron named his close ally Lecornu as the third prime minister in a year, after the previous two \u2013 Fran\u00e7ois Bayrou<\/a> and Michel Barnier <\/a>\u2013 were ousted by parliament amid bitter disagreements over budget cuts.<\/p>\n

Lecornu was appointed after his centrist predecessor, Bayrou, lost a confidence vote on 8 September over his unpopular plan for a \u20ac44bn (\u00a338bn) budget squeeze and austerity programme to reduce France\u2019s public debt.<\/p>\n

The prime minister has said he will ditch Bayrou\u2019s deeply unpopular proposal to scrap two public holidays<\/a>. But trade unions are concerned that other elements of Bayrou\u2019s budget cuts \u2013 such as a freeze on most welfare spending \u2013 could be maintained. Lecornu has promised to abolish lifelong privileges for ex-prime ministers, but has so far not revealed his budget plans.<\/p>\n

Lecornu has only weeks to come up with a budget text and form another minority government. He has to avoid any budget being immediately rejected by opposition parties who could call a vote of no confidence and oust him from office. Since Macron called a sudden snap election<\/a> last June, the French parliament has been split between the left, the far right and the centre with no absolute majority. This has resulted in repeated deadlock over the budget.<\/p>\n

The French interior ministry estimated that between 600,000 and 900,000 people had taken part in street demonstrations across the day. Photograph: Tom Nicholson\/Reuters<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re here to protect public services, which are being chipped away at by successive government budget cuts,\u201d said Sylvie, a public sector worker from Cr\u00e9teil outside Paris, who ran local creche provision after working for nearly 20 years in hospital child psychiatry.<\/p>\n

Carrying a flag of the FSU public sector union, she said: \u201cFrance is one of the few countries that a still has a proper social security system and a safety net to look after those in society who need help, but year after year it is being eroded by funding cuts. Salaries for public sector workers are very low; we do this work because we love it and want to serve people, not \u2013 for profit. Yet we\u2019re being blamed for the high public debt, when in fact it is Emmanuel Macron\u2019s tax breaks to businesses that have damaged public finances. We\u2019re marching peacefully today because we just want the government to start listening to us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Christiane, who worked in cultural services in the Val-de-Marne outside Paris, said: \u201cThere are more and more working poor \u2013 people who have jobs who can\u2019t afford rent and are sleeping in their cars.\u201d<\/p>\n

Guillaume, 49, a youth worker for children excluded from the school system in Rouen, Normandy, had come to Paris to march with the SUD union health-workers\u2019 branch. He said: \u201cAll social protections are being attacked, from pensions to social security and healthcare provisions. The rich are getting richer and there is more inequality. I see the impact of budget cuts in the social work sector \u2013 more children need help and Covid aggravated the situation because some children were shut inside with families who may have neglected or mistreated them. I\u2019m here today to tell the government: stop giving money to big businesses as tax breaks and handouts, it is damaging society and the whole state sector. We need measures to tax the very wealthy.\u201d<\/p>\n

skip past newsletter promotion<\/a><\/p>\n

Sign up to This is Europe<\/p>\n

The most pressing stories and debates for Europeans \u2013 from identity to economics to the environment<\/p>\n

Privacy Notice: <\/strong>Newsletters may contain information about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. If you do not have an account, we will create a guest account for you on theguardian.com<\/a> to send you this newsletter. You can complete full registration at any time. For more information about how we use your data see our Privacy Policy<\/a>. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy<\/a> and Terms of Service<\/a> apply.<\/p>\n

Sandrine, from Lyon, a member of the CGT union, worked in a major French building firm, where she said shareholders were making large amounts of money while salaries were stagnating. \u201cThis is about social justice and tax justice,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

The French interior ministry estimated that between 600,000 and 900,000 people had taken part in street demonstrations across the day.<\/p>\n

French riot police charge amid teargas during clashes with protesters at a demonstration in Paris. By mid-afternoon, 140 people had been arrested across France. Photograph: Tom Nicholson\/Reuters<\/p>\n

By mid-afternoon, 140 people had been arrested across France. There were some clashes on the margins of protest rallies in the western city of Nantes, with police firing teargas, and in Lyon, where French media said three people were injured.<\/p>\n

While the day of protests is an early test for Lecornu, much of the anger and slogans at the demonstrations were aimed at Macron, who has 18 months left in power and is at his lowest popularity levels since taking office in 2017.<\/p>\n

Politicians on the left joined trade union marches. \u201cThe president is the source of chaos, and everything that has happened recently is the result of his actions,\u201d said Jean-Luc M\u00e9lenchon, leader of the leftwing party, La France Insoumise, in Marseille.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Hundreds of thousands of people have marched in street demonstrations across France as trade unions held a day…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":434166,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[12,26],"class_list":{"0":"post-434165","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world","8":"tag-news","9":"tag-world"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115226621176522987","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/434165","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=434165"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/434165\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/434166"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=434165"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=434165"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=434165"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}