PARIS: The French government said it would see through planned pension reforms but said the new system that has sparked nationwide strikes would be introduced gradually and public concerns would be addressed.
Transport systems were paralyzed for a fourth day on Sunday as unions at state railway SNCF and Paris public transport system RATP extended their strike against the changes.
“I am determined to take this pension reform to its completion and ... I will address people’s concerns about it,” Prime Minister Edouard Philippe told Le Journal du Dimanche.
“If we do not implement a thorough, serious and progressive reform today, someone else will do one tomorrow, but really brutally,” he told the weekly publication.
Philippe has said he would present a detailed outline of the pension reform plan on Wednesday.
Deputy Environment Minister Emmanuel Wargon told radio France Info the government would be flexible about both the timeline and implementation of the reforms.
“Timelines may be relaxed if necessary and we may differentiate how each special pension system converges with the new system under different deadlines and terms,” she said.
She said a date would be set to implement the new system but people’s pension rights would be calculated proportionally based on how much time they had worked under the new and old systems.
“Some say that everybody will lose under the new system. Not everybody will lose. It will be rather positive for a significant part of French citizens,” she said.
Philippe Martinez, the leader of the CGT union, said the CGT would fight until the government dropped the plan.
“We will continue until the plan is withdrawn,” he told the JDD, saying the prime minister should “go back to square one.”
France has one of the most generous pension systems among countries in the OECD grouping of industrialized nations.
President Emmanuel Macron was elected in 2017 on a platform to liberalize the economy and reform the pension system.
Macron wants to introduce a pension system with equal rights for everyone and to do away with a set of sub-systems under which some workers at SNCF, RATP and other institutions can retire in their early fifties, a decade ahead of others.
Unions plan a second demonstration on Tuesday, after a Thursday’s first protest attracted 65,000 people in Paris and 806,000 nationwide, according to police figures.
French government determined on pension reform as strikes continue
French government determined on pension reform as strikes continue
- Transport systems were paralyzed for a fourth day on Sunday as unions at state railway SNCF and Paris public transport system RATP extended their strike
Spain eyes full service on train tragedy line in 10 days
- The Jan. 18 disaster in the southern region of Andalusia partially shut the line linking Madrid and Seville
- “After the replacement, the whole of the Madrid-Seville line will resume service,” said Puente
MADRID: Spain aims to restart within 10 days full service on a key high-speed railway line where a collision between two trains killed 45 people, the transport minister said on Wednesday.
The January 18 disaster in the southern region of Andalusia — one of Europe’s deadliest such accidents this century — partially shut the line linking Madrid and the city of Seville as investigators cleared the wreckage and collected evidence.
“Today we have received legal permission to proceed with the replacement of the infrastructure in the section of the accident,” Transport Minister Oscar Puente wrote on X.
“Our aim is that it is completed in a timeframe of approximately 10 calendar days. After the replacement, the whole of the Madrid-Seville line will resume service,” he added.
The line was Spain’s first high-speed rail connection when it opened in 1992, with the network expanding to become the world’s second-largest after China’s and a source of national pride.
But the accident has raised doubts about the safety of rail travel in the country.
A preliminary report released last week suggested the track was cracked before a train run by private firm Iryo derailed and smashed into an oncoming service operated by state company Renfe.
