Paris (AFP)

The SNCF will launch negotiations with the unions to overhaul working conditions and remunerations in TGV maintenance centers, said Wednesday the director of Voyages SNCF, Rachel Picard.

A first "round table" with the four representative unions of the SNCF must allow Wednesday afternoon to define the terms and schedule, detailed Mrs. Picard AFP, while work stoppages affect the TGV technicentre North of Landy in Saint-Denis (Seine-Saint-Denis), succeeding a strike in the Atlantic TGV in Châtillon (Hauts-de-Seine).

"We had planned substantive work in early 2020 on all the conditions of work, life and remuneration of all these trades.It is aware that we must take the subject in large," said Ms. Picard. "But clearly, the agents tell us it's too late, they are impatient, we were wrong, we were not fast enough, so we decided to do it now."

The management has identified four themes, according to the manager, who wants "a framework constructed discussion, serene".

The first concerns the numbers and difficulties of recruitment, because "too many positions are not covered" in technicentres.

The second theme concerns "the work environment". "Of course, there is money to put, tools too," said Mrs. Picard. "We really want to modernize our technicentres thoroughly."

The management also wants technicentres agents "to share the good results", their work contributing to the improvement of punctuality, she noted.

Finally, management and unions must discuss "the adaptation of remuneration to new work patterns" and "the evolution of expertise - because we also see that if we have trouble recruiting, it's because We demand high levels of expertise - "said the TGV boss.

Ms. Picard acknowledged that the rise of the TGV in recent years, and the creation of the low-cost service Ouigo, had had "an impact on the production system, and in particular on the maintenance centers".

Rolling the trains more intensively has the effect of having them maintain more at night - "a fairly substantial bonus" having been put in place at the beginning of the year - and have maintenance operations "tighter", did she exposed.

On Wednesday morning, a delegation of railway workers from the Landy technicentre was received at the human resources department of SNCF's national management, in Saint-Denis (Seine-Saint-Denis), Fabien Monteil of South-West France told AFP. Rail.

This delegation "reassembled the 46 claims of the railway workers of the Landy", for example on wages and bonuses, or on "specific points" to this technicentre, the only responsible for Eurostar and Thalys, said Mr. Monteil. The manager who received the delegation "said he was going to call the director" of the Landy "for negotiations to resume quickly at the technicentre," he added.

According to Monteil, only "a few executives and agents" were working on Wednesday morning and "it's a bit of a traffic jam", with more and more unrevised trains. "Our goal is to get out of the conflict before the weekend, we do not want to block travelers," he said.

The traffic was normal Wednesday on TGV North, Eurostar and Thalys, according to the SNCF.

© 2019 AFP