Paris (AFP)
The prospect of seeing trains running normally for Christmas breaks is getting further and further away, with railway unions remaining determined in their refusal to reform pensions.
"The question is not whether there will be trains at Christmas, but how much," said AFP a manager at the headquarters of the SNCF.
Although the day of mobilization scheduled for Tuesday, December 17 was to mark the end of the movement, "it is unthinkable that we can provide a normal service at Christmas," he adds. "It will not be catastrophic, but not great either."
The return to normal will indeed take several days, especially the time to catch up the delays in the maintenance of trains or to put back the bearings of the agents. Christmas holidays start on Friday night, the 20th.
Concretely, "if it stops on the 17th we save Christmas, if it does not stop on the 17th, we kill Christmas", sums up the person in charge.
It is still too early to predict when the unions will stop moving. They remain united in the dispute, at least until Tuesday. And even though strike rates have been dropping in recent days, most of them say they do not want to "let go".
The CGT, the Unsa-Ferroviaire and Sud Rail absolutely do not want to hear about the abolition of the particular pension scheme for railway workers and the dialogue initiated with the management-to which the government has asked to negotiate the social accompaniment of its reform - turn to dialogue of the deaf.
The general secretary of the CGT-Cheminots Laurent Brun warned Thursday that there would be "no truce for Christmas, unless the government comes to his senses" by withdrawing his project.
Unsa, she maintains the vagueness. "I hope the French (...) will not be bored either for Christmas or after", "but it depends on the government," said Friday its secretary general Laurent Escure.
- TGV guaranteed? -
"Announce that the trains will not run for Christmas, I think it's pretty irresponsible," retorted the minister of ecological transition Elisabeth Borne, saying that "this is not what we can expect from trade unionists who say defend the public service ".
The last major dispute at the SNCF extended during the Christmas holidays dates back to 1986.
Beyond the mobilization of unions, agents should start to consider their personal situation, judge a manager. "It's time for calculations!"
The situation at the SNCF will be quite complicated, with different scenarios for contract workers, sedentary railway status and "rolling" status, not to mention the extinction of the status on 1 January ... Some 85 For example,% of drivers will not be affected by the reform, according to management.
To complicate matters on the social front, a new departure procedure for trains - now under the sole responsibility of the driver - will be widespread Sunday, which annoyed the unions.
While waiting to know more about the continuation of the movement, the direction of the SNCF is organized to try to give a little visibility in case of continuation of the movement.
For the TGV and Intercités, it guarantees for the moment departures until Wednesday 18 and must extend Tuesday its forecasts until the weekend of departures on vacation.
For Christmas itself, that is to say from December 23 to 26, the SNCF intends to display the "guaranteed trains" and inform the travelers Thursday.
For these periods of "guaranteed trains", the site and the SNCF application must signal the trains available for booking, display them full when they are and clearly identify those that are deleted - in theory at least.
The situation is more problematic for the TER, whose circulation is announced the day before. This does not prevent the company from selling tickets combining guaranteed TGV and TER more random in correspondence.
© 2019 AFP