Rainy "social climate" as strikes loom

WHEN French people talk about the economy, they either refer baldly to "the crisis" or borrow terms from meteorology. Poor relations between government, management and employees are euphemistically known as "the social climate". And when a French government official warned The Irish Times that "this will be a hot winter", he wasn't talking about the weather.

"Strikes, Demonstrations, What to Expect," said yesterday's banner headline in Le Parisien. A chart in the tabloid assessed inconvenience suffered by the public in a series of strikes from last weekend through the first week of November.

The unrest is the result of the austerity measures taken by the Prime Minister, Mr Alain Juppe to reduce deficit spending. If Mr Juppe succeeds, France will join European Monetary Union in 1999. But the cost will be high fewer social benefits and the loss of many thousands more jobs in a country where 12.5 per cent of the workforce are unemployed.

On Le Porisien's industrial action chart, a little grey cloud without lightning indicates no inconvenience to the public. Neither the stoppage planned for Thursday at the Renault automobile factory nor next Tuesday's demonstrations by 13 senior citizens' groups are expected to cause any trouble.

One lightning flash on the chart signifies a little discomfort: this was the case when 20,000 workers from the military shipyards of Cherbourg, Brest and Lorient clogged traffic across central Paris last Saturday. They were demanding that the government rescind the Milton Plan named after the Defence Minister, Mr Charles Milton - to do away with up to 75 000 out of 250,000 arms industry jobs over the next six years.

In the present strained "social climate", French workers are resorting more and more readily - some would say too readily - to industrial action. When a passenger in a Marseilles bus refused to put out his cigarette yesterday, bus drivers went on strike in the northern half of the city.

Today's work stoppage by French journalists is expected to cause medium inconvenience. Media workers will gather in front of parliament to protest against the elimination of their longest held privilege, a 30 per cent income tax reduction first awarded to the press in 1934.

The nationwide strike by millions of public service workers and doctors planned for Thursday, is riddled with grey clouds and lightning flashes. The greatest inconvenience will be suffered by railroad passengers, followed by hospital patients and PTT clients. Users of the Paris Metro, buses and the suburban RER train network are also likely to find themselves without transport.

Once the public recovers from the Thursday shutdown, it has a banking strike to look forward to on October 25th, followed by the November 7th barricade by lorry drivers of the circular highway surrounding Paris in protest at rising fuel costs.

There is a question mark next to a strike by all professions in early November. If Mr Louis Viannet, head of the left wing CGT trade union, achieves his goal of uniting public and private sectors in a general strike like those which occurred last winter, the government's austerity programme and EMU membership could be in danger.

One of the instant paperbacks newly published to explain France's problems is Economic Horror. The term could be used to describe France's debt ridden social security system. Fifteen previous reforms of the system have made little headway. Mr Juppe stood firm through weeks of strikes last December out of determination to stick to his November 1995 social security reform plan.

But France's powerful "health lobby", including doctors' unions and pharmaceutical companies, has fiercely opposed reforms such as longer working hours and the use of generic brands of medication.

Parisians are getting out their walking shoes and bicycles - many of them purchased during the strikes last December - in anticipation of Thursday's stoppage. The autumn rains, they fear, will conspire with the "social climate" to make for miserable weather.