The Lyon Part-Dieu station is empty on December 7, 2022 during a strike at the SNCF (AFP/Archives/OLIVIER CHASSIGNOLE)
Some 200,000 travelers were looking to save their Christmas weekend on Wednesday after their trains were canceled due to a new strike by controllers, sharply criticized by SNCF and the government for not being satisfied with the 12% salary increase granted in two years.
Only two out of three trains will run this weekend, according to SNCF’s overall estimate. Cancellations almost exclusively concern TGVs. On Friday, in detail, two out of three TGVs should run on the Atlantic and Mediterranean axes, one out of two trains on the North axis (the Paris-Lille shuttle is announced to be almost normal) and three out of four East TGVs. TGVs between provincial stations will be more affected. Three Ouigo out of four should also circulate.
For Saturday and Sunday, there will be a little more cancellations than Friday, warned the SNCF, without having yet confirmed the figures. But a look at sncf-connect.com shows cancellation rates much higher than on Friday, especially for secondary stations: 10 of the 20 TGV Paris-Rennes appear canceled on Saturday (50%), as well as 13 of the 22 TGV Paris -Bordeaux on Sunday (59%), and eight of the 11 TGV Paris-Angoulême on Sunday (73%).
The Intercités are supposed to run normally, according to the SNCF, but several have been canceled between Paris and Clermont-Ferrand or Limoges, for example.
Travelers whose train has been canceled will be able to change their ticket without paying the price difference, repeats the SNCF.
But most of the maintained trains are already full.
Travelers wait on a platform at Montparnasse station before boarding a train during a strike by SNCF controllers, in Paris on December 2, 2022 (AFP / STEPHANE DE SAKUTIN)
“I understand the demands, but going on strike during the holidays … For the children, the families, it’s a bit difficult”, looses a traveler “a little bit nervous”, Isabelle Barrier, who came to Gare de Lyon to be reimbursed for her ticket to Toulouse.
Instead, she will travel on Friday, a day earlier, by coach…an eight-hour journey.
In front of the Gare de Lyon shop on Wednesday morning, some did not hide their annoyance. “Privileged”, “it happens every three months”, annoys a man who wonders how he will return home with his wife and children…
– 200% refund –
The attitude of the controllers, who launched this strike by organizing on Facebook over the unions, somewhat annoys the management of the SNCF, which calculates that the wage increases represent 12% on average over two years.
The Gare de Lyon in Paris on December 2, 2022 during a strike at the SNCF (AFP/Archives/STEPHANE DE SAKUTIN)
Last year, a strike also ruined the first weekend of departures during the Christmas holidays, and the railway company had for the first time decided to reimburse travelers for double the amount of their canceled ticket.
The CEO of SNCF Voyageurs, Christophe Fanichet, renewed the measure on Wednesday. He who found last year “scandalous” to strike for the holidays repeated that it was “unacceptable”.
At Gare de Lyon, several customers questioned on Wednesday were not reimbursed at 200%, the agents saying that the computer was not yet following.
“They are not aware”, is surprised Wesley Pellegrinelli, after being reimbursed 100%.
“It’s being put in place,” SNCF Voyageurs replied to AFP.
– Unions in withdrawal –
“At Christmas, we don’t go on strike,” also stormed government spokesman Olivier Véran.
“I obviously do not question the right to strike or the right of employees to demonstrate or to mobilize but frankly, is it essential to do so on a Christmas weekend? The answer is no”, estimated the minister on France Inter.
The controllers had already gone on strike the first weekend of December. Since November, the SNCF has been struggling to establish a dialogue with the collective organizing the movement, which is demanding better recognition of the specificity of their profession and are independent of the unions, even if they had to rely on the latter to file notices .
The management has proposed to increase the “work bonus” of the captains (the official name of the controllers) by 600 euros per year, part of which will be integrated into their salary in 2024, as well as an additional allowance of 600 euros gross per year.
Proposals deemed sufficiently satisfactory for the Unsa-Ferroviaire to withdraw its notice and for the CGT-Cheminots and SUD-rail not to call for the work to be stopped. Hundreds of controllers decided otherwise.
© 2022 AFP
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