While Emmanuel Macron was in full speech before the European Ministers in charge of Space at the Pierre Baudis congress center in Toulouse, Wednesday February 16, a “counter-summit” was organized at the beginning of the afternoon in front of the Stock Exchange work, place Saint-Sernin.

A gathering of nearly 150 people who responded to the call of an inter-union CGT, FSU and Solidaires. A “counter social summit”, according to the expression of the secretary of the CGT departmental union Cédric Caubère, for “salaries, employment, peace”.

The demonstration remained static, at the big barrage of the CGT which hoped for a meeting with the Head of State: “From memory, we had never known such a closure of the center of Toulouse on the occasion of the arrival of a President of the Republic […] We just wanted to cross the street to meet the President and bring him back from the stars to concrete earthly and social realities, that will not be the case…”

“The impoverishment of our salaries…”

As for the social climate that reigns within the public services of health insurance, retirement, social benefits, morale is not looking good. Evidenced by the press briefing, held the same morning, by the CGT.

With the health crisis, the working conditions of employees have deteriorated sharply and the impact on users is obvious. All organizations are impacted, Caf, CPAM, Carsat Midi-Pyrénées (retirement), Acoss (Urssaf) where private law employees employed by the public service have been carrying out several strikes since October 2021.

Above all, they are calling for a revaluation of the value of the point to 10 euros (it is currently 7.24 euros). “What we observe is a pauperization of our salaries, explains Lucille Chorro (Caf 31). Out of four levels of remuneration at the family allowance fund, three have now fallen below the minimum wage. “The more the population increases, the more the workforce is reduced and the benefits paid to employees are thus sacrificed”, assures Jean-Baptiste Cuerel (Carsat).