Return of the CGT to Toulouse: “Salaries are no longer sufficient to meet minimum needs”
Secretary general of the CGT of Haute-Garonne, Cédric Caubère denounces the “stall between the level of shareholder dividends and salaries”. The CGT is preparing two demonstrations, on September 22 and 29.
The Departmental Union of the CGT made its comeback yesterday by bringing together representatives of its branches at the Bourse du Travail in Toulouse. The union, which is preparing the demonstrations of September 22 (for the health sector) and September 29 (interprofessional), with the FSU and Solidaires, is on the offensive on wages.
What is the situation of employees in this fall?
From the point of view of wages, it is catastrophic. The low wages combined with inflation means that we are well above the 6% inflation announced by the government. Just go to school, fill up or pay your energy bills to realize it. Wages are no longer sufficient to meet minimum needs.
The CGT is particularly offensive in this return. Why ?
Because faced with the situation of employees, there are unprecedented benefits of large companies. They show staggering profit rates, not seen for decades, and on the other hand, employees are finding it increasingly difficult to live from their work. It is this injustice that it is time to fight.
Employees suffer from inflation but so do companies…
What we see is a complete disconnect between the level of dividends paid to shareholders, corporate profit and wages paid. The money exists. The problem comes from the unequal distribution of wealth.
In a press release, you make serious accusations by explaining that “record profits from the diversion of public aid, tax exemptions and exemptions from contributions”…
There is not a sector that makes profits that is not largely helped and subsidized by public money. Pensions with contribution exemptions on low wages, for example. We can also mention the corporate tax rate. Regularly, some hit the headlines because we discover that they pay little or no tax. So big corporations not only don’t play the public good game but they also do everything to get themselves exonerated from their obligations.
You even mention an “aggression” on the part of the Medef and the Macron government…
I don’t see how to qualify it any differently. The fate of employees is unspeakably violent. All wages are pulled down, social benefits are called into question – just look at the attacks on unemployment insurance – and are not enough to live on. Yes, employees suffer significant social violence. And I would add that we do not really understand where the price increase comes from, whatever we are told. The profits of the markets, of the food industry, of the energy suppliers are soaring at the same time as the prices. The profits of large companies are made directly paid by the employees.
How do you see unemployment insurance and pension reforms in this context?
The employees came back up. Reform after reform, the successive governments accede to the desires of the Medef which ask to “fluidify” the labor market. But unemployment insurance must be an important safety net. On the decline in the retirement age, it seems that the employers are not very warm and I think that the government has understood that it was an explosive subject that it was better to avoid.
Did the CGT, which sided with Nupes, support Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s call to demonstrate?
For the CGT, there is a need for the demands to find a political extension. But we believe that social progress is won through mobilizations in the workplace first and foremost. Our goal is not to achieve a day of action, it is actually to carry a social movement that applies advances on wages.