the Feyzin refinery requisitioned
(Credit: Martin Gaboriau)
This Monday, October 17, the government announced the requisition of the Feyzin refinery to supply service stations, while the strike has just been renewed by the CGT.
The strike continues this Monday morning at the Feyzin refinery where fuel exports are still blocked by strikers. “We are 100% strikers this morning”confirmed to Lyon Capital Pedro Aflonso, union representative of the CGT, a few minutes before the announcement of the requisition of the site from 2 p.m. this Monday, October 17. A measure which should make it possible to supply the stations of Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes and Bourgogne-Franche-Comté.
“They are trying to break the strike to supply the gas stations. It is an obstacle to the right to strikecompulsory labor was a different era”, Pedro Alfonso, CGT union representative
7 people requisitioned in Feyzin
Asked by Lyon Capital Just before the announcement fell, Pedro Aflonso still had the slim hope that the government would not come to this measure, which the Prime Minister had left hanging Sunday evening on TF1. “In our view, the requisitions are an obstacle to the constitutional right to strike“, told us the union representative, specifying that a rally was planned for this Tuesday at 1:30 p.m. in front of the Rhône prefecture”to precisely tell the prefect and the giant TotalÉnergie not to use force and requisitions”. The state’s response will ultimately have been faster.
According to our information, the requisition will concern seven people at the Feyzin depot. “This is just what is needed to restart a minimum of shipping and restock service stations in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes and Bourgogne-Franche-Comté regions.“, we hear from the side of the Rhône prefecture, where the decree installing this requisition has just been taken. This morning nearly 40% of the service stations in the two regions were affected by shortages, after a weekends when supplies are even rarer.
“Break the strike to supply the stations“
“We do it for the French, we don’t do it against the strikers, they (the requisitions) are absolutely necessary so that people can continue to go to work and provide for their basic needs“, justified Monday Agnès Pannier-Runacher, the Minister for Energy Transition, during a morning visit to the port of Gennevilliers in Ile-de-France, intended to check the current refueling of tank trucks in a depot supplied by the Port-Jérôme-sur-Seine refinery in Normandy.
“(The requisitions) are absolutely necessary so that people can continue to go to work and provide for their basic needs”, Agnès Pannier-Runacher, Minister for Energy Transition
“They are trying to break the strike to supply the service stations. It is an obstacle to the right to strike, insists Pedro Alfonsocompulsory labor was a different time”. Shortly before 9:30 a.m., according to the union delegate, the employees had not “received no official information from“from their leadership. “We only saw the information in the media”, explains Mr. Alfonso. After the Mardyck depot, in Flanders, will therefore be the second from the TotalÉnergies group to be requisitioned.
The strike movement renewed this morning
This Monday morning, at 6 a.m., the strikers had renewed their movement there in anticipation of the call for a general strike scheduled for Tuesday, October 18. The agreement on wage increases concluded overnight from Thursday to Friday with two majority unions of TotalEnergies, the CFDT and the CFE-CGC had no effect on the mobilization of the CGT strikers at the Feyzin refinery , at the stage of the employees of the four other sites mobilized in France. “Management has already communicated widely on the agreement, it does not seem ready to return to the negotiating table“, said Monday to AFP Mr. Sellini.
This agreement, which the CGT rejects for the moment, provides for an overall “envelope” of a 7% wage increase, including a 5% increase for workers and technicians and 3.5% for executives, plus an individual part which may differ. according to the people. It also provides for a bonus of one month’s salary, with a floor of 3,000 euros and a ceiling of 6,000 euros.
“Usually, there are 250 truck days, but they only manage to get around ten days out when they manage to schem with the interims”, Pedro Alfonso, CGT union representative
In Feyzin as in Donges, La Mède or even in Flanders, the strikers are still demanding a 10% increase corresponding to “inflation plus sharing“profits made by the oil company, namely 5.7 billion dollars for the second quarter alone (5.8 billion euros).
Pending a problem with the ongoing social conflict, the vast majority of trucks transporting fuel to supply service stations in the Lyon area still did not leave this morning. Asked about the number of trucks that were able to leave the refinery before 9 a.m. on Monday morning, Pedro Alfonso claimed to have counted only 5. “Usually, there are 250 truck days, but they only manage to squeeze out ten days when they manage to schem with the interims. It doesn’t have too much influence on things“. The requisition announced for 2 p.m. should have a completely different impact.