the cleaning agents of the Perrache station on strike, the Metropolis denies any responsibility
They object to the future loss of their jobs as the contract of the Arc-en-Ciel company which employs them ends at the end of the year.
The cleaners at Lyon-Perrache station are angry. Since October 10, the latter have gone on strike to signal the future loss of their activity. The contract with Arc-en-Ciel, which employs them and is in charge of cleaning the station, ends on December 31 and will not be renewed.
the start of this protest movement, waste was created in the station, the bins were overflowing and piles of rubbish of all kinds litter the ground.
Rachel Keke in support
This Wednesday, the strikers gathered in front of and inside the station received a visit from heavy support. The MP (LFI) for Val-de-Marne Rachel Kéké came to meet the strikers from the cleaning company.
The elected representative from the Ile-de-France, a chambermaid by profession before entering politics, had been one of the emblematic figures of the social struggle of chambermaids at the Ibis Batignolles hotel in Paris. The latter denounced their working conditions, subcontracting and low wages.
Today, she wants the anger of Lyon’s Perrache employees to be heard. It calls on the Metropolis of Lyon, competent on this issue, to guarantee the jobs of the agents.
“There are employees who have worked for 10 or 20 years and who today will find themselves on the street. My presence here is a message to say that the Metropolis must stop despising these employees and act as if they are not complicit in this system with subcontracting, because in the end, it is the employees who will find themselves outside”, criticizes the deputy of Nupes.
The Metropolis of Lyon defends itself
Faced with these criticisms, the Metropolis of Lyon wanted to respond this Wednesday by means of a press release. It recalls that as part of the “responsible purchasing promotion scheme” (SPAR), it must reserve the public market for cleaning the Perrache station to integration structures which offer jobs to people who are far from it.
However, the T2MC Holding group, sole shareholder of the Arc-en-Ciel company, does not meet the necessary criteria, with its 9,500 employees and its 110 million euros in turnover.
With the end of the contract approaching for this company, the latter will necessarily lose the Perrache station market from next year, leaving its cleaning agents idle. A situation known to the group for several months.
“The Metropolis recalls that it is indeed T2MC Holding which is responsible for the situation and that the group cannot hide behind the Metropolis of Lyon on this subject. It urges it to find individual solutions that respect qualifications and the seniority of each of the employees”, defends the Lyon community led by the ecologist Bruno Bernard.
For their part, the strikers intend to continue their fight. An evening of support for the Perrache strikers organized was this Wednesday evening at the Annex, in the 7th arrondissement, in the presence of Rachel Keke.
While waiting for a possible exit from the strike, the Metropolis wants to raise the tone. She sent a letter to the prefect of the Rhône to ask him to act in the face of the state of the station, deemed “unbearable”. The Metropolis of Lyon considers that stopping cleaning entails health risks. A fire started on Tuesday.