“last minute cancellations can still take place”, we are told at Toulouse station
It was a mobilization that most French people feared: the SNCF controllers’ strike. This movement begins on December 23 and will last through Christmas. Trains are canceled, Occitania is not spared. Report in Toulouse Matabiau station.
In the hall of Toulouse station, dozens of travelers seem disoriented, annoyed. A few meters from these souls in transit, a phrase repeated almost in a loop: “hello, I’m coming because my train is canceled this weekend…”
A refrain heard this December 21, dozens of times, by the agents present at the information desk. The cause : a strike by controllers over the Christmas weekend.
“We are starting to get used to the SNCF”whispers Liliane on her way to Marseille, with her suitcases full of gifts. “I’m joining my son and my grandchildren for the holidays, I haven’t seen them for a year. No way not to go there!”, adds the retiree who preferred to advance her ticket.
This morning, at the microphone of our colleagues from Franceinfo, the CEO of SNCF Voyageurs, Christophe Fanichet, apologized for the “200,000 passengers deprived of trains. MBut the boss wanted to be reassuring: “two out of three trains run”.
However, when talking to station staff, the picture seems bleaker.
Behind his counter, Baptiste* shows us the first train cancellation estimates. In these hands, several sheets with routes highlighted in bright red from Toulouse. He confirms that this color code corresponds to trains that are not running. There are many, more than just one in three.
Some destinations are more affected than others. The Toulouse-Lyon journey seems almost impossible to make by train at Christmas.
video length: 13sec
With the strike, to get to Lyon from Toulouse, there are only two possible routes left on the SNCF application.
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©Margaux Delaunay FTV
Controllers wishing to strike have 48 hours to file their notice. Baptist clarifies:“These sheets can therefore change, last minute cancellations can still take place.”
The anger movement of the controllers, initially carried by a collective called Collectif national ASCT (CNA), was formed outside of any trade union framework and would bring together more than 3500 skippers (the official name of controllers).
However, he relied on the unions to carry his demands and file the strike notice at Christmas and New Year.
To calm the discontent of passengers, Christophe Fanichet, CEO of SNCF Voyageurs said: “all journeys can be exchanged for free, otherwise it is possible to have your ticket reimbursed at 200%”. In practice, everything gets complicated. At the counter, it is only possible to obtain the sum corresponding to the purchase price of the ticket. To benefit from the 200% it is an online procedure, and the traveler receives the sum in the form of a voucher.
Régine has just paid the price. “I’m going to Lannion (Brittany), my train is canceled and I can’t postpone my ticket, the other journeys are full or I’m working at that time”, she confides to us, saddened. This Toulousaine has obtained her refund, but she will spend the end of year celebrations at home, having found no alternative.
On social networks, some Internet users separate from good plans, to try to travel despite the strike. The Intercités are less affected than the TGVs, but they are stormed:
“We spend about ten nights a month traveling through France”, testifies one of the strikers. It evokes working days that can reach “until 10 a.m. or 11 a.m.” hourly amplitude. According to him, the controllers find themselves”more and more” alone on board, in TGVs “which can have up to 600 customers”, whereas they must be at least two. The movement calls for better consideration and fairer remuneration.
Regarding salary conditions, the management of the SNCF proposed a bonus “for all railway workers“of 600 euros gross per year, as well as an additional allowance for the controllers of the same sum. “The allowance is 38 euros net per month, it is well below what we expected“, concluded this ASCT striker.
The strike will “cost several tens of millions of euros“, but what the”touch, beyond all that, it’s the impact it’s going to have on our business. In effect, “the French trust“at the SNCF”to be able to travel“. Or, “for Christmas, we will not be there“, regrets Christophe Fanichet.
Baptiste* the first name has been changed