Faced with the black anger of the French, who find themselves for many preventing from leaving by TGV at Christmas, the direction of the SNCF is confused in apologies.
The chairman and CEO of the group himself came to tell the microphone of RTL on Thursday morning how much he is "
sorry
", "
griefed
" even, by the consequences of the controllers' strike.
"
I have more than 40 years of house, I have seen strikes, but I have not seen many on the day of departures like that
," he said.
Before driving the point home: "
It's still very unique
".
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What is it really ?
In general, the month of December is often marked, at the SNCF, by social movements.
2019, 2018, 2016, 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010... Recent examples are legion.
These mobilizations, however, generally avoid the most critical periods - Christmas and New Year.
If it has already happened that December 24 and 25 have been marked by strikes in recent years, the phenomenon is indeed quite rare.
Since 2003, this has only happened three times, in 2008, 2010 and 2019. The first two times, the very low participation rates did not lead to the consequences that we are experiencing this year.
In 2008, social movements did not concern the TGV but only a few regional trains in Paris, Marseille, Nice and Metz, while in 2010,
Read alsoSNCF, all-category champion of strikes in France
The precedent of 2019 is ultimately the only time in the last twenty years that disruptions have been significant on the rail network on December 24 and 25.
At the time, the pension reform caused the longest social conflict ever known within the French railway group: 37 days from December 5, 24 and 25 inclusive.
On Christmas Eve, only two out of five TGVs circulated, four out of 10 TERs or one out of five Intercités.
Much more disruption, therefore, than this year.
In 2019, nearly one in two French people found themselves in difficulty to leave for Christmas, compared to one in four in 2022.
“Generally, the end-of-year celebrations are more the subject of blackmail than strikes
,” explains Agnès Verdier-Molinié, president of the Foundation for Research on Administration and Public Policy (Ifrap).
A way of saying that social movements at the SNCF take place more at the beginning of December, threatening the big departures at the end of the year, before negotiations with management generally make it possible to avoid this outcome.
The general secretary of a group union exposes this strategy bluntly, describing the end-of-year strikes at the SNCF as a “
tradition
”.
"It's the only way to be heard,"
he explained recently to
Figaro.
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This time, the traditional pattern of end-of-year negotiations did not happen again.
However, management has spared no effort to reach out to disgruntled controllers.
"
We gave everything to avoid the strike
," recalled Jean-Pierre Farandou Thursday morning.
In addition to a 12% increase in the salaries of all railway workers over two years, the controllers obtained, among other things, an additional 1.5% increase.
A victory for the unions, which do not call for a strike, but no longer seem to control the group of skippers at the initiative of the movement.