"Cast members, we're here!" shout this Tuesday morning in front of the New Port Bay Club hotel, at Disneyland Paris, Seine-et-Marne, more than a thousand employees on strike. For their third day of mobilization, after the social movements of May 10 and 23, more than a thousand employees of amusement parks, hotels and restaurants of the American group are again mobilized against inflation, they demand an increase in their pay and better working conditions.
"It's historic, such a movement at Disneyland Paris! The initiative started from employees who founded the collective called Anti-Inflation Movement. The unions Unsa and CGT joined them in supporting them. There are all trades represented. There are many employees with seniority and also many young people and even fixed-term contracts. All trades are represented. Hotel, catering, security... And not only the little hands, there are also managers, "comments Ahmed representative of Unsa. Euro Disney SAS, which owns and operates the leisure complex, employs some 17,000 people in the Val-d'Europe sector, where the first park opened in April 1992.
From 40 to more than 1200 employees mobilized in a month and a half
The movement began Tuesday, May 10 with a first rather discreet mobilization still gathering 200 strikers, according to the organizers. Tuesday, May 23, they were 500, still according to the Anti-inflation Movement. "The management has only offered us measures since the beginning of our movement, such as a revaluation of 125 euros. We are asking for an increase of 200 euros net per month and more regular hours, "summarizes Fabien. The striking workers are also demanding double paid Sundays, in order to respond to inflation. They are also demanding the doubling of mileage allowances and the end of adapted schedules put in place after the Covid period.
"We used to work seven hours a day. It was regular. Now sometimes we can do ten hours some days and others only four hours. It impacts our family lives, "says a thirty-year-old, chef de partie in a restaurant in the park. "I've been working at Disneyland Paris for twenty-six years. I earn 1,700 euros: I'm always overdrawn. With my rent of 800 euros I can never make ends meet and with inflation it's even worse. " Abounds a fifty-year-old employee at the dishwasher in a restaurant.
At the origin of the movement, initiated a month and a half ago within the staff, Anthony Adoux, 31, has been working at the animation workshop for nine years. "We structured ourselves with a few people from maintenance. We made a group and we met in the evening, at night. At the beginning we were about forty people wondering what we were going to do, trying to find more and more people around us and different professions. After that we went up to 80, 120, 200 and then 500 last week. And here it seems that there would be 1,200; I think we are much more, "summarizes the employee.
The management, which counted this Tuesday morning 954 strikers, specifies that at the end of "a meeting with trade unions with which it maintains dialogue, it proposed a bonus of 125 euros and the possibility of monetizing rest days as well as the monthly payment of the 13th month".
More information to come...
