A dark day ahead for motorists who will be traveling on the Ile-de-France motorways, on the ring road and in the west of the capital, Monday morning.
Taxi drivers, who are protesting against the reform of the reimbursement of “medical transport” by Health Insurance, have called for a new day of mobilization of the profession this March 4 and the organization of processions, snail operations, or even roadblocks.
The national movement, supported by the FNAT and the FNDT (the two main taxi union federations), could be particularly followed in the provinces, notably in Nîmes (Gard) or Toulouse (Haute-Garonne).
But it is in the Paris region - to which processions from all over France are invited to converge - that the mobilization of drivers should be the most important.
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“There will be at least 2,000 taxis.
And who will all go through the ring road, from 8 a.m.,” predicts Emmanuelle Cordier, president of the National Taxi Federation, recalling that drivers have already mobilized four times in less than three months on the subject.
“This time, the initiative for the demonstrations does not come from the unions but from the base,” specifies the representative of the drivers, who fears demonstrations that will be more difficult to supervise than the previous ones.
Several routes, from assembly points in the inner and outer departments where drivers are invited to meet at dawn Monday morning, have already been defined.
They will take various major routes leading to the capital (from the A 1 to the A 6 via the A 3, A 4, A 86, A 13 motorways, etc.).
At 11 a.m. at Place du Trocadéro?
Processions from the Grand-Est region and the Loiret should join the Ile-de-France taxis.
Everyone will meet for snail-like operations on the ring road, which could quickly be paralyzed during morning rush hours.
The different processions should in theory meet from 11 a.m. on the Place du Trocadéro (Paris 16th arrondissement) for a static gathering.
But on Friday evening, this place of arrival had not yet been “validated” by the Paris police headquarters.
And the organizers mentioned the possibility of having all the processions arrive at Les Invalides, better able to accommodate the hundreds of vehicles expected.
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“The National Union of Health Insurance Funds has unilaterally decided on a 30% reduction on the reimbursement rates for medical transport by taxi,” recalls the president of the FNDT.
“This means that we will return to the prices that were in force in… 2014!
It is not possible.
Taxis, which already suffer from competition from VTCs, did not need that.
They are at the end of their tether,” said the union representative, who is planning a mobilization that will be completely fed up.
“The suffering of the drivers is reminiscent of the despair of another profession, that of farmers,” summarize the two union federations which support this new mobilization in their press release.