It’s sometimes hard to get a grasp on how quaintly old-fashioned French industrial relations still are, but organisers estimate that 1,000 and police say 600 strikers turned out at the end of last week for a demonstration in the northern French city of Rouen against the reform of France Telecom’s public status, and one union has called for a national 24-hour strike today, La Tribune-Defosses reported: the SUD-PTT union plans a demonstration in Paris with participation from provincial delegations to protest against the new personnel management regulations, the blockage of transfers, merit-based advancement and the new classifications; the call to strike and demonstrate comes at a time when worker demonstrations and work stoppages have multiplied over the last 10 days; France Telecom issued a statement late last week recalling that the change will have no negative consequences for the level of remuneration and that workers will in any case retain their status; the company clarified that the reclassification aims to transform the old system of job demarcation by level to demarcation by function, which is more flexible and more reflective of the job.
