French fishermen continue to blockade Channel ports

Thousands of cross-Channel ferry passengers faced a second day of travel disruption today as French fishermen continued a blockade of ports in protest against EU quotas.

P&O Ferries said it was forced to suspend services from Dover at 6am as protests restarted off Calais, just nine hours after they ended.

Three thousand passengers, including families returning from Easter holidays, had to be helped home overnight after being stranded at the ports.

Blockades at Boulogne and Dunkirk remained in place. P&O advised passengers on day trips to make alternative arrangements while others were told to head to Dover but to get there early because of extra security. The company is planning to sue the French government for compensation for the disruption. See story HERE

We will we see a “Class War” in France?

France faces a “class war” that could undermine President Nicolas Sarkozy’s reform efforts and spark a period of damaging labour unrest, one of the country’s most prominent business leaders has warned.

In an interview with the Financial Times as France braced for its second national strike in less than two months, Maurice Lévy, head of Publicis, said “people are really angry” over the country’s growing economic hardship and costly bank rescues.
EDITOR’S CHOICE
Workers pile pressure on Sarkozy – Mar-18
Brussels and France resolve auto dispute – Mar-02
France softens plan to deny aid to carmakers – Feb-26
Sarkozy pressed to add social element to plan – Feb-18
Lex: French car industry – Feb-13
French aid to car industry remains under fire – Feb-13

Mr Lévy criticised the government for fanning the discontent. The boss of the advertising group said ministers had failed to explain adequately why the state had bailed out banks while refusing to help consumers with new tax breaks or wage rises.

Unions have promised another record turnout for Thursday’s general strike, with more protests planned across the country than in January when up to 2.5m people came out on to the streets.

The public mood has worsened, with protests becoming militant amid factory closures and as the government struggles to revive the economy. See full story from the Financial Times HERE

End of the Expats dream in Europe?

On the edge of a village in south-west France, an expat’s dream is coming to a very public end.

Victoria Butcher has put her house on the market and is also selling all of its contents – everything from the fridge to her children’s clothes.

Even the chickens, so symbolic of the good life, are up for sale (though strictly on the condition that the buyer keeps them for their eggs and does not eat them for Sunday lunch). ‘I am desperate,’ says the softly-spoken 42-year-old, who three years ago left her job with the education authority in Hampshire to seek a better life for her family in France.

‘I am here alone with my three children and I have run out of money. Despite trying for a year, I can’t find a job and can’t sell my house – the buyers have dried up, particularly the British. What else could I do? I have no choice but to sell everything I can.’

And so her neighbours trawl through her belongings, handing over five euros for some
crockery, ten for a wooden chair.

That Victoria’s dream of life in France should come to this is clearly distressing for her. But the sad truth is that she is far from alone.

What the French termed l’invasion anglaise is under serious threat. Across Aquitaine, a region where 30,000 expats live, a silent but steady retreat is being beaten as house contents are packed into removal lorries ahead of the long journey back north.

The British inhabitants here have been hit by a combination of factors. First, France is suffering the effects of the credit crunch like the rest of the world.

Unemployment is already above two million. And when it comes to handingout the few jobs there are, the British aren’t exactly first in line. See story from The Mail Online HERE

Sarkozy aide warns of risk of social unrest

From Rueters:

” A senior aide to French President Nicolas Sarkozy warned that countries risked seeing explosions of popular anger comparable with the riots seen in Greece unless governments provided some protection to industry.

Henri Guaino, one of Sarkozy’s inner circle of advisers, told Le Monde that without some commonly agreed rules on reasonable levels of protection and government intervention more uncontrolled outbreaks of populism and xenophobia were likely.

“We should take this risk very seriously,” he said in an interview which appeared on Tuesday.

He said the riots in Greece, strikes in Britain in protest against foreign temporary workers in the energy sector or anti-government protests in Iceland were an example of what could happen in other countries.

“This crisis is already going through all the chapters of an economics textbook. We should be careful that it doesn’t also go through a history textbook as well,” he said. See full story HERE

The French On Strike today. Will it spread?

The French, doing one of the things that they know best (and that I admire them for) have gone on strike. The public and private sector are in the streets to protest the economic crisis and try to convince Sarkozy to do more. See full story HERE

Also, is this Europe’s winter of discontent and how bad will the bad get?

The French are in revolt. On Thursday, teachers, television employees, postal workers, students and masses of other public-sector workers will be united in a hugely-popular strike with car workers, supermarket staff, journalists and thousands of others in the private sector.

One poll said that 75 per cent of the public supported the action, which has the backing of the large union groups and opposition socialists. It will be a big test for President Nicolas Sarkozy but, more importantly, the strike will mark the biggest protest so far in one of the world’s largest economies against the grief and distress being caused by the catastrophic global downturn.

A depression triggered in America is being played out in Europe with increasing violence, and other forms of social unrest are spreading. In Iceland, a government has fallen. Workers have marched in Zaragoza, as Spanish unemployment heads towards 20 per cent. There have been riots and bloodshed in Greece, protests in Latvia, Lithuania, Hungary and Bulgaria. The police have suppressed public discontent in Russia, and will be challenged again at large gatherings this weekend.

This is turning into Europe’s winter of discontent. Protests are widespread and gathering pace. It seems to be about national interests superceding the common cause that has united countries for decades.

Comparisons with the Thirties have tended to focus on the numbers – a lack of growth and waning consumer confidence, an increase in business failures and job losses, collapsing stock markets and currencies and panicky runs on banks. See full story HERE