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“Say no an eleventh time to this unjust and brutal reform”. At the end of the meeting at Matignon with the Prime Minister, the inter-union does not mince its words and reaffirms its opposition to the very controversial bill. This short-lived meeting ended in failure, both for the government and for the social partners who regret the decision of the head of government to maintain the text.

This Thursday, April 6 will therefore be held a new day of strike and the unions as the politicians of the left hope that it will be massive. According to forecasts, several sectors should be impacted such as transport, education and refineries.

On the SNCF side, several disturbances are to be expected. Thus, it will be necessary to count on average three out of four TGVs, the same for the Ouigo. Regarding the TER, one in two trains should run on average while there should be only one Intercity in 4. For the Thalys and the Eurostar, however, traffic will be almost normal.

In Paris, the RATP expects almost normal traffic on the RER with some disruption on several metro lines. Traffic should also be impacted in several other cities such as Nice, where three tram lines will be at a standstill, specifies Le Parisien.

Regarding the aviation sector, several airports will experience disruptions. “From Wednesday April 5, 2023 in the evening until Friday April 7, 2023 at 6 a.m., air traffic will be disrupted on departure and arrival from the airports of Marseille-Provence, Toulouse, Bordeaux and Nantes”, explains the Directorate General of Civil Aviation in a statement, stating that “cancellations and delays are to be expected”.

While garbage collection seems to be resuming its normal course, will this new day of mobilization lead to new strikes in the community?

On Monday April 3, in a letter addressed to the mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, the CGT called on all professionals in the sector to “actively and massively participate in the days of inter-union and inter-professional actions of the days to come, and in particular that of 6 April 2023”.

In addition, a new “renewable and indefinite” strike notice for garbage collectors was filed from Thursday, April 13. Thus, if the mobilization of tomorrow could have an impact on the collection of waste, the situation should not deteriorate so much before April 13.

Is the situation similar for refineries?

In the fuel sector, the situation seems to be improving slightly on the territory even if around 11 French service stations remain totally or partially out of business on Tuesday 4 April. Several refineries have resumed their activity such as that of Esso-ExxonMobil in Normandy.

Despite everything, others remain shut down for the moment, such as that of TotalEnergies in Gonfreville-l’Orcher in Seine-Maritime, which still weighs nearly a quarter of French capacity. For the time being, we will therefore have to wait a little longer to know the consequences of the mobilizations in this area.