Remoulding workers' rights: French plastics maker puts Macron reforms to the test
Record ID:
1437837
Remoulding workers' rights: French plastics maker puts Macron reforms to the test
- Title: Remoulding workers' rights: French plastics maker puts Macron reforms to the test
- Date: 21st October 2019
- Summary: PARIS, FRANCE (OCTOBER 11, 2019) (REUTERS) HEADQUARTERS OF FRENCH UNION FORCE OUVRIERE FORCE OUVRIERE CONFEDERAL SECRETARY, MICHEL BEAUGAS, SPEAKING WITH JOURNALIST (SOUNDBITE) (French) FORCE OUVRIERE CONFEDERAL SECRETARY, MICHEL BEAUGAS, SAYING: "These company agreements come from the so-called "Macron ordinances" which turn the hierarchy upside down. Before companies could not break a sector-wide agreement, and that agreement itself could not be worse than the law. Now companies can break sector-wide agreements and be worse than the law, including these famous "performance collective agreements" which are agreements where you hold a gun to the workers' heads so they're signed." BEAUGAS DURING INTERVIEW (SOUNDBITE) (French) FORCE OUVRIERE CONFEDERAL SECRETARY, MICHEL BEAUGAS, SAYING: "When you think that almost everywhere in the world, including in the United States, people are envious of our social system, and we are dismantling it. That's it, we're dismantling a system that's envied by everyone, and today in France, we're taking it to pieces for budgetary reasons." MENETOU-RATEL, FRANCE (OCTOBER 3, 2019) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF WORKER WORKING ON RUBBER PARTS RUBBER MATERIAL BEING PLACED ON TABLE (SOUNDBITE) (French) HEAD OF PLASTALLIANCE EMPLOYERS' FEDERATION FOR PLASTICS SECTOR, JOSEPH TAYEFEH, SAYING: "The idea isn't to sign a performance collective agreement and the next day find ourselves facing a strike or with tyres burning in front of a factory. The goal is to sign this agreement to have flexibility and performance and also to improve the condition of workers as we also see that workers' purchasing power increases considerably after this type of agreement is signed. And so, we could say that we're in a win-win relationship." WORKER AT WORK RUBBER PARTS ON TRAY TRAYS AND WORKERS INSIDE FACTORY
- Embargoed: 4th November 2019 11:22
- Keywords: France labour reforms Emmanuel Macron performance collective agreement 35 hours sick leave plastics
- Location: MENETOU-RATEL, MAUBEUGE AND PARIS, FRANCE
- City: MENETOU-RATEL, MAUBEUGE AND PARIS, FRANCE
- Country: France
- Topics: Lawmaking,Government/Politics
- Reuters ID: LVA005B21IPTZ
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: Last year, Brice Thomas, a worker at a French plastics factory, gathered together his fellow workers in the plant's finishing workshop and told them that, at a meeting with bosses, he had signed away some of their paid sick leave.
But ultimately, the workers agreed to the change - and a series of other dilutions of their employee protections - because, they said, they trusted the bosses and they understood the plant needed to be competitive in a tough global market.
The outcome at the plant was possible because two years ago French President Emmanuel Macron pushed through measures aimed at liberalising France's highly regulated labour market and reducing the nearly double-digit jobless rate, double that in Britain and markedly higher than Germany.
Macron has not yet achieved his aim. Only 200 companies have so far adopted the type of agreement used at the plastics plant, and on a national level Macron faces fierce resistance from trade unions.
However, the case of Plasti-Tremp, a family-run business near Sancerre, a picturesque French village famous for its wine, offers a glimpse of the changes that are possible when Macron's reform drive aligns with interests on the ground.
The firm specialises in plastic coating, such as the concertina-shaped covers that go round vehicle gear shift sticks, and puts the plastic hand grips on metal pliers.
Competition is from China and eastern Europe for its low-value-added products, and from Germany and Scotland for more sophisticated components. French labour regulations push up costs.
"While I'm walking at a certain pace, the world is running", Jean-Pascal Godon, who created the company with his wife in 1986 on a part of his father's farm property, said.
That is why, when Macron's Labour law reform came along, he took advantage of it. His company was one of the first to sign a performance collective agreement, a tool that allows him to adjust salaries and working hours, and to increase mobility without having to prove he faces financial difficulties.
Workers who refuse changes can be laid off, and can't challenge their dismissal in an employment tribunal.
Working time at Plasti-Tremp went from 35 hours to 39 hours a week. The company also stopped fully compensating the first few days of sick leave to reduce non-justified absenteeism among workers.
If business lawyers and employers federations applaud those changes, trade unions fear for their cherished protection system that limited the ravages of an uncontrolled free market.
"People from all around the world envy our system, and we are dismantling it", a senior official at Force Ouvriere union, Michel Beaugas, said to Reuters.
Still, Joseph Tayefeh, the head of Plastalliance, an employer federation for the plastics sector, defended the agreement, saying workers' purchasing power has increased as a consequence of past companies signing the accords.
"We could say that we're in a win-win relationship," he said.
(Production: Thierry Chiarello, Clotaire Achi, Ardee Napolitano, Caroline Pailliez) - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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