Just a quick update, as I've not yet been able to collar anyone for more than a couple of minutes. (Everyone in the LCR office, especially their rail and student organisers, has gone into meltdown and is unreachable).

The strike in transport is still on. The metros, suburban rails and buses continue to be at a near standstill on some lines, with service severely limited on others. On the SNCF national rail lines, around 30% of train workers are still on strike, down from 60% on the first day (figures from an LCR/SudRail comrade). There have been odd fights on picket lines and between commuters on the packed, sporadic trains, and business in Paris is severely disrupted.

The government has reneged on their original commitment to not negotiate, and is offering a month of talks. The minister for work is still insisting that "we cannot have a strike and talks at the same time". The general assemblies in workplaces, which are happening daily, are confounding the attempts of the government and the CGT high-ups to orchestrate a "civilised" negotiation, and are voting to continue the strike until tomorrow at least. Although the strikes are starting to waver (though they will be taken up again on the 20th), the overall feeling from the grassroots is one of militancy.

The rightwing press are still pushing Sarkozy's line that workers under special régimes (notably railway workers, and Sarkozy is actually going very easy on the fishermen, and has held back from calling outright for the abolition of their pension perks) are "privileged" workers who are "holding the rest of us hostage". That they enjoy a uniquely advantageous pension scheme is true - special regime workers can retire on a full pension at 50. A head of the CFDT (not a left-wing union) commented in an interview that the issue was "not whether or not to reform pensions; but on whose terms". The far left is pressing the argument that an attack on special regimes is merely the harbinger of an attack on all pensions (eminently true), but seems to stop short of addressing the politics of the disparity between a railwayman who can retire at 50, and another manual labourer who cannot. To me, the logical response, which the last LCR communiqué approached but didn't make explicit (pointing out that although the population is ageing, productivity per head is climbing rapidly as well), is to demand retirement at 50 for everyone. But we'll see how that political argument pans out.

I'm interviewing a railway worker on Sunday, so I'll be able to go into greater depth on the actualities and politics of the rail dispute then.

Edward