{"id":270218,"date":"2023-03-14T08:49:55","date_gmt":"2023-03-14T13:49:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/?p=270218"},"modified":"2023-03-14T08:50:26","modified_gmt":"2023-03-14T13:50:26","slug":"garbage-tarnishes-paris-luster-as-pension-strike-continues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/?p=270218","title":{"rendered":"Garbage Tarnishes Paris Luster as Strike Continues"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

PARIS (AP) \u2014 The City of Light is losing its luster with tons of garbage piling up on Paris sidewalks as sanitation workers strike for a ninth day Tuesday. The creeping squalor is the most visible sign of widespread anger over a bill to raise the French retirement age<\/a> by two years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The malodorous perfume of rotting food has begun escaping from some rubbish bags and overflowing bins. Neither the Left Bank palace housing the Senate nor, across town, a street steps from the Elysee Palace, where waste from the presidential residence is apparently being stocked, was spared by the strike.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

More than 5,600 tons of garbage had piled up by Monday, drawing complaints from some district mayors. Some piles disappeared early Tuesday with help from a private company, the TV station BFMTV reported.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other French cities are also having garbage problems, but the mess in Paris, the showcase of France, has quickly become emblematic of strikers\u2019 discontent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a bit too much because it was even hard to navigate\u201d some streets, said 24-year-old British visitor Nadiia Turkay after touring the French capital. She added that it was “upsetting to be honest\u201d because on \u201cbeautiful streets … you see all the rubbish and everything. The smell.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Turkay nevertheless sympathized with striking workers and accepted her discomfort as being “for a good cause.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even the strikers themselves, who include garbage collectors, street cleaners and underground sewer workers, are concerned about what Paris is becoming in their absence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt makes me sick,\u201d said Gursel Durnaz, who has been on a picket line for nine days. \u201cThere are bins everywhere, stuff all over. People can\u2019t get past. We\u2019re completely aware.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But, he added, President Emmanuel Macron has only to withdraw his plan to increase the French retirement age \u201cand Paris will be clean in three days.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Strikes have intermittently hobbled other sectors including transport, energy and ports, but Macron remains undaunted as his government presses ahead with trying to get the unpopular pension reform bill passed in parliament. The bill would raise the retirement age from 62 to 64 for most people anf from 57 to 59 for most people in the sanitation sector.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sanitation workers say two more years is too long for the essential but neglected services they render to all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhat makes France turn are the invisible jobs. … We are unfortunately among the invisible people,\u201d said Jamel Ouchen, who sweeps streets in a chic Paris neighborhood. He suggested politicians go on a \u201cdiscovery day\u201d to learn first-hand what it takes to keep the city clean.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThey won\u2019t last a single day,\u201d Ouchen said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Health is a prime concern within the sanitation sector, officially acknowledged with the current early retirement at 57, though many people work longer to increase their pensions. With the exception of sewage workers, there appear to be no long-term studies to confirm widespread claims of shortened life expectancy among sanitation workers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Still, health reasons were behind Ali Chaligui\u2019s decision to switch out of his job as a garbage collector for an office position in logistics. Chaligui, 41, says he still suffers after-effects 10 years later, like tendonitis, shoulder and ankle problems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMonsieur Macron wants us to die on the job,\u201d said Frederic Aubisse, a sewer worker and member of the executive committee of the sanitation section of the leftist CGT union, at the forefront of the mobilization against the pension plan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The stakes will be high on Wednesday<\/a> for both the government and striking workers. Unions are organizing their eighth nationwide protest marches since January, and the third in nine days; the action is timed to coincide with a closed-door meeting of seven senators and seven lower-house lawmakers who will try to reach a consensus on the text of the bill. Success would send the legislation back to both houses for voting on Thursday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But nothing is certain, and the ticking clock appears to have fed the determination of strikers manning picket lines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Durnaz, 55, is among those on the picket line at an incineration plant south of Paris, one of three serving the capital \u2014 all blocked since March 6. He has only been home twice to see his wife and three children. \u201cIt\u2019s cold, it rains, there\u2019s wind,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even if the bill becomes law, \u201cwe have other options,\u201d said Durnaz. \u201cIt\u2019s not over.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNothing is written in stone,\u201d Aubisse, the union official, added. He cited an unpopular 2006 law to promote youth employment that was pushed through by then-Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin despite massive student protests that triggered a political crisis. Months later, it was abandoned in a parliamentary vote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If the pension reform is voted through, \u201cThings will happen,\u201d Aubisse said. \u201cThat\u2019s sure and certain.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

PARIS (AP) \u2014 The City of Light is losing its luster with tons of garbage piling up on Paris sidewalks as sanitation workers strike for a ninth day Tuesday. The creeping squalor is the most visible sign of widespread anger over a bill to raise the French retirement age by two years. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":270219,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[71],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-270218","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-worldnews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270218","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=270218"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270218\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":270221,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270218\/revisions\/270221"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/270219"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=270218"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=270218"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=270218"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}